Antoinette Tucker and Autumn Town are public defenders who make a difference in the lives of their clients.

Shanelle Kindel and Karin Williamson, both public defenders, are proud of the work they do for clients.

NACDL launches the Gideon’s Champions Project.

When asked to think about the state of Tennessee, one’s thoughts may quickly gravitate to music. Tennessee is the birthplace of rock and roll, country and blues, and musical icons from the past and present quickly come to mind: Johnny Cash, B.B. King, Patsy Cline, Kenny Chesney, and Elvis Presley. Others may think of the state’s strong ties to the Civil Rights Movement. Tennessee was the home of the Highlander Folk School, a training ground for many of the Movement’s key figures including Rosa Parks and John Lewis, and the Lorraine Motel where Martin Luther King, Jr., was assassinated.

When some people in the indigent defense community speak of federal public defenders, there is often a twinge of jealousy because federal defender offices embody many of the ideals of parity and equality about which state public defenders can only dream. Federal defenders are generally paid at the same rate as their counterparts in the U.S. Attorney’s Office and their caseloads are measured by multiples of 10 rather than multiples of 100.

A Lawyer’s Response To the Threat of His Client’s Loss of Counsel (Gideon’s Champions) William P. Wolf Gideon’s Champions April 2013 53 One of the fundamental reasons that a Bill of Rights was pushed through and ratified to become part of the U.S. Constitution in 1791 was the fundamental belief th