Disaggregating government and its employees

Civil rights doctrine suffers from strange and inconsistent disconnects between government and government officials, especially law enforcement. Municipal liability is difficult (and state liability impossible) because individual officers are the presumptive targets of litigation. Individual officers have qualified immunity because it is unfair to hold them individually liable for all but the most egregious mistakes (and even then . . .). But indemnification means the municipality pays any judgment and thus bears the costs, if not the liaiblity, for the rare non-immune constitutional misconduct. The government bears the burden (and costs) to handle misbehaving officers outside of constitutional liability.

But that disconnect leaders to this Second Circuit case holding that the New York Police Benevolent Association, the officers' union, could intervene in a lawsuit challenging New York and NYPD policies during the 2020 George Floyd protests. The PBA, on behalf of its members, had a distinct interest in defending police policies and practices against constitutional challenge, an interest the government of New York City could not adequately protect. It is true that an employer's interest may diverge from that of its employees. But the logic of this decision places the union, on behalf of its members, on an equal footing with the municipal government and the department (which has never shown itself hostile to or willing to do anything about misbehaving officers) in making public policy and in deciding what policies are constitutionally valid and wise.