For high court: rights of states vs. rights of disabled

But in 2003 and 2004, the court voted to allow such lawsuits in two different circumstances. In 2003, the high court upheld a federal Family and Medical Leave Act suit against Nevada. A year later, the justices affirmed a federal ADA suit against Tennessee. The Tennessee case involved the failure to provide handicapped access to a county courthouse in which a criminal defendant was forced to abandon his wheelchair and crawl up a flight of stairs to a second-floor courtroom for a required court appearance.

Now, legal analysts are closely watching the Georgia prison case for an indication of what might become of the conservative wing's federalism jurisprudence. Under the late Chief Justice William Rehnquist, the emphasis was frequently on restoring what conservative justices viewed as a balance struck by the nation's Founders between the federal and state governments, with both seen as "dual sovereigns."

Some scholars criticize this approach as conservative judicial activism.

"This will be the first case in which the new chief justice [Mr. Roberts] has had to confront this issue. For that reason it is more than usually significant," says Gene Schaerr, a Washington, D.C., appellate lawyer set to argue a portion of the case in support of Georgia.

Mr. Schaerr filed a friend of the court brief for 12 states and Puerto Rico urging the justices to uphold "the principles of dual sovereignty that are a defining feature of our nation's constitutional blueprint."

Mr. Days counters in his brief that the same principles that led to victory for the disabled man forced to crawl up the steps in the Tennessee courthouse should also apply to a disabled inmate struggling to survive without accommodations in a state prison.

The allegations in Goodman v. Georgia are not pretty.

Mr. Goodman complains that his cell is too small to permit him to turn his wheelchair around. He charges that because prison guards refuse to help him or install physical modifications to his cell, he has been forced sometimes to sit for hours in his own waste or risk bodily injury by literally hurling himself in the direction of the toilet.

He says for more than two years he was unable to take a shower because of lack of proper facilities and that he is unable to get from his wheelchair to his bed without help.

Georgia officials dispute the charges. They say Goodman has filed more than 60 lawsuits while in prison and made contradictory allegations throughout. They even question his need for a wheelchair.

For example, a prison security tape captured Goodman in July walking out of his cell unassisted as guards conducted a routine search of the cell, according to Peggy Chapman, a spokeswoman for the Georgia Department of Corrections.

"He does actually walk out of the cell," Ms. Chapman says. "He is not holding onto anything. He is handcuffed."

She notes that Goodman has told news reporters that the video is of someone else. Chapman says Georgia officials have no doubt it is Goodman.

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