Speedy Trial Clause
Clause in the Sixth Amendment of the United States Constitution
The Speedy Trial Clause of the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution provides, "In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial...". The Clause protects the defendant from delay between the presentation of the indictment or similar charging instrument and the beginning of trial.
History
In Barker v. Wingo (1972), the Supreme Court developed a four-part test that considers the length of the delay, the reasons for the delay, the defendant's assertion of his right to a speedy trial, and the prejudice to the defendant. A violation of the Speedy Trial Clause is cause for dismissal with prejudice of a criminal case. Within these parameters, it was determined that the five-year wait for this case to go to trial was not in violation of the Constitution.
In 1974, Congress passed the Speedy Trial Act to help protect and clarify defendants' speedy trial rights.
Speedy trial statutes
In addition to the constitutional guarantee, various state and federal statutes confer a more specific right to a speedy trial. All U.S. states have either statutes or constitutional provisions detailing this right. In New York, the prosecution must be "ready for trial" within six months on all felonies except murder, or the charges are dismissed by action of law without regard to the merits of the case.
The public source identifies “Speedy Trial Clause” as clause in the Sixth Amendment of the United States Constitution. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Speedy, Trial and Clause.
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Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Nov 22, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q2681974. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1972 and 1974.
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This entry incorporates text from “Speedy Trial Clause” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.