In 1999, the House Democratic Leadership retained CGL to represent it in the Supreme Court caseDickerson v. United States, on the constitutionality of Miranda rights. The issue was whether a provision of a bill passed by Congress had overturned the Supreme Court’s ruling in Miranda v. Arizona, which established the constitutionality of “Mirandizing” suspects.
In an amicus brief to the court, Professor Charles and Jonathan Cuneo presented a “specifically legislative viewpoint,” arguing that the Court’s decades of reaffirming Miranda prevented Congress from superseding it with a mere legislative provision (see below). The Court ultimately upheld the requirement that police read citizens’ their rights upon being arrested as a criminal suspect.