Template:Cardozo indeterminacy

The great American jurist Cardozo J, held that a creditor’s claim in negligence against a debtor’s admittedly negligent auditors failed because the auditors did not owe the company’s creditors a duty of care, there being no sufficiently proximate relationship between them.

Said Cardozo J, in an immortal passage that gave rise to the metajuridical concept of “Cardozo indeterminacy”:

“If liability for negligence exists, a thoughtless slip or blunder, the failure to detect a theft or forgery beneath the cover of deceptive entries, may expose accountants to a liability in an indeterminate amount for an indeterminate time to an indeterminate class. The hazards of a business conducted on these terms are so extreme as to enkindle doubt whether a flaw may not exist in the implication of a duty that exposes to these consequences.”