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businesses already do what they want in politics through the use of small organizations. all you end of the world doomsayers are going to be disappointed when this has little effect except to make things more transparent.
http://www.scotusblog.com/2010/01/an...ns/#more-15376
Analysis: The personhood of corporations
Rehabilitating an image
Lyle Denniston | Thursday, January 21st, 2010 6:45 pm
SCOTUSblog
Analysis
Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens may have had his tongue in his cheek, or perhaps wanted merely to taunt the majority, when he wrote in Thursday’s opinion on the role of corporations in national politics: “Under the majority’s view, I suppose it may be a First Amendment problem that corporations are not permitted to vote, given that voting is, among other things, a form of speech.” It is a tantalizing notion.
Suppose that General Motors Corp., troubled that a candidate for Congress from Michigan was too favorable to the United Auto Workers, decided to do everything in its corporate power to defeat that candidate. So, aside from spending huge sums of its own money (none of it federal bailout money) to influence the outcome, it went to the office of the voting registrar in downtown Detroit. It sought to sign up, affirming that it was a citizen and resident of Michigan. Denied registration, it sued, claiming that, under the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Cons ution, it was a “person,” and, as a “citizen,” it was en led to equal protection under the election laws. Would the Supreme Court buy that?
General Motors might already be halfway to winning its lawsuit. It has been understood, for decades, that corporations are “persons” under the Cons ution. And nothing the Supreme Court said Thursday undermined that notion. If anything, the decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission conferred new dignity on corporate “persons,” treating them — under the First Amendment free-speech clause — as the equal of human beings.
At least in politics, the Court majority indicated, corporations have a voice, and they have worthy political ideas. Here is the way Justice Anthony M. Kennedy put it (partially quoting from an earlier ruling): “Corporations and other associations, like individuals, contribute to the ‘discussion, debate, and the dissemination of information and ideas’ that the First Amendment seeks to foster.”
It does not matter that the right-to-vote scenario is quite implausible. The fact is that the decades-old image of American corporations as a destabilizing and perhaps even corrupting influence in politics has now been thoroughly re-examined by the Supreme Court, and the corporate “person” emerges from the process with — in the eyes of the majority — a burnished image of good citizen. There is a deep chasm of perception, between Thursday’s majority and the dissenters, about the nature of the corporate personality.
Justice Stevens, writing for the dissenters, turned Chief Justice John Marshall’s celebrated comment in the Dartmouth College case — in a ruling that actually favored the corporate form — into a belittling comment: “A corporation is an artificial being, invisible, intangible, and existing only in contemplation of law. Being the mere creature of law, it possesses only those properties which the charter of its creation confers upon it.”
In vivid contrast, the majority overruled a 19-year-old precedent (Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce) that had lambasted the corporation, when it entered the political arena, because of ”the corrosive and distorting effects of immense aggregations of wealth that are ac ulated with the help of the corporate form and that have little or no correlation to the public’s suport for the corporation’s political ideas.” That, the Court had said in 1990, was a form of corruption that legislators could use as the basis for singling out corporations for restrictions on their political activity. The overruling may have been intended, in part, to scuttle that image.
The rehabilitation of the corporate “person” almost certainly was a project that five of the Justices were prepared to embrace. It could be argued, indeed, that the Court put the case over to the current Term for a second argument, focused on corporation’s rights under the Cons ution, as part of that project. There was not a hint that those five, in the end, were in any way moved by the suggestion at that second argument by Justice Sonia Sotomayor that the Court may have been wrong for a century about awarding “personhood” to corporations.
The majority put aside the dissenting opinion’s repeated mentions of the special favors that the corporate form gets, treating those as a completely inadequate foundation for treating corporations differently as political citizens. And Justice Antonin Scalia, in a separate opinion buttressing the majority ruling, went to considerable lengths to enhance the cons utional pedigree of corporations’ rights and to denounce the dissenters’ suggestion that the Founders did not think highly of corporations.
The question now arises whether the enhanced legal stature of corporations will make a difference in other fields of cons utional law. One might suggest that corporations have already benefitted from greater sympathy from the current Court — for example, in cons utional limitations on the size of punitive damages that juries may assess for corporate wrongdoing. And, this Term, there seems to be quite a realistic prospect that the Court, applying the Due Process Clause, may limit the scope of the federal criminal fraud laws when an executive of a corporation is accused of depriving the shareholders of “honest services.”
Going further, one might speculate whether it would be worth starting a lawsuit to test some of the restraints that states impose on corporations as conditions in their charters, in an effort to further liberate the corporate form. Or, perhaps, one might anticipate a lawsuit if, as is already being suggested in some quarters, that Congress might respond to the Citizens United ruling by passing a law to require corporations operating in interstate commerce to be federally chartered, and decreeing that, as such, they are not “persons” with cons utional rights.
It is not too much to expect that lawyers for corporate America may well be looking to explore the outer possibilities of their clients’ “personhood” and new-found cons utional equality.
businesses already do what they want in politics through the use of small organizations. all you end of the world doomsayers are going to be disappointed when this has little effect except to make things more transparent.
Weapons of Mass Distraction.
We have to be the most "entertained" culture in the history of human existence.
That's no accident.
No, I didnt think it was clear because I am not entirely sure about the solution to this problem.
Senators and Representatives have the power they have. Honest question..consider for a moment that I do not mean offense as it seems hard to ascertain your exact position on just about everything...
Are you proposing weakening the Legislative branch? Empowering another branch in counter-balance or proposing an all new body of government?
Or, none of the above?
Nice analogy, but again, this ruling isnt about campaign contributions.
Though, your analogy still fits perfectly if you just change the language of the last point a bit...
"You know there's this vote coming up on a bill that, if passed, would cost your company $10 million a quarter. I'm kinda on the fence about it, but if you advertise for my campaign [for] a measly $1 million I'll think about voting in favor of it. After all, your opinion matters [the most -Ed]."
My thoughts exactly. If I'm some business or union (whether or not I'm still technically a person at that point), I can already spend any amount of money I want to buy myself an army of lobbyists. I can donate whatever I want to a particular candidate's favorite charity. I can spend an unlimited amount of money to host a lavish celebration to "honor" a particular candidate. I can donate to as many different PACs or 527s as I want. I can even "hire" a bunch of people and then give them paid time off to go "volunteer" for someone's campaign. I can let those volunteers use my phones, my copiers, my office space. But OMG, if I want to buy a 30 second commercial on American Idol, well now I've tarnished the sanc y of the whole campaign process. Oh noes!
The outrage and paranoia over the predicted fallout from this is ruling is comical.
Last edited by coyotes_geek; 01-22-2010 at 12:52 AM.
That compelling state interest was identified in Austin (overturned yesterday) and highlighted in Rehnquist's Bellotti dissent. You seem to be ignoring it. What a surprise.
Odd that you of all people should make such a weak appeal to authority.
Oops, you did it again.
Is socialism for corporate interests that different than for Uncle Sam? Serbia-Montenegro seems to think so. In reality, the only difference is the master. I know, Friedman, von Hayek, and Bastiat. Fluff me now.
In dissent, Justice Stevens wrote "While American democracy is imperfect, few outside the majority of this Court would have thought its flaws included a dearth of corporate money in politics."
teabaggers are so ing stupid.
^^^Without any doubt, the stupidest post so far in this thread. And there have been a few really dense ones.
January 22, 2010
Lobbyists Get Potent Weapon in Campaign Finance Ruling
By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court has handed a new weapon to lobbyists. If you vote wrong, a lobbyist can now tell any elected official that my company, labor union or interest group will spend unlimited sums explicitly advertising against your re-election.
“We have got a million we can spend advertising for you or against you — whichever one you want,’ ” a lobbyist can tell lawmakers, said Lawrence M. Noble, a lawyer at Skadden Arps in Washington and former general counsel of the Federal Election Commission.
The decision seeks to let voters choose for themselves among a mul ude of voices and ideas when they go to the polls, but it will also increase the power of organized interest groups at the expense of candidates and political parties.
It is expected to unleash a torrent of attack advertisements from outside groups aiming to sway voters, without any candidate having to take the criticism for dirty campaigning. The biggest beneficiaries might be well-placed in bents whose favor companies and interests groups are eager to court. It could also have a big impact on state and local governments, where a few million dollars can have more influence on elections.
The ruling comes at a time when influence-seekers of all kinds have special incentives to open their wallets. Amid the economic crisis, the Obama administration and Congressional Democrats are trying to rewrite the rules for broad swaths of the economy, from Detroit to Wall Street. Republicans, meanwhile, see a chance for major gains in November.
Democrats predicted that Republicans would benefit most from the decision, because they are the traditional allies of big corporations, who have more money to spend than unions.
In a statement shortly after the decision, President Obama called it “a green light to a new stampede of special interest money in our politics.”
As Democrats vowed to push legislation to install new spending limits in time for the fall campaign, Republicans disputed the partisan impact of the decision. They argued that Democrats had proven effective at cultivating their own business allies — drug companies are spending millions of dollars to promote the administration’s health care proposals, for example — while friendly interest groups tap sympathetic billionaires and Hollywood money.
After new restrictions on party fund-raising took effect in 2003, many predicted that the Democrats would suffer. But they took Congress in 2006 and the White House two years later.
While Democrats pledged new limits, some Republicans argued for bolstering parties and candidates by getting rid of the limits on their fund-raising as well. Several cases before lower courts, including a suit filed by the Republican National Committee against the Federal Election Commission, seek to challenge those limits.
Thursday’s decision, in Citizens United vs. the Federal Election Commission, “is going to flip the existing campaign order on its head,” said Benjamin L. Ginsberg, a Republican campaign lawyer at the law-and-lobbying firm Patton Boggs who has represented both candidates and outside groups, including Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a group formed to oppose Senator John Kerry’s 2004 presidential campaign.
“It will put on steroids the trend that outside groups are increasingly dominating campaigns,” Mr. Ginsberg said. “Candidates lose control of their message. Some of these guys lose control of their whole personalities.”
“Parties will sort of shrink in the relative importance of things,” he added, “and outside groups will take over more of the functions — advertising support, get out the vote — that parties do now.”
In practice, major publicly held corporations like Microsoft or General Electric are unlikely to spend large sums money on campaign commercials, for fear of alienating investors, customers and other public officials.
( but from playing games with the IRS, the corps know how to "anonymize" the money, so this comment is bull )
Instead, wealthy individuals and companies might contribute to trade associations, groups like the Chamber of Commerce or the National Riffle Association, or other third parties that could run commercials.
Previously, Mr. Noble of Skadden Arps said, his firm had advised companies to be wary about giving money to groups that might run so-called advocacy commercials, because such activity could trigger disclosure requirements that would identify the corporate financers.
“It could be traced back to you,” he said. “That is no longer a concern.”
Some disclosure rules remain intact. An outside group paying for a campaign commercial would still have to include a statement and file forms taking responsibility. If an organization solicits money specifically to pay for such political activities, it could fall under regulations that require disclosure of its donors.
And the disclosure requirements would moderate the harshness of the third-party advertisements, because established trade associations or other groups are too concerned with their reputations to wage the contentious campaigns that ad hoc groups like MoveOn.org or Swift Boat Veterans for Truth might do.
("disclosure requirements would moderate"? G M A F B This is politics,the filthiest, lying-ist activity operated by humans)
Two leading Democrats, Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York and Representative Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, said that they had been working for months to draft legislation in response to the anticipated decision.
One possibility would be to ban political advertising by corporations that hire lobbyists, receive government money, or collect most of their revenue abroad.
Another would be to tighten rules against coordination between campaigns and outside groups so that, for example, they could not hire the same advertising firms or consultants.
A third would be to require shareholder approval of political expenditures, or even to force chief executives to appear as sponsors of commercials their companies pay for.
The two sponsors of the 2002 law tightening the party-fundraising rules each criticized the ruling.
Senator Russ Feingold, Democrat of Wisconsin, called it “a terrible mistake.” Senator John McCain of Arizona, the Republican presidential nominee in 2008, said in a television interview on CNN that he was “disappointed.”
Fred Wertheimer, a longtime advocate of campaign finance laws, said the decision “wipes out a hundred years of history” during which American laws have sought to tamp down corporate power to influence elections.
But David Bossie, the conservative activist who brought the case to defend his campaign-season promotion of the do entary “Hillary: The Movie,” said he was looking forward to rolling out his next film in time for the midterm elections.
led “Generation Zero,” the movie features the television host Lou Dobbs and lays much of the blame for the recent financial collapse on the Democrats.
“Now we have a free hand to let people know it exists,” Mr. Bossie said.
========
aka "Now we have a free hand" ... to tell more vicious lies that will be believed by the dumbed-down rabble and sheeple.
copied from Alternet comments section:
"A corporation is a privileged artificial en y with no soul, no conscience, and unlimited life span. It is artificial because it exists only by virtue of adjusted ink on paper and an enabling government franchise. It is privileged since its officers and owners (shareholders) are immune to legal action stemming from business mistakes, bad management, financial losses, and other reasons.
Corporate personhood is a legal absurdity because the government, cons uted by the people to serve the people's interests, cannot logically create or empower an artificial en y with the same rights and powers as a natural person. To do so would be to establish something as great as or greater than the people who cons uted the government itself. That would be like people creating a robot with godly powers. It can't be done.
The corporation has no conscience and which unregulated represents a mortal danger to society since its prime directive, indeed its only directive, is to generate profits (a corporation's real product) in any manner possible. The safety and wellbeing of workers, consumers and the environment represent adverse impact to the bottom line and are thus vigorously resisted.
Corporate influence of legislation is done through lobbying government under the cons utional clause guaranteeing people the right to pe ion the government for redress of grievances. The ludicrous notion of corporate personhood allows for this exercise of cons utional rights properly belonging only to natural persons.
Corporations properly have no rights at all other than possible statutory rights such as the right to due process of law, but not natural rights such as the right to free speech. Corporations are properly and correctly the object of regulation and subject to taxation. The more wealthy and powerful they become, the more they should be taxed.
Government has every right to break up corporations "too big to fail" for the good of the society and the protection of the people and the environment, and every right to censure corporations through huge fines and other disciplinary actions for anti-social and environmentally destructive behavior.
Corporate officers and shareholders are also properly taxed on their corporate earnings and investment income. The exercise of privilege is the proper target of taxation. The exercise of rights is not. Corporations cannot logically have rights, especially natural rights."
=========
As a corporate-d person, I plan to deduct all my personal operating/structural costs and overheads (electricityy, gas, car purchase/insurance, phone, internet, cable TV, mortage/interest/propertytaxes, etc) from my revenue and pay income taxes only my net income, just like a corporate person.
I don't get why the SCOTUS is for corporate rights and against individual rights.
This article provides a decent argument.
Still, it would seem that you could limit the political "speech" of corporations while making an exception for the press and also for political advocacy groups comprised of individuals and funded by individuals. That would seem to be in line with the original spirit and intent of the Cons ution. Nowadays we seem to regard the Founding Fathers as a bunch of corporate lawyers, instead of the revolutionaries who sought independence, individual liberty, and self-government for the people.
If you can't regulate the political activities of corporate "persons," what limits can be placed? Could GE, Microsoft, and Boeing register to vote? I know I've come across the term "natural persons" occasionally in laws and regulations. It's clear why that language is used. But does that impede on some form of "speech"?
As always, the government and society is arrayed against actual living individual persons. We can't let individual commoners have too much liberty and political power, nevermind that the governing do ent which created this nation was designed to do precisely just that. You aren't an individual, you're a cog in a wheel. Just be glad you exist to further glorify the state and the Fortune 500.
It's unreal to see there is actually a branch of government that makes Congress look competent in comparison.
eh, eff it.
I like this ruling. When the govt. lawyer said that they would withhold a political book from being printed around election because it has the mention of a politician's name, it was clear that the intended consequences were uncons utional. The FEC should never have authority on allowing or blocking political speech, because of the timing. No more PACs is a great consequence of this ruling. I would think this would mean more transparancy as to where money is coming from.
I do not see how this is judicial activism. If anyone could explain further. I know I used a Conservative site, but the charge is normally "you only like judicial activism when it goes with your views" so this is how a conservative wiki has defined it.Judicial activism is when courts do not confine themselves to reasonable interpretations of laws, but instead create law. Alternatively, judicial activism is when courts do not limit their ruling to the dispute before them, but instead establish a new rule to apply broadly to issues not presented in the specific action. "Judicial activism" is when judges subs ute their own political opinions for the applicable law, or when judges act like a legislature (legislating from the bench) rather than like a traditional court. In so doing, the court takes for itself the powers of Congress, rather than limiting itself to the powers traditionally given to the judiciary.
Judicial activism should not be confused with the courts' Cons utionally mandated rule in preserving the Cons utional structure of government, as they did in Bush v. Gore, Boy Scouts v. Dale, and D.C. v. er.
http://www.conservapedia.com/Judicial_Activism
Well, if 'Conservapedia' says it...
That reminds me of the outfit that was publishing a "conservative" interpretation of the Holy Scriptures. We can't have the Son of God sounding like a commie sometimes, I guess.
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