------ The Book America's Small Business Needs
Access
to
Justice
Why the Court’s are closed to small businesses — and why its costing America its future.
----Read An Excerpt
400 $/hr
AVG ATTORNEY HOURLY RATE
$100K
Min. Cost of Commercial Trial
91%
Civil Cases With Unrepresented Party
0
Constitutional Right to Civil Counsel
--------The Problem
Justice has become a
luxury -
and America's
entrepreneurs are paying
the price.
There is a foundational promise embedded in the American legal system: that every person and every business has equal access to the courts. That the law protects the small as readily as it protects the powerful. That a contract breach, a stolen trademark, or a fraudulent partner can be remedied through the judicial system regardless of the size of your balance sheet.
That promise has been quietly broken. The cost of litigation in the United States has reached levels that make the courts effectively inaccessible to the vast majority of small businesses. A routine commercial dispute — the kind that large corporations resolve with a call to in-house counsel — can cost a small business owner hundreds of thousands of dollars and years of distraction before a single substantive hearing.
“The courthouse door is technically open to everyone. The price of admission is another matter entirely.”
— Access to Justice, Chapter One
This book tells the story of how that happened, who benefits from it, who is harmed by it, and what must change. Because when entrepreneurs can’t enforce their rights, can’t defend themselves, and can’t access the institutions designed to protect them — the entire economy suffers the consequences.
The Luxury of Litigation
How the hourly billing model, discovery costs, and procedural complexity have transformed the American courthouse from a public institution into a private marketplace — one accessible only to those who can afford to wait.
Read more
The Goliath Strategy
The documented playbook through which large corporations weaponize legal costs against small business opponents — using delay, discovery burden, and the sheer cost of fighting to achieve outcomes without ever reaching a verdict on the merits.
Read more
Civil Gideon & the Right to Courts
The unfinished constitutional revolution: how the right to counsel established for criminal defendants has never been extended to civil matters — and why the Civil Gideon movement argues it must be, especially for commercial disputes
Read more
------ Civil Gideon - The Central Reform
The Right to
be heard
in Court
In 1963, the Supreme Court held in Gideon v. Wainwright that criminal defendants have the right to appointed counsel. It was a watershed moment — the recognition that legal representation is not a luxury but a constitutional necessity in proceedings where liberty is at stake. Six decades later, no equivalent protection exists for civil matters. Access to Justice argues that this gap must be closed — and makes the legal and economic case for extending Gideon to commercial disputes.
When Law
Fails Small
Business,
All of Us
Lose
Access to Justice makes the economic case alongside the legal one: that an equitable, accessible legal system is not just a matter of fairness, it is a prerequisite for the kind of dynamic, entrepreneurial economy the United States needs to compete and grow.
Read the Case
for Equal Access
to the Courts
A rigorous, essential investigation into how America’s legal system became a private luxury — and the reforms that could restore justice as a public right.