Corporations and Rights

Don,

I blogged on this one yesterday, much to the dismay of some of my liberal friends (http://commonsenseliberty.wordpress.com). One point that gets missed in this debate, in my view, is that whatever "abusive" power corporations have stems from the state's involvement in business. Were business entities formed freely by contractual agreement among members and the state were limited to enforcing said contracts, 99% of corporate shenanigans would disappear.

Under such a system, any person or business entity could choose whether to deal with any other person or business entity. The issue of whether "corporations" are people would disappear along with crony capitalism.

Terry

Two quotes from the the concurring and dissenting opinions respectively;

Concurring;

"The Court has thus rejected the
argument that political speech of corporations or other
associations should be treated differently under the First
Amendment simply because such associations are not
“natural persons.”

Dissenting;

If taken seriously, our colleagues’ assumption that the
identity of a speaker has no relevance to the Government’s
ability to regulate political speech would lead to some
remarkable conclusions. Such an assumption would have
accorded the propaganda broadcasts to our troops by
“Tokyo Rose” during World War II the same protection as
speech by Allied commanders. More pertinently, it would
appear to afford the same protection to multinational
corporations controlled by foreigners as to individual
Americans: To do otherwise, after all, could “‘enhance the
relative voice’” of some (i.e., humans) over others (i.e.,
nonhumans). "


The comparative level of logic and reason is astounding. Talk about an activist court.

Interesting that the dissenters write this portion:

More pertinently, it would
appear to afford the same protection to multinational
corporations controlled by foreigners as to individual
Americans

These are the people on the court that cite foreign constitutions and foreign court decisions in their opinions ~ sometimes from countries much less free (and free of corruption) than ours.

Don,

I'm actually quite surprised that you defend the principle of corporate formation. Corporations are a legal construct developed by the State. As such, can not the State determine who to grant a certificate of incorporation to and upon what conditions to revoke that certificate?

Do you believe people have a constitutional right to form a corporation? What if the State no longer allowed incorporation, would this be a violation of the constitution?

People are free to associate in groups together via contract law. Corporations, however, could not come into existence based on a group of individuals contracting with each other. Corporations only exist due to the State constructing them.

It is puzzling that individuals, each endowed with certain guaranteed liberties, lose some of those liberties when they assemble, voluntarily and legally, in a corporate form.

Funny like how you're paying for their wars for oil and too big to fail bail outs among so many other things? Funny that way or HA HA funny?

The United States does not specifically enter wars because of oil. Oil market stability might be a reason why the U.S. politicians find themselves authorizing use of force in some regions but the primary purpose is to correct some kind of injustice or to engage enemies of the state. To just spout the "war for oil" mantra, is to miss a whole lot of other stuff. Not that you're all that proficient at catching the jist of other topics, either.

You are evil.

No I'm not the one who is pro-corporate rule. I'm pro-people rule. Thinking corporations are people is evil thinking.

With the possible exception of Yabbut Kuehn, you are the only one here who is in favor of corporate welfare. That is very corporatist of you. Still, you continue to accuse libertarians of being corporatists.

You are quite content to have politicians give my money to corporations, then express shock that they want to give their money to politicians so that politicians will give them even more of my money.

I can honestly say you are all about someone or something 'ruling'; you use the word often.

Your cries against corporations are actually cries against the state. If we actually had a federal government that stayed within the bounds of the Constitution, corporations wouldn't be able to reap the benefits of lobbying.

It's only due to overreach by the government that corporations spend so much time rent seeking. Two wrongs do not make a right.

"Your cries against corporations are actually cries against the state."


You support of corporations is really support for the state as corporations ARE creations of the state and government.

No, corporations are creations of individuals.

Nope sorry dude... their rights, privileges and limited liability protections are granted by government and decree of law.

Maybe English is a second language for you. Creation and regulation aren't the same thing. Individuals create corporations like Microsoft and Franklin Street Bakery, the government regulates and taxes them.

Again. Did muirbot write one sentence telling us why Ilya Somin's arguments don't stand the scrutiny? A list of reasons? noooooo! That's too much to ask. As can be expected from a muir comment, it is full of emotion and very little substantive thought.

Which is one of the biggest difference between Muir and Daniel Kuehn. Kuehn's problem is he tries too hard often, hair splitting being a common tactic. Daniel, at least, give us some opportunity to do some serious thinking from time to time.

Muirbot is a waste of all of our time, that including muir himself.

On the one hand, that's a good description of Daniel. On the other hand, that's not a good description. I never said it was a good description; you're twisting my words and missing the subtlety of my argument.

Laughed then 'liked'.

That's really interesting... Muirgeo as a waste of his own time. For him I think that's actually possible. Never thought of it that way!

Based in this logic we should never have fought the Revolutionary war against corporate abuses. But then again I suspect most libertarians would be Tory King George Loyalist fighting or fleeing from George Washington.

The Revolution, in the US, was not fought against corporate abuses. That isn't true. Until the last moment the colonists (living in colonies of royal charter) thought of themselves as Englishmen and would not have broken away from a parliament if they had been given a voice within it.

You screaming idiot.

And again such a belief as apparently required by libertarian doctrine is evidence of its impracticality of real world application to the governing of human societies. Libertarianism thus ultimately is Corporatism. We fought a revolution against that FOR liberty. The framers had major concerns with corporations. Corporations were seen as creations of the state and thus fully under the authority of whatever laws we wish to apply to them.

You guys are really asking for a fascist dictatorship lead by the likes of Herr Palin. You deserve such but the rest of us sure as heck don't.




"I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed
corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a
trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country."

Thomas Jefferson, 1812
Source:Liberty Quotes

Libertarian principles are at odds with corporatism, which finds full function in law under fascist regimes. The individual becomes less important while corporations support a government from which they receive privileges and protection. This is the opposite of what libertarians believe.

Have you ever read any of Mises work, or Hayek?

Troll, Thomas Jefferson also owned slaves, was a very poor manager of his household and business finances, was a terrible war time commander, caused the U.S. go into a nearly decade long depression by his boycott and argued rather stupidly that the U.S. should not have large cities.

Successful trolling is successful.

Yeah TJ was a troll too.

Uh-huh.

Every time you butcher the English language a kitten is murdered.

Please, Muirgeo, won't you think of the kittens.

I'm not sure why it required a blog post. I've never heard anyone argue against free speech for corporations.

It strikes me as self evident that corporations are legal fictions, but maybe I've just been reading too much Sam Grove:

"At the end of the day, there are no governments and no corporations. There are only people and their behaviors."

Apologies to you MnM, but I want this upfront so I post it as a reply.

"GMU law professor Ilya Somin, in a post at The Volokh Conspiracy, answers those who insist that corporations do not have first-amendment rights."

I am sorry but this is very facile to be sure, but still just an opinion by Ilya Somin. Though facile, I don’t think she makes her case for the reasons I made on the previous post. As a matter of fact she shows the same disingenuousness of which I accuse DK, Tex, muirduck, Gil, and others.

I will now try to draw all of that together. BTW, I know that I will draw ire, but some cages need to be rattled here.

“In my last post, I explained why it’s a mistake to deny free speech rights to people organized as corporations on the grounds that corporations aren’t “real people.” It’s true, of course, that a corporation is not a person. But the people who own and operate it are. “Corporate speech” is really just speech by people using the corporate form.”

There is your prime example of a disingenuous presentation. Ilya claims that denying corporations the right of free speech is denying the individuals who formed the corporation free speech. Nothing could be further from the truth. Those individuals still have their individual right of free speech and their rights are in no way infringed by a restriction on the corporation.

Corporations, paper fictions, are formed for a reason, and the most basic reason is to protect and shield wealth from the taxman. To say that an owner(s) of a corporation can then have two voices, one fabulously wealthy and the other as in common with the people in general, in advocacy of a policy or candidate is taking the concept of free speech far beyond what I believe the founders intended, and certainly far beyond what I would like to see.

The individuals are free to join together in common cause using their own documented salaries and energy to promote a cause or candidate, denying the paper fiction the same rights is hardly a cancellation of their right to free speech.

“The same point applies to corporate speech and property rights. When corporations “speak,” they are just a means that individuals use to exercise their rights of free speech — often a more effective means than the available alternatives. And just as the right protected in Griswold actually was a human right rather than a right belonging to the contraceptives, property rights are rights of human owners, not rights belonging to tracts of land or objects.”

Again Ilya makes a disingenuous statement, “The same point applies to corporate speech and property rights.” How she connects property rights to corporative free speech, even after reading the link, is a mystery to me. As a matter of fact she has to twist in upon herself, because she herself said in her linked article, that the rights are invested in the people not the property. If she were going to draw any conclusion it would have to be that free speech rights are invested in the individual people, not the corporation they own.

She has it backwards, in my opinion.

“After all, contraceptives are just a means that women use to exercise their rights to reproductive choice, albeit a particularly effective one.”

This just drives my case home, rights are invested in the women not the contraceptive. Free speech rights are invested in the people not the businesses they own.

Here is where I think libertarians are missing the boat.
When has the national libertarian party ever garnered even 5% of the total vote? Never. Are there the rare libertarian winning and serving in the House, Yes. Very rare. Local elections produce some wins for the libertarians, but not many.

The talk on this Café is about “well we just have to work at educating the people”. Well, gents, care to tell me how you’re going to educate the nation when Microsoft can buy and sell everyone of you and never get out of petty cash? Notice I said Microsoft (the corporations), not Bill Gates (the person). Is there a difference in the amount of exposed wealth to be used to advocate? I suspect that there would be. BTW, don’t come at me with the strict focus of Microsoft and Bill Gates, I just used them as a convenient example, we just as easily used General Motors as a corporation and the CEO of that corporation as the individual.

I know I have repeatedly railed against the government in D.C. as a “foreign” government to me, and that statement has repeatedly drawn approval from many on this Café.

Why should a foreign government have the power to screw up my world?

Well Libertarians, why should a foreign corporation, Microsoft-Inc. Washington state, United Auto Workers-inc. Michigan state, etc. etc. etc. be granted the power to come and screw up your world.

Think about it Libertarians, would it improve your chances locally to win elections if you only had to compete against money and people from your own district or state? I suspect it would.

And if Libertarians won more elections, their ideas would get more exposure and in short order Libertarians would be more main stream and competitive because they would have a track record to show for their ideas and principles.

Knee jerking to the status quo and conventional wisdom is not a good idea ever, and believing that denying human rights to a paper fiction is a denial of individual human rights is somehow as twisted as it gets.

Like I pointed out in the previous post on this subject, the United Auto Workers came into a local district here in the Houston area and in 1996 spent huge sums of money to elect a retread dimwit democrat to the House of Reps. They bought him, and the people in his district had no representation in D.C. because of that. The United Auto Workers had representation but not the locals.

Doesn’t that bother any one but me?

It would not deny one single individual in this world free speech to restructure the election rules to eliminate money in campaigns that is not generated from people within the district, state, or nation in which the election is being held. Could this idea be made workable, I think it could. Is it wise, in my opinion yes.

One of the reason I rebelled in the first place is because my local representative to the House of Reps in D.C. was being bought by people and corporations that were foreign to that district. And, this happened in two states.

We have something wrong in this country and one of the things is this confusion that paper fictions and agreements among men should be granted individual rights as if they were natural free men/women.

I close with this, contrary to Ilya, Don, Russ, and others, not one single individual in this nation is denied free speech rights when a corporation, paper fiction, is denied advocacy.

Take your best shots people, but please read and think, then read and think again before you do, please.

Vidyohs.... we agree on something!?!

Long ago I told you that people on the left and right typically see and identify the same problems in the same way, where we differ is in our solutions.

You and I will never agree on that level because everything you want brings harm to people, harm and degeneration because it is the same old tired socialist crap served up in your temples of socialism and sold to idiots such as yourself.

Further more I doubt seriously we agree on this as I have never seen evidence that you have thought anything through with any completeness.