Opinion below, which I've only had time to skim for now. The Court held that the 14th Amendment does not categorically require the state to provide counsel for all indigent parents facing a civil contempt hearing for non-payment of childs support where the other parent is also not represented by counsel. In this case, Turner (who had served the incarceration but whose case was considered not moot) was deprived of due process.
State-provided counsel are required in some circumstances, but not others. When they're not required, certain substitute procedural safeguards are required: "But we attach an important caveat, namely, that the State must nonetheless have in place alternative procedures that assure a fundamentally fair determination of the critical incarceration-related question, whether the supporting parent is able to comply with the support order."
As many of our readers know, there has been a movement for various forms of "Civil Gideon" to be establshined, so that indigent litigants would be assured state-provided counsel for certain kinds of litigation that most direct affect liberty interests (e.g., divorce, custody, eviction). The movement has largely been stymied politically and fiscally, but the ultimate fate of the movement is still very much up for grabs. (California has established a pilot program for Civil Gideon.) Although no broad Civil Gideon right was recognized, it must be of some comfort to the movement that the majority opinion, which you can download below, was written by the more liberal side of the court. We'll have to see what the minimum "alternate procedures" turn out to be. [I've tweaked this post as I've read the opinion. If I feel the need for a wholesale revision, I will provide an "UPDATE."]
UPDATE: Looks like Concurring Opinion's symposium on the case has already begun.
Marty Guggenheim has an optimistic take (from the point of view of expanding the right to state-provided counsel).