ReclaimDemocracy takes on corporate personhood

topic : corporations

Ask a friend or colleague to define the term "corporation". Most will define it as a large company with limited liability. Ask if corporations should be defined as persons, with the same rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness as the rest of us, and you might just get some laughs.

The truth, unfortunately, is hardly a laughing matter. Thanks to an 1886 Supreme Court misappropriation*, today's corporations enjoy many of the very same human protections and privileges as you and I. Add these legally defensible and even exploitable constitutional rights to a corporation's endless financial resources, media control and limited liability privileges, and the makings to overthrow democracy unfold.

While many Americans do not yet realize the extent to which corporate power controls our lives, corporate control over the governed is in some cases beginning to make itself obvious:

1.Today's free speech laws virtually enable corporations to buy votes; Since free speech was equated with money in the 1970's, it has become unlawful to limit the amount of money a corporation can contribute to a campaign. Corporations hold that doing so would limit their constitutional right to "free" speech.

2.A direct consequence to the above, taxpayer money is increasingly being spent in areas that benefit corporations and their wealthy counterparts to the detriment of the public at large; While weaponry and war spending is skyrocketing, and while enormous tax breaks are being handed out to rich corporations and the super-wealthy, the educational and social services necessary to sustain the public are being under-funded or slashed. Similarly, domains that have long belonged to the public are being "privatized" or, in other words, handed over to the highest corporate bidder.

3.Corporations are successfully suing local governments that pass laws to control corporate behavior in their communities. The corporations charge that the townships, cities or states in question are violating their "constitutional rights" as "persons" under the first and fourteenth amendments.

4.Corporations also challenge local communities by manipulating federal law in their favor; In California, the Bush Administration actually joined a lawsuit brought against the state by General Motors and Daimler Chrysler, charging that by regulating car emissions California is trying to regulate fuel economy -- something only the federal government has the authority to do. (An agreement was reached and the suit was dropped, but in 2004 another California law requiring new automobiles to emit fewer greenhouse gases was challenged in federal court. The case, which was brought in part by the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, is pending.)

5.Corporations use their "right to privacy" and their "right to unlawful searches and seizures" to keep government inspectors off their property, sometimes until it is too late to prevent what become serious violations of environmental law. In terms of lives, dollars, or both, the damage then becomes the public's problem.

6.A recent Supreme Court ruling on Eminent Domain set a precedent that makes it legal for municipalities to force homeowners to sell their property if it is found to be in the "economic interest" of the city. In the words of former Justice Sandra Day O'Conner, "Any property may now be taken for the benefit of another private party, but the fallout from this decision will not be random. The beneficiaries are likely to be those citizens with disproportionate influence and power in the political process, including large corporations and development firms."

While the list of corporate abuses is long and daunting, it is important to remember that America's corporations have not always been allowed this kind of reign over our lives. In fact, the revolution that led to our country's founding was as much a revolution against corporations like England's infamous East India Company, which used force to monopolize the colony's market, as it was against the crown itself. Early America was very careful with the powers it granted corporations, and created laws that among other things limited corporate life-spans, revoked charters when necessary, made it illegal for corporations to own other companies, and insisted that, in addition to making money, a corporation had to operate in the public interest.

Over the years, corporations have successfully pushed for laws that have created an overwhelming imbalance of power in their favor: Today's corporations have no limitations put on their "life-spans", but live on and on until they fold or declare bankruptcy; while most states still have the authority to revoke corporate charters, charter revocation has been virtually unheard of in the 21st century. (This even though a 1982 study found that 23 percent of America's largest 500 companies were either convicted of criminal behavior or forced to pay a penalty of more than $50,000 for serious misbehavior during the previous decade*). Today's corporations are not only allowed to own other companies, they are allowed to own subsidiaries as a means to funnel money and evade taxes. Finally, the notion that corporations must operate for the public good in addition to maximizing profits has largely been lost, while their limited liability status -- originally granted to them because they served the public interest -- remains intact. Unaccountable to their creditors, to the environment and to the communities in which they operate, today's corporations are allowed unparalleled power and influence over our lives. Democratic rule by, for and of "the people" is becoming more rhetoric than reality, and corporate policies are dominating America's agenda.

But in a country that values democracy, where free and fair elections are demanded, it is possible to return to an era where corporations are subservient to the people who created them. A major grassroots movement to abolish Corporate Personhood is under way, and citizens all across America -- liberals and conservatives, activists, farmers and small business owners - are getting together to enact local laws to control the behavior of the corporations that do business in their communities.

Returning corporations to their rightful place in the legal world -- defining them as superficial entities designed by people to make money, as opposed to "persons" with inherent rights and privileges - will take significant time, energy and vision. But just as the emancipation and women's suffrage movements found support and ultimate triumph, so too might the justice of this cause one day prove undeniable to American values of decency and equality.

For more information on Corporate Personhood, visit the following sites:

ReclaimDemocracy.org http://www.reclaimdemocracy.org

Program on Corporations, Law and Democracy http://www.poclad.org/

Women's International League of Peace and Freedom (WILPF) http://www.wilpf.org/

*For information on how Corporate Personhood has been predicated on a court reporter's misleading headnote rather than on an actual Supreme Court ruling, read Thom Hartmann's book "Unequal Protection".

*Corporate crime information was taken from Thom Hartmann's book "Unequal Protection" page 184.