Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
Ever since the SCOTUS decision in Citizen's United, liberals have taken aim at "corporate personhood" as the root of all evil (never mind that the Court's decision did not actually depend upon the notion that corporations are constitutional "persons"). This new crusade against corporations has now taken shape as a constitutional amendment, proposed by ultra-liberal Reps Theodore Deutch, Peter DeFazo, Alcee Hastings, and Jim McDermott, as well as Vermont Socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders.
First off, let’s give them credit for actually proposing an amendment. The usual liberal tactic since Earl Warren’s day has been to rely on activist judges to change the Constitution. So, hat’s off to those with the guts to admit that some changes require an amendment.
That said, just look at what they are proposing!
Section 1. The rights protected by the Constitution of the United States are the rights of natural persons and do not extend to for-profit corporations, limited liability companies, or other private entities established for business purposes or to promote business interests under the laws of any state, the United States, or any foreign state.
Section 2. Such corporate and other private entities established under law are subject to regulation by the people through the legislative process so long as such regulations are consistent with the powers of Congress and the States and do not limit the freedom of the press.
Section 3. Such corporate and other private entities shall be prohibited from making contributions or expenditures in any election of any candidate for public office or the vote upon any ballot measure submitted to the people.
Section 4. Congress and the States shall have the power to regulate and set limits on all election contributions and expenditures, including a candidate’s own spending, and to authorize the establishment of political committees to receive, spend, and publicly disclose the sources of those contributions and expenditures.
Since virtually all media outlets are organized as corporations or other entities established for business purposes, the Section 2 promise of preserving “freedom of the press” is a dead letter. But even if that freedom gets preserved, what of the others. Under this amendment there would be no Fourth Amendment objection to searching the offices of any corporation without warrant or probably cause. The government could expropriate the property of any business with no Fifth Amendment requirement of “just compensation.” In fact, corporations and other businesses could be criminally prosecuted with no worries about “due process.”
Have they gone mad? Or is this what they want?
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Comments :
Dec '11
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
Crazy people are crazy? Who knew?
Dec '10
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
Seems like they've conveniently excluded non-profits and unions unless "other private entities" is interpreted to include them.
Oct '10
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
Wow !!! Pretty soon they will be using the Constitution to limit corporations in the same way they're already using the courts to eliminate the rights that "natural persons" once had.
Edited on Dec 21, 2011 at 12:32pmJun '11
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
Both. I think they are crazy AND this is exactly what they want. The great thing is that there are so many holes in it that it is laughable.
Citizens United couldn't send out a flyer endorsing a candidate, yet AARP could. Bank of America couldn't, yet ABC Credit Union could.
AARP would become the example for the work around. Form a non-profit corporation that takes donations from corporations. It wouldn't stop political speech at all (until they amended it again), but it would do away with corporate constitutional protections regarding due process, search and seizure, etc.
Edited on Dec 21, 2011 at 1:17pmRe: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
raycon: Wow !!! Pretty soon they will be using the Constitution to limit corporations in the same way they're already using the courts to eliminate the rights that "natural persons" once had. · Dec 21 at 12:31pm
Edited on Dec 21 at 12:32 pm
No doubt there will soon be a fundamental right to dissolve any corporation within the first trimester.
May '10
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
It's ironic that you should bring this up the same day as our latest debate over marriage and civil unions. Marriage and corporations are both means by which government and society treat multiple persons as a single legal entity (in the case of marriage, a "family" or "household").
Nov '11
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
Did you just ask if Bernie Sanders has gone mad? Excuse me.
Hahahahahahahahaha.
Jun '10
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
Adam Freedman
raycon: Wow !!! Pretty soon they will be using the Constitution to limit corporations in the same way they're already using the courts to eliminate the rights that "natural persons" once had. · Dec 21 at 12:31pm
Edited on Dec 21 at 12:32 pm
No doubt there will soon be a fundamental right to dissolve any corporation within the first trimester. · Dec 21 at 12:39pm
Or during the first nine months if a doctor signs off on it.
Jul '10
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
Yeah, they mean it. I expect Section 2 is a way to ensure that only media corporations (whom Democrats consider friends) have any ability to sway elections.
By the way, isn't corporate "personhood" the legal basis on which corporate revenues are taxed?
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
What of the contract clause? That's in the constitution. Congress can now make laws breaking private contracts, it appears.
Apr '11
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
The way I read the "freedom of the press" clause in Section 2 is a way to exempt their darlings in the media - it's fine to make a profit so long as you deliver leftist propaganda.
"The rights protected by the Constitution of the United States are the rights of natural persons and do not extend to for-profit corporations, limited liability companies, or other private entities established for business purposes or to promote business interests."
Does this extend to enviornmental groups who promote the "business interests" of alternative energy corporations? I'm surprised they don't slip in a vague "public good" clause to protect the businesses they like.
If only we had some sort of "Ghost of Christmas (er, I mean Solstice) Future" machine to show these people the hell they would create. A wonderful paradise of tiny "Mom & Pop" businesses who never expand - and, thus, create no jobs - because to do so would risk personal bankruptcy.
it's a disgrace that such idiots are in any position of power.
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
That's right - well, without the legal fiction of corporate personhood, corporations couldn't own property in the first place. But to be fair, the liberals (or most of them) don't dispute the general legal fiction, but they insist that corporations cannot enjoy any of the rights that the Constitution (supposedly) reserves only to human beings.
Nov '11
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
Great, a constitutional amendment guaranteeing that the bulk of America's business will be done off-book.
Mar '11
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
Since corporations use their fictitious "personhood" to sign contracts, what becomes of the contracts they are already party to? Contracts like labor agreements, royalty assignments, and all that stuff?
Talk about a "reset" button.
Apr '11
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
Citizens United is a great example of why we should be careful in saying that the other branches can ignore the SCOTUS when it gets things wrong. We like the Constitution and current Constitutional jurisprudence far more than they do, and should work to keep it strong.
Dec '10
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
We are the most hyper-regulated society on the face of the earth. Not only are we hyper-regulated in the Federal Code but we enforce our regulations to a much greater degree then Europe or the Pacific Rim. The idea that allowing Corporations to go without elementary due process rights in the face of the already obsessional regulatory climate is so completely stupid as to awe me.
One of the things that I think gives America it's unique character is this very notion of full Corporate personhood. By doing this we lock together the weakest members of society and the strongest memebers of society in mutual self interest. They have a mutual self interest in preserving basic human rights. This is good for the long term preservation of freedom and justice.
May '10
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
Adam Freedman
That's right - well, without the legal fiction of corporate personhood, corporations couldn't own property in the first place....· Dec 21 at 2:52pm
That's what I thought immediately. If companies are not "persons" then they could not own cars, computers, and stuff like that.
Nov '11
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
I'm not knowledgeable enough to do this, but we need someone who knows the law to make a case here in favor of this and talk about if the wording is good or bad.
To my ears, the wording sounds poorly constructed and like it could have unintended consequences.
Oct '10
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
Fred Cole: I'm not knowledgeable enough to do this, but we need someone who knows the law to make a case here in favor of this and talk about if the wording is good or bad.
To my ears, the wording sounds poorly constructed and like it could have unintended consequences. · Dec 22 at 5:25am
A great deal of the "unintended consequences" of such laws are in fact intended by the laws authors, but not necessarily by the naive congressmen who pass it.
Nov '11
Re: Proposed Amendment: No Rights for Businesses
raycon
A great deal of the "unintended consequences" of such laws are in fact intended by the laws authors, but not necessarily by the naive congressmen who pass it. · Dec 22 at 6:16am
Too true. What's worse are the unintended consequences that are unintended.