When a binding precedent appears to demand an unjust result, a court need not formally overrule it; it may instead "distinguish" the earlier case by pointing to some factual difference that makes the old rule inapplicable. This gives judges welcome flexibility. But the practice carries a practical barrier: because each distinction must rest on ever finer factual grounds, repeated distinguishing breeds convoluted chains of reasoning that make the governing rule harder for later courts and litigants to discern. Formal overruling, by contrast, is available chiefly to the highest appellate courts, and legislative correction depends on political will that marginalized groups often lack.