A third law favors public officials whose state power funds endless legal delay

Evidence

Even an opponent as determined as W. Kingsland Macy—and as well equipped with money as Macy was—had had to abandon his search for ultimate justice. Justice delayed, the Taylor Estate case proved, was truly justice denied. And, Moses must have realized (for he demonstrated the realization in subsequent actions), as long as he had public power, as long as he was representing the state, he would have the means of employing as many lawyers as he needed, of delaying, and thereby denying, justice to his opponents, of shielding himself from its punishments. If there was one law for the poor, who have neither money nor influence, and another law for the rich, who have both, there is still a third law for the public official with real power, who has more of both. — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker, 969

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: A genuine refinement of ‘justice delayed is justice denied’: state lawyers as a mechanism giving officials more impunity than even the rich.
• SEED: Article angle: the ‘litigiousness’ asymmetry as a tool of power — how procedural delay itself, funded state-backed, is the real inequality in ‘equal justice under law.’
• XREF: connects to: Legalism paradoxically disables the power it aims to secure — Chuck Missler, The Kingdom, Power and Glory: The…, 1228; Public officials with state power can defy the law with near-impunity by prolonging litigation. — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the…, 969

Broader Connections

• Legalism paradoxically disables the power it aims to secure #expands (0.75) — Chuck Missler, The Kingdom, Power and Glory, 1228