BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy

Subject: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 16 Sep 09 - 04:58 PM

The Supreme Court is going to decide whether or not the campaign finance rules that apply to human beings also apply to corporations. This is a rehashing of the question of whether or not corporations are "persons" under the 14 amendment of the Consitution. The SCOTUS never actually ruled that they do, despite the widespread belief that they did, but this fiction has taken on the force of law anyway, and has enabled corporations to become the rulers and masters of the citizenry of this country, with more rights than actual human beings. Here's some background on this subject:

http://www.iiipublishing.com/afd/santaclara.html

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: wysiwyg
Date: 16 Sep 09 - 06:10 PM

I know several corporations I wish would have had abortions....

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Lox
Date: 16 Sep 09 - 06:13 PM

The thought of corporations not being bound by the same laws as people is scary.

How many corporation bosses would get away with crimes on the basis that it wasn't them what done it, it was the corporation.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Amos
Date: 16 Sep 09 - 06:24 PM

The corporation should be bound by at least the laws that bind individuals but more to the question is whether they should have an individual's rights. For example, an individual's right to speak his mind freely is sacrosanct; for a corporation to do so is a falsehood since it is highly improbable the PR office will have unanimous support throughout the corporation. Corporations also wield far larger budgets than individuals by their nature, which means they can become Gorillas Among Citizens.



A

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 16 Sep 09 - 06:25 PM

The question is whether corporations have the same "inalienable rights" as human beings (as outlined in our Constitution). If they have the same rights, their funding of political activity is protected as "free speech". This creates most of the problems we have in this country that arise from the ability of corporations to essentially buy our elected officials, and to some extent, also our Supreme Court Justices.

As the article I posted says, it flips the relationship that corporations have with our government from being one in which the corporations are subordinate to the government (the will of the people) to being one in which the government (the will of the people) is subordinate to the corporations.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Sep 09 - 06:42 PM

If a company is a person, presumably it must be subject to the same penalties for lawbreaking as ordinary people? Is it really true that conpanies can be sent to jail or executed?

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 16 Sep 09 - 07:30 PM

They get fined, but they often go into bankruptcy in order to avoid having to pay, in the case of large fines, and then continue with business as usual. But since they own the lawmakers and sometimes the judges, they often only get a slap on the wrist, or they are not held responsible in any way.

But obviously, they don't have all of the same attributes as a human being. They can't vote for president, for instance. That's a big part of the absurdity of the whole thing. But it was a corrupt Supreme Court clerk, and corrupt Supreme Court justices that make it possible for this absurdity to exist in the first place, and to continue.

The 14th amendment was created to protect the recently freed slaves and their descendants. But later on, the people that amendment was enacted in order to protect had their rights taken away from them and no longer had the status of "person", and the corporations were given the status of "person" instead. Only a corrupt system can produce such an outcome.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Little Hawk
Date: 16 Sep 09 - 09:06 PM

To treat a corporation legally the same as if it were a living human being is ludicrous.

A corporation is potentially immortal, since it has no physical body, but is simply an idea put into legal form. Ideas are capable of living forever. A human being has a physical body, is mortal, and inevitably dies in time...but a corporation lives on and on by replacing its expendable human representatives (the board of directors) with other expendable human representatives.

It has no soul, but people serve it as if if were a living being that could command them.

It has no mind, but they obey it.

It has no body or heart or consciousness, but they let it become their master.

It becomes, in effect, a deathless and meaningless monster created by the ambitions of men whom it outlives and it is served by those men and others who eventually replace them.

Its sole purpose is to profit through competition and thereby enlarge itself. Thus its material appetites are unlimited...and they are not controlled by any form of moral consciousness.

That makes a corporation one of the most dangerous and ammoral artificial lifeforms that could possibly be imagined.

You could say that it's a sort of a Frankenstein monster, but unlike that monster it does not exist in bodily form. Therefore you can't shoot it, burn it, or destroy it through any physical means. You can only go after its human servants....those who work for it.

It is madness to abandon the control of society to the ambitions of these mentally created entities called corporations, which are by their very nature heartless, mindless, and soulless and live only to devoure and enlarge themselves. The corporation has come to serve the same function as a growing cancer does in a human body...and that is to eventually consume and destroy its host.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 16 Sep 09 - 09:48 PM

The 14th Amendment, originally a reconstruction amendment after the Civil War, has been extended and enlarged in several ways' i. e. citizenship (citizenship cannot be revoked), and 'due process'.
The latter was applied in 1897 to provide protection to private contracts. The freedom of contracts , however, was negated in 1937.

The Amendment has evolved to follow the developing standards and needs of the people; i. e., in 1880 blacks could no longer be banned from juries, but in 1896 separate but equal facilities were ruled OK; Brown vs. Board of Education (1954) began the reversal of that ruling and in 1974, protection was expanded to cover Hispanics and other groups.
Tha Amendment covers apportionment of representatives, but also was amended effectively by the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Corporate Personhood first came to the fore in 1886, dealing with taxation of railroad properties, and the "juristic person". Juristic persons are entitled to protection under the 14th Amendment. A juristic person is a legal entity through which the law allows a group of natural persons to act as if they were a single composite individual, or for a single person to have a separate legal identity other than their own- they are not 'human beings,' but may act as persons for certain purposes, such as lawsuits, property ownership and contracts. The concept is found in most legal systems (including England's), throughout the world.

"Only a corrupt system can produce such an outcome" is a nonsensical statment; only ignorance is behind that remark.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Sep 09 - 10:30 PM

Where did you hear about this?

Why is this not strictly a freedom of speech issue?

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Little Hawk
Date: 16 Sep 09 - 10:34 PM

You make a good point, Q. The problem isn't that "only a corrupt system can produce such an outcome"...because a non-corrupt system can certainly come up with similar ideas to the present legal status of the corporation.

The problem is that a corrupt system finds very bad ways to misuse a concept such as the corporation.

And that is what has occurred.

A corrupt system can, in fact, ruin any humanly devised arrangement...whether it be the idea of monarchies, the idea of religion, the idea of political parties, the idea of representative democracy or the idea of legal entities termed "corporations".

When the general leadership of a nation fall under the influence of gross corruption (when they are bought out, in other words), then the system...whatever it is...WILL be corrupted.

It is the corruption itself that is the problem.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 16 Sep 09 - 10:45 PM

Corporate Personhood is nevertheless not a part of the 14th amendment, and the Supreme Court has never ruled on it. I would suggest that I am not the one is ignorant...


"The Civil War accelerated the growth of manufacturing and the power of the men who owned the corporations. After the war corporations began a campaign to throw off the legal shackles that had held them in check. The systematic bribing of Congress was instituted by Mark Hanna, sugar trust magnate Henry Havemeyer, and Senator Nelson Aldrich and their associates. [Jonathan Shepard Fast and Luzviminda Bartolome Francisco, Conspiracy For Empire, Big Business, Corruption and the Politics of Imperialism in America, 1876-1907 (Quezon City, Foundation for Nationalist Studies, 1985), p. 92-97] Most Supreme Court judges who were appointed were former corporate lawyers.

In 1886 the supreme court justices were Samuel F. Miller, Stephen J. Field, Joseph P. Bradley, John M. Harlan, Stanley Matthews, William B. Woods, Samuel Blatchford, Horace Gray, and chief justice Morrison. R. Waite. Never heard of a one of them? These men subjected African Americans to a century of Jim Crow discrimination; they made corporations into a vehicle for the wealthy elite to control the economy and the government; they vastly increased the power of the Supreme Court itself over elected government officials. How quaint they are forgotten names. In all fairness, Justice Harlan dissented from the infamous Plessy v. Ferguson decision [163 U.S. 537 (1896)], which, as he said, effectively denied the protection of the 14th Amendment to the very group of people (former slaves and their descendants) for whom it was designed."

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 16 Sep 09 - 10:49 PM

Also, "Juristic persons" are not in any way a part of the 14th amendment.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 16 Sep 09 - 11:07 PM

By the way, my comment that "only a corrupt system can produce such an outcome" was not only referring to the idea that corporations could have personhood, but rather to the outcome that corporations could be given the status of personhood under a law that was intended to protect the personhood of human beings, while those same human beings were having their personhood denied - especially in light of the fact that juridical personhood and corporate personhood is not mentioned at all in the Constitution, and the Supreme Court never ruled on it. And it's true that such an outcome could only be produced by a corrupt system.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 16 Sep 09 - 11:12 PM

Correction: under a Constitutional amendment that was intended to protect the personhood of human beings...

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Little Hawk
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 10:52 AM

Very well covered, Carol. ;-D

It is quite clear that the architects of the Constitution of the USA did not anticipate the rise of certain things that would come in the future, such as...

political parties
multi-national corporations
modern mass media
weapons of mass destruction
massive urbanization in place of a once largely agrarian society
modern transportation systems
enormous loss of natural habitat
etc...

Had they been able to foresee what would happen with all these various things, I think they would have probably worded the Constitution quite differently in some sections, so as to protect future generations of Americans.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 12:01 PM

Why is this not strictly a freedom of speech issue?

You have to look to the animal rights issue to find a good push-back to the corporate rights discussion, and to the rights of individuals with diminished capacity.

Humans who are very young and adult humans of diminished capacity may have someone speak for them. Their personhood is not in question, but the right to speak for them comes into play. Who will speak, and are they keeping the best interests of those individuals in mind? You may have seen the woman who thought she could interpret grunts for a brain dead husband years ago, and it was determined that she was simply speaking for herself and her understanding was made up. (This is an old story, it may have been on 60 Minutes long before the Internet). That kind of thing is at question when one speaks for another, are they serving the other individuals or themselves?

In the environmental movement there is a book that came out years ago called Do Trees Have Standing? that fed into the animal rights discussion. When people stand up to speak for non-human persons, or to demand personhood for non-humans, their motivation is in question and the rights they ask to support or fight for are highly subjective.

Corporations with personhood are a different creature. They have that personhood to protect the corporation's individuals from personal loss if the corporation takes a financial or legal hit. The corporation assets may be siezed, but the personal property of the corporation partners is exempt from seizure (though the individual corporate leaders can and do go to prison. This wasn't always the case). This corporate citizen is a sort of super-human personhood.

Free speech rights are what are being examined by the supreme court, in relation to the corporation as a person. But the corporation is usually standing for many actual humans who aren't necessarily of one mind, and if there are investors such as mutual funds, then the money of those individuals may be used in ways that those individuals oppose, in their name.

Newspapers and book publishers (after the 1960 decision around Lady Chatterley's Lover that prohibited the U.S. Post Office from blocking the distribution of print material it found objectionable) are one form of corporation that have free-speech rights from the Bill of Rights. The first ammendment oversees the speech of writers within the publishing corporation as well as the corporation itself.

A PR department of a non-journalistic corporation department is not the same as a publishing corporation, and I think the question will boil down to who is speaking for whom, and who is entitled to speak. The PR speech is sponsored to promote the needs and wishes of the corporation, it is sales speech, not freedom of expression. The sales speech can be examined and punished if it misrepresents an item. The owners of the corporation take a financial hit if there is an action against the corporation. The owners of a business corporation are invested in the production of something, and may not want it to engage in political speech on their behalf. A newspaper can spout off all it wants, be as hateful as can be, but that is free speech and is what those investors expect.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 12:23 PM

Another point that I think is worth pointing out is that while other countries may extend some rights of personhood to "juristic persons", like lawsuits, property ownership and contracts, the governments of those countries do not become subordinate to those juristic persons. In the US, when the 14th amendment is taken to apply to corporations, this gives them far more rights than just those needed for the purpose of making contracts and owning property and things that are directly related to the functioning of their corporations, and include the right to engage in political activity and to have freedom of expression, which puts the government in a subordinate position to the corporation. It's an entirely different situation.

At any rate, since the Supreme Court has never ruled on this question before, it will be interesting to see if they finally do that, or if they, like their predecessors, will continue to kick that can down the road. Since the Court is still largely the same corrupt court that installed Bush in power in 2000, I don't hold out much hope.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 12:32 PM

Let's hope they surprise us with their common sense.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: John P
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 12:38 PM

Wouldn't it be nice if corporations who knowingly take actions that kill people were put to death? All assets taken away, all investors out in the cold. Do that to a few large corporations, and investors would start demanding ethical behavior instead of profits at all costs.

Corporations are, by their nature, immoral. Their only reason for their existence is to produce money for investors. If some CEO started acting ethically instead of profitably, they would be out of a job in a nanosecond and some less ethical person would be making the profitable decisions.

Until the owners of corporations start getting hit big time for the sins of their organizations, there is no reason to expect them to act like real people.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: heric
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 12:42 PM

Already said above but with slightly different wording:

The sentient individuals who act in multiple ways through and with a coporation have inalienable rights to free speech. Most of them will have no realistic way to resist the power of the mob which is the larger bulk of the people (with varying degress of authority and discretion) in this legally manufactured "entity" that exists only under the laws created to allow the concerted efforts of all these people to function in certain multple ways. People delegate much of their authority to the corporate "leaders," i.e. directors who might re-delegate to executives, but if you do not constrain the corporate "rights," you will be impinging upon the free speech rights of individuals. Can an individual delegate free speech rights to others, even in advance of knowing what the words will be? Would an individual ever choose to do so? Some would, some wouldn't.

Constituional rights of individuals require constraints on the "rights" of a group.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 05:11 PM

Stilly River Sage

A well reasoned argument. This will be the central issue in which Abrams will be arguing on behalf of Corporate Free Speech before the high court this coming week.


I wrote 500 words on the probable situations that would occur should the corporate plantif wins. The billion dollar movies against certain candidates will become a new phenomenon.
Perhaps my hypotheticals confused some readers here if they did not see I was speaking about fictional possibilities.





The problem I have is that when I clik on my name I no longer get a list of my posts !!!!!!!!!

This index was the best thing about this forum.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 05:13 PM

The 14th Amendment is long and complicated , comprising many court decisions, covering everything from birth to death (decisions affecting abortion, right to die, and all the rights throughout life, for persons and institutions.

From the Constitution, Government Printing Office
Fourteenth Amendment - http://www/gpoaccess.gov/constitution/pdf2002/032.pdf


"Person"
Perhaps the first inclusion of corporations was in 1877, when it became clear that ..."there is no doubt that a corporation may not be deprived of its property without due process of law (41). While various decisions have held that the "liberty" guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment is the liberty of natural(42) not artificial persons,(43) nevertheless in 1936, a newspaper corporation successfully objected that a state law deprived it of liberty of the press.(44)"
( ) are footnotes with titles of cases.

Deisions of the Courts, from the 1880s on, corrected the damaging excesses of reconstruction, and, in two steps forward-one step back decisions, slowly paved the way for blacks and other minorities to enter into full citizenship.
This is just one part of the current Fourteenth Amendment, which now covers many items. The Courts reflect public opinion; radical reforms would cause public resistance and the disruption of governmental controls.

Calling any of the Courts 'corrupt' is left wing nut demagogery. The Courts' record is one of service throughout.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 05:37 PM

Yes, I definitely agree that the Court's record is one of service, but it has often been service to narrow, vested interest groups rather than the Constitution. When it is difficult to see the separation between the members of the court and the people or groups about whom they are giving favorable rulings, it is perfectly reasonable to say that the court is corrupt, and to suggest otherwise is extremely blinkered.

While precedent has been built on the notion that the 14th amendment applies to corporations, there has never been a Supreme Court ruling on it. So the question persists and has not been settled. Maybe it will be this time, and maybe not.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 05:41 PM

Cornell University Law School-
U. S. Code collection

Section 1. Words denoting number, gender and so forth-
In determining the meaning of any Act of Congress, unless the context indicates otherwise-
"words importing the singular include and apply to several persons, parties, or things;
............

the words "person" and "whoever" include corporations, companies, associations, firms, partnerships, societies, and joint stock companies, as well as individuals;
..............

Based on numerous lower court decisions and thus taught as covered by the Fourteenth Amendment.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 05:45 PM

Nevertheless, it has not been ruled on by the Supreme Court, so the question has not been settled.

Since the link provided by the above poster doesn't take people to the text of the 14th amendment, here it is...

1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

2. Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State.

3. No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

4. The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.

5. The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 05:54 PM

Supreme Court actions may define the boundaries of corporate and union 'personhood,' as well as of other groupings, but the basic rights of these 'juristic' persons seems well established.

Also involved here are Class Action Suits, where a group are acting as a person before the courts.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 05:55 PM

Since the part about not being denied life, liberty, or property, or equal protection of the laws is specifically stated as the right of persons born or naturalized in the US, and since corporations cannot be either, it's pretty obvious that the people who wrote and voted on this amendment intended for these rights as outlined in the 14th amendment to apply to human beings and not corporations.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 06:00 PM

One of the functions of the Supreme Court is to determine whether precedent set by lower courts is Constitutional, and if it isn't, then the Court renders the precedent invalid. If and when the Court ever actually rules on the question, we will see then whether or not any of the established precedent will stand. If they rule that the 14th amendment does not apply to corporations, which they have the power to do, then all of the legal precedent that has given corporations the same rights as human beings under the 14th amendment in the past will become null and void.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 06:14 PM

Carol C said:

But obviously, they don't have all of the same attributes as a human being. They can't vote for president, for instance. That's a big part of the absurdity of the whole thing. But it was a corrupt Supreme Court clerk, and corrupt Supreme Court justices that make it possible for this absurdity to exist in the first place, and to continue.

I'm not quarreling with your judgment, "corrupt", which you are entitled to make, I suppose, but you tell us that last positively, as a fact, and accordingly I assume you know some specific incident(s) that establishes that, which evidently I've missed.   Would you please give us the chapter and verse?

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: curmudgeon
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 06:16 PM

"Never ascribe to malice that which is more simply explained by stupidity."

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 06:18 PM

I already posted a specific incident.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 06:54 PM

"Corrupt" has several meanings. One of them is "influenced by bribery", and that would be a charge that needs the kind of specific incident which Dave Oesterreich asked for.

However another meaning is just "rotten", and that is an epithet that is perhaps a lot easier to justify.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 06:55 PM

I missed it. What date and time, please, Carol C?

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Bill D
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 07:47 PM

One of the talk programs (Olbermann? Maddow?) mentioned a few days ago, that AFTER some decision, one of the Justices..(chief justice?) was talking and said...(paraphrased) "We didn't really deal with the issue of the 'person' status of corporations ...though we just assume that they have it...."

and supposedly, a clerk overheard and wrote down his remark and passed it off as part of the decision......something like that. And it has been taken for granted ever since.
It was so weird that on the program, it was asked again...

I never did hear exactly who & when this was supposed to have occurred

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Bill D
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 07:55 PM

Ok...look here...and scroll down to 2nd section.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Little Hawk
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 08:37 PM

Fascinating stuff, Bill! It sure puts a different face on the events in Boston that led to the American Revolution.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 08:46 PM

16 Sep 09 - 10:45 PM


To me, particularly in this context, corruption is when public officials make decisions that favor groups that they have personal connections with (which could be financial in nature or could be of other kinds) because of those connections rather than making their decisions based on a neutral assessment of their responsibilities under their job description.

The case I have been referencing in this thread is the same one that was referenced on the show (I think it was Maddow, but I can't remember, either). The link in my first post goes into some detail about the case.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Bobert
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 08:47 PM

First of all, it is a given tha the Roberts/Alito/Scalia/Thomas Court will see fit to strike down over a hundred years of precedence... That is a given becuase they are all corporate puppets...

But the best argument against alolowing corporation to buy up as much advertsing time and to put out whatever lies they want to in the forms of faike documentaries is simple: Corporations trade on a stock exchange and every stock holder owns a share of that corporation... Now when the Board of Directors, or the CEO decide to use money form a publicly (stock holders) owned corporation run ads they are, in essence, saying that the represent to the feelings of every stock holder, or if not, that some kind of vote were taken and those who do not agree with the ad lost some kinda of vote...

That is bullshit!!!

I mean, let'as step into the real world here... Lotta folks have 401's, right... They don't sit at their computers everyday and buy and sell stocks... No, most don't really have much of a clue about the affairs of the corporations in which they own stock...

Everyone with us so far...

Well, should a corporation buy an ad without the full knowledge to the owners of the stocks then it would seem to me that that corporation is guilty of hoodwinking their investers... I think the term racketeering is what it's called....

So, bottom line, when Robert's Boys give a green light to their corporate bed-buddies they are in essence giving a green light for these folks to be exempted from the law...

Real pickle, ain't it???

But it is going to happen by the activists Roberts Court...

Might of fact, before these activist assholes are reigned in they are going to shread as much precedence as they can find to shread on any issue that comes before them that makes the right wing all warm and fuzzy...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 09:03 PM

Bobert, when you said:


First of all, it is a given tha the Roberts/Alito/Scalia/Thomas Court will see fit to strike down over a hundred years of precedence... That is a given becuase they are all corporate puppets...

I think you meant to insert "not" before "see fit".

Not striking down all those years of judicial tradition may be seen as serving corporations. To "strike down over a hundred years of precedence" would be to strike a real blow to corporations.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Bobert
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 09:28 PM

No, Dave, I got it right... Roberts and Co will strike down over a hundred years of precedence...

Congresss enacted a law (name escapes me) in 1906 that limited corporations for buying power in the government... Courts have upheld that law ever since... (The cat will come to me... Brain fade)...

So everytime the act has been reviewed the courts have upheld it... I reckon that those decsions are what would be thought of as precedents...

Roberts and gang are about to interpret this 103 year old act, whioch has been uphelp for over a century and they are going to, in essence, say that every time the courts have upheld that those courts were wrong...

Seems to me that that amounts to striking down those decisions...

What am I missing here???

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 09:32 PM

The rights of companies, associations inc. unions, firms, funds, partnerships, societies, joint stock companies, class action groups to act as a person in procedings will not be overturned. These rights are ingrained in the democratic process.

Limits may be imposed to prevent excesses and define boundaries, but the right of a group to act as a person are based on too many decisions and actions since the 1877 decisions (regarding a newspaper) mentioned previously and the Munn vs. Illinois case allowing the public (a state governing body operating as a person) regulation of private business,and the 1888 ruling allowing taxation of railroads (not resting on some 'remark'). These and other decisions are the basis of the 'legal person'.

When the Amendment was ratified in 1868, the concern was reconstruction; as it now stands it covers many aspects of personal and business life, and the current edition linked at the Government Printing Office fills a volume (not considering additions since 2002).

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 10:17 PM

Nobody's arguing whether or not they will be able to act as persons in matters pertaining directly to the conduct of their business. There is nothing whatever in any of my posts that even hints at that. So that's a straw man argument.

What is being discussed is whether or not they have the same exact rights as a human being under the 14th amendment, including freedom of speech (in the form of money spent on political campaigns), and things that aren't directly related to conducting their business.

What this decision would do, if the court finds that the 14th amendment does not apply to corporations, is that it will affirm the right of the government to place limits on what corporations can and can't do, in this case, what they can do with regard to political activity.

When the amendment was ratified, the concern was that the newly freed slaves might still be denied equal rights under the law.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Bill D
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 10:20 PM

Ok...with the results of my previous search in hand, I added "Santa Clara" to the search terms, and I find that Wikipedia names names


"However, before oral argument took place, Chief Justice Morrison R. Waite announced:

    "The court does not wish to hear argument on the question whether the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws, applies to these corporations. We are all of the opinion that it does."[3]

This quotation was printed by the court reporter, J.C. Bancroft Davis, a former president of a small railroad, in the syllabus and case history above the opinion, but was not in the opinion itself. As such, it did not technically - in the view of most legal historians - have any legal precedential value.[4] However, the Supreme Court is not required by Constitution or even precedent to limit its rulings to written statements."

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 10:29 PM

Alternatively, the above poster could have read the opening post in this thread, and had a look in the link posted in it.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 10:53 PM

The rights of corporations- and all such groups- are, in the opinion of legal students, covered by the 14th Amendment and have been for over a century. Within that Amendment, limits may be placed on what those bodies may do; if it is ruled that contributions by them should be limited, the same limitations would undoubtedly be placed on unions, societies, action groups, etc.

The original intent when it was ratified has little to do with the current content or intent of the much enlarged and modified Amendment; the vengeful reconstruction provisions may have been intended to protect freed slaves, but they imposed conditions on the South that caused rancor and blocked industrial development, causing hardship to both blacks and whites, factors that slowed integration for many years.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Sawzaw
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 10:57 PM

I am totally against any kind of business entity, association or group from having the rights that a individual, ordinary citizen has.

In the late 1800's a railroad in California won some sort of legal case that gave them rights and everything was built on that "case law".

It gripes me when someone says "you need a lawyer to do that" I say what the hell rights does a lawyer have that an ordinary citizen does not have?

One of the biggest problems we have in the US is the legal system is out of control. Whom ever has the most money usually wins.

Ever hear the story about the one lawyer town? The guy was starving until another lawyer set up shop in the same town.

In 1886, . . . in the case of Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Company, the U.S. Supreme Court decided that a private corporation is a person and entitled to the legal rights and protections the Constitutions affords to any person. Because the Constitution makes no mention of corporations, it is a fairly clear case of the Court's taking it upon itself to rewrite the Constitution.
          Far more remarkable, however, is that the doctrine of corporate personhood, which subsequently became a cornerstone of corporate law, was introduced into this 1886 decision without argument. According to the official case record, Supreme Court Justice Morrison Remick Waite simply pronounced before the beginning of arguement in the case of Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Company that

             The court does not wish to hear argument on the question whether the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws, applies to these corporations. We are all of opinion that it does.

          The court reporter duly entered into the summary record of the Court's findings that

             The defendant Corporations are persons within the intent of the clause in section 1 of the Fourteen Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

          Thus it was that a two-sentence assertion by a single judge elevated corporations to the status of persons under the law, prepared the way for the rise of global corporate rule, and thereby changed the course of history.
          The doctrine of corporate personhood creates an interesting legal contradiction. The corporation is owned by its shareholders and is therefore their property. If it is also a legal person, then it is a person owned by others and thus exists in a condition of slavery -- a status explicitly forbidden by the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution. So is a corporation a person illegally held in servitude by its shareholders? Or is it a person who enjoys the rights of personhood that take precedence over the presumed ownership rights of its shareholders? So far as I have been able to determine, this contradiction has not been directly addressed by the courts.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 11:13 PM

Nevertheless, it is the Supreme Court, and not most legal students, who will have the final say on whether or not the 14th amendment will apply to corporations.

The text of the 14th amendment, that I posted above, was written for the purpose of ensuring that freed slaves and their descendants would not be denied the same rights as White people (well, White men, anyway). That was the only purpose of that amendment. That was the whole reason it was written.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: CarolC
Date: 17 Sep 09 - 11:15 PM

The court didn't actually rule on the Santa Clara case.

Subject: RE: BS: Corporate Personhood vs Democracy
From: Bill D
Date: 18 Sep 09 - 12:18 PM

"Alternatively, the above poster could have read the opening post in this thread, and had a look in the link posted in it.

Didn't the author of that post not too long ago make some point about "not having time to read all the posts..? (even posts two lines above)