Kowalski v. Tesmer
The Supreme Court ruled that two Michigan attorneys could not sue on behalf of future, not-yet-identified indigent defendants to challenge a state law limiting appointed appellate counsel for people who plead guilty.
Because the attorneys had no actual client and the would-be clients were not shown to be seriously hindered from raising their own rights in court, the Court reversed the ruling in the attorneys' favor without deciding whether the underlying Michigan law was constitutional.
“The attorneys before us do not have a "close relationship" with their alleged "clients"; indeed, they have no relationship at all.”
The Court's core reason for denying the attorneys third-party standing.
How it got here: A federal trial court ruled the Michigan practice unconstitutional; the Sixth Circuit, sitting en banc, agreed on standing and the merits; Michigan sought Supreme Court review.
The Case in Depth
What happened
Michigan changed its constitution so that people who plead guilty no longer had an automatic right to appeal, and the legislature later passed a law barring appointed appellate lawyers for most guilty-plea defendants. Two Michigan appellate attorneys, along with three indigent defendants who had been denied counsel, sued, arguing the law violated due process and equal protection rights of indigent defendants.
The question before the Court
Could two lawyers sue to challenge a Michigan law denying appeal lawyers to guilty-plea defendants, before any specific client existed?
The Court's answer
No — the Court ruled the two attorneys could not sue on behalf of hypothetical future clients. To assert someone else's rights, a litigant must show a close relationship with that person and a real hindrance blocking that person from suing directly. The attorneys had no actual client, only a claimed future attorney-client bond with defendants who did not yet exist and were not identified.
The Court also found no serious hindrance: indigent defendants denied appellate counsel could still appeal the denial themselves through Michigan's courts and eventually to the Supreme Court, and some had actually done so successfully without a lawyer. Because the attorneys lacked standing, the Court never decided whether Michigan's underlying law was constitutional.
Curious how the Court got there? See the step-by-step legal reasoning →
Why it matters
The decision means challenges like this one generally must come from an actual affected person, not a lawyer suing on behalf of hypothetical future clients. It leaves Michigan's restriction on appointed appellate counsel for guilty-plea defendants in place for now, and it makes it harder for advocacy groups to use friendly attorneys as stand-in plaintiffs to test similar laws before someone is actually harmed.
What changes now
The Sixth Circuit's ruling in the attorneys' favor is reversed, and the case goes back for further proceedings consistent with the Court's standing ruling. Because the Court decided the case on standing grounds, it never reached whether Michigan's law itself is constitutional, leaving that question open for a future case brought by an actual affected defendant.
What this does not decide
The Court did not decide whether Michigan's law denying appointed appellate counsel to most guilty-plea defendants is constitutional. It ruled only that these particular attorneys, without an actual client, could not bring the challenge on hypothetical future clients' behalf.
Concurrences and dissents
Concurrence — Justice Thomas
Justice Thomas agreed with the majority's result but argued the Court's third-party standing doctrine has become too generous, listing several past cases granting standing to litigants with only remote connections to the people whose rights they asserted. He suggested it is doubtful anyone lacking a personal stake should ever litigate another's constitutional rights, though he acknowledged it may be too late to fully revert to that older, stricter rule.
Dissent — Justice Ginsburg
Justice Ginsburg argued the attorneys had shown both a concrete economic injury from losing appointment income and a sufficiently close relationship with the class of indigent defendants they represented under the rotation system. She contended that indigent, often poorly educated guilty-plea defendants face a formidable, near-insurmountable hindrance in navigating Michigan's appellate procedures without counsel, and that Younger abstention was irrelevant because no state proceeding was pending when the suit was filed. She would have affirmed the Sixth Circuit and reached the merits.
How the Court got there
The legal reasoning, step by step
- The Court asked whether the two attorneys could invoke third-party standing, a doctrine allowing someone to sue over another person's rights only if they show a close relationship with that person and some real hindrance preventing that person from suing on their own.
- The Court found the attorneys' claimed relationship was only a hypothetical future attorney-client bond with unnamed defendants who might someday be denied counsel, unlike prior cases where the Court allowed standing based on an existing attorney-client relationship with a known client.
- Applying the hindrance requirement, the Court noted that indigent defendants denied counsel still had multiple avenues to challenge the denial themselves, including appeals to Michigan's courts and this Court, and pointed to real examples of pro se defendants who had done exactly that.
- The Court also reasoned that if a lawyer's assistance was truly all that indigents needed, the attorneys who filed this suit could simply have gone to state court and helped those defendants directly, rather than filing a broad federal lawsuit.
- The Court further explained that allowing this suit undercut the Younger abstention doctrine, which limits federal courts from interfering with pending state criminal proceedings, since it let federal courts short-circuit the state process before individual defendants pursued their own claims.
- Concluding that the attorneys failed both the close-relationship and hindrance requirements, the Court held they lacked standing to raise the rights of hypothetical future clients.
Doctrinal impact
Cases affected by this decision
Distinguishes Caplin & Drysdale, Chartered v. United States (491 U. S. 617)
That case involved an existing attorney-client relationship with a known client, unlike the hypothetical relationship claimed here.
Distinguishes Department of Labor v. Triplett (494 U. S. 715)
Triplett involved representation of known claimants, unlike the unascertained future clients claimed in this case.