Kagan's Silence: The Court Broke Her
Who wrote blistering dissents in case after case as the 6-3 supermajority methodically dismantled forty years of precedent — that Elena Kagan stood up and said the institution deserves more credit than it gets.
By Harvey Specter Jr. | Law, Business & Power Correspondent
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Elena Kagan told an audience that the Supreme Court gets "a bad rap." The woman who dissented in *Dobbs*. Who watched *West Virginia v. EPA* dismantle the administrative state. Who wrote blistering dissents in case after case as the 6-3 supermajority methodically dismantled forty years of precedent — that Elena Kagan stood up and said the institution deserves more credit than it gets.
I've sat across the table from people who've just signed something they know is wrong. I recognise the face. It's not dishonesty exactly. It's a person who has decided that the alternative — naming what's actually happening — costs more than they're willing to pay.
Kagan is still on that court. She still has a vote. And that calculus matters when you're deciding what you're willing to say out loud.
But here's what I actually want to talk about, because the Kagan story is really a story about institutional capture dressed in judicial robes — and that pattern shows up everywhere, including in places that affect people reading this in Malta.
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The $29 lawsuit platform is the more interesting legal story of the moment. A company called Petty Lawsuit built a product that lets you file a civil claim against someone for twenty-nine dollars. No lawyer. No consultation. Just a form, a fee, and a complaint filed in your name. Frictionless access to the legal system — or so the pitch goes.
Sean Griffin, a Washington D.C. lawyer who tracks AI in the legal profession, flagged the obvious problem immediately: a platform that generates legal documents, advises on causes of action, and files on your behalf may constitute the unauthorised practice of law. Most jurisdictions prohibit this. Not because lawyers are protecting their turf — well, partly because lawyers are protecting their turf — but because the law recognises that bad legal advice causes real, sometimes irreversible harm. A poorly drafted complaint can waive rights the plaintiff didn't know they had. A wrong court, a wrong defendant, a wrong framing — these aren't typos. They're outcomes.
What Petty Lawsuit is doing is what the industry calls "unbundling" — breaking legal services into discrete components and selling them without the full liability that comes with representing someone. The EU's approach to this, particularly under the AI Act and existing professional services directives, is significantly more cautious than the American one. Malta, operating within that EU framework, has professional regulations that make this kind of model legally precarious. The Malta Chamber of Advocates does not look kindly on unauthorised practice, and neither does the Courts Act.
But here's the thing I want you to hold onto: the impulse behind Petty Lawsuit is legitimate, even if the execution is legally exposed. Most people don't access their rights because access is expensive. A tenant in Valletta facing an illegal rental increase doesn't call a lawyer. They don't know they can. They don't think they can afford to. They absorb the injustice and move on. That's not justice. That's market failure dressed up as normal.
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The Evolution Gaming settlement published by the UK Gambling Commission tells a quieter version of the same story about institutional cover and what happens when oversight is subordinated to relationship management. The Commission detailed the failures: inadequate anti-money laundering risk assessments, weak third-party oversight, controls that existed on paper and nowhere else. Evolution settled rather than contest. That's the move of an organisation that knows what discovery would find.
I am not going to celebrate or condemn the gambling industry here — you know where I stand on that industry's relationship with Malta, and I've said what I have to say. What I will say is this: the AML failures the UKGC described are not unique to gaming. Weak third-party due diligence is endemic across industries in Malta. Companies bring in partners, vendors, and subcontractors without conducting meaningful oversight — and when something goes wrong, the primary entity is legally exposed for the acts of those third parties. The Company Service Providers Act and AML obligations under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act apply here. Ignorance of what your subcontractor is doing is not a defence. It is, increasingly, the offence.
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Washington State's Attorney General filing a $225 million lawsuit against Playtika
