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Corporate Personhood

Should Corproations have "personhood" rights?

  • Yes, corporations are just like a person

    Votes: 6 9.4%

  • No, corporations are not just like a person

    Votes: 58 90.6%
  • Total voters
    64
The Mark said:
Going back to the OP question, I have a question.

At what point in time did corporations gain any or all the rights of a person?

At the time, I assumed it was in reference to the recent SCOTUS decision.

I have a different take on the SCOTUS decision.

As a disclaimer, I haven’t read the SCOTUS decision, and all information I have gleaned about it has been screened through DP (I is lazy).

SCOTUS was not saying "A corporation has the right to free speech".

SCOTUS was saying "preventing the use of corporate funds for political ads by those individuals who control said corporation limits the free speech rights of those individuals."

Any thoughts?
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[ame=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_personhood_debate]Corporate personhood debate - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame]
"In the United States, corporations were recognized as having rights to contract, and to have those contracts honored the same as contracts entered into by natural persons, in Dartmouth College v. Woodward Corporations were recognized as persons for purposes of the 14th Amendment in an 1886 Supreme Court Case, Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad, 118 U.S. 394. Some critics of corporate personhood, such as author Thom Hartmann in his book "Unequal Protection: The Rise of Corporate Dominance and the Theft of Human Rights," claim that this was an intentional misinterpretation of the case inserted into the Court record by reporter J.C. Bancroft Davis. [1] Bancroft Davis had previously served as president of Newburgh and New York Railway Co."
 
The Mark said:
… SCOTUS was not saying "A corporation has the right to free speech".

SCOTUS was saying "preventing the use of corporate funds for political ads by those individuals who control said corporation limits the free speech rights of those individuals."

Any thoughts?
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What if “those individuals who control said corporation” are not citizens of this country?

:confused:
 
Chappy said:
What if “those individuals who control said corporation” are not citizens of this country?

:confused:
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Non-citizens have a right to freedom of speech too.
 
"Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; but only for individual people and not groups or corporations."

Hey, look, you guys are right!
 
misterman said:
Please don't start throwing out insults or accusing me of not knowing what I'm talking about. I know this stuff really well. Of course there are exceptions - but the exceptions have nothing to do with who is speaking.
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You don't know what you are talking about and that is evident.
misterman said:
No.

But you can be a group and not an individual. Individuals aren't the only entities that have rights under the First Amendment.
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Religion is an idea. The Press is an idea. The People is the people. No entities besides people are mentioned in the first amendment.

misterman said:
No it doesn't.
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Yes it does.

misterman said:
No it doesn't.
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Amendment I

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
 
The Mark said:
Consequences, of course.

And no need to call me names.
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If you're going to be obtuse then expect to be labeled as such. If you prefer not to be labeled as such then perhaps consider not being obtuse.

Now, what are the consequences? Are they legal consequences? Is there in fact laws that restrict free speech or not?
 
NoJingoLingo said:
You don't know what you are talking about and that is evident.
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Others have said that too, and found out otherwise. You're no different.

Religion is an idea. The Press is an idea. The People is the people. No entities besides people are mentioned in the first amendment.
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The press is an entity.
 
Chappy said:
What if “those individuals who control said corporation” are not citizens of this country?

:confused:
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I dunno, does campaign finance law restrict campaign contributions to US-only contributors?

If a foreign corporation funds a political add for a candidate, wouldn't that be a point said candidates' opponents could use against him/her? Something like “X foreign corporation wants Y candidate to win because A, B, C.”
 
misterman said:
Others have said that too, and found out otherwise. You're no different.



The press is an entity.
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Well, it seems you have no new arguments. You are simply repeating the same ones that have been refuted so. I'm done re-refuting them.
 
NoJingoLingo said:
If you're going to be obtuse then expect to be labeled as such. If you prefer not to be labeled as such then perhaps consider not being obtuse.

Now, what are the consequences? Are they legal consequences? Is there in fact laws that restrict free speech or not?
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I wasn't being obtuse.

I completely recognized what you were actually saying.

I chose to make a point about grammar, and/or inalienable rights. After all, you CAN do anything. The repercussions for such, however...
 
The Mark said:
I dunno, does campaign finance law restrict campaign contributions to US-only contributors?
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Yes.

But this has nothing to do with campaign finance.
 
NoJingoLingo said:
Well, it seems you have no new arguments. You are simply repeating the same ones that have been refuted so. I'm done re-refuting them.
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Sounds just like you. And you've stooped to worse.

The First Amendment clearly limits the power of Congress to ban speech. Nothing about who is speaking is mentioned.
 
misterman said:
Yes.

But this has nothing to do with campaign finance.
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Explain please?

How can restrictions on foreign donations to a campaign have nothing to do with campaign finance?
 
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The Mark said:
Explain please?
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This decision isn't about corporations giving money to campaigns, or anyone else. "Campaign finance" refers to financing the campaigns of candidates for office, i.e. donations. Corporations are still banned from giving money from their treasuries to federal campaigns or parties.

It's only about corporations spending money to run ads or publish things giving their opinions about candidates directly, like anything else. That's it.
 
The Mark said:
Explain please?

How can restrictions on foreign donations to a campaign have nothing to do with campaign finance?
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You added the foreign part later. Please see my reply. Foreign corporations are also banned from giving money to candidates, as are individuals.
 
misterman said:
This decision isn't about corporations giving money to campaigns, or anyone else. "Campaign finance" refers to financing the campaigns of candidates for office, i.e. donations. Corporations are still banned from giving money from their treasuries to federal campaigns or parties.

It's only about corporations spending money to run ads or publish things giving their opinions about candidates directly, like anything else. That's it.
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Ah.

It would seem to me that such ads could be used against the candidates they support, under the right conditions.

For example, if an ad supporting Pres. Bush's reelection in 2004 had been funded solely by one of the largest oil companies, or even worse, a group of the largest oil companies...

Edit: Added another response.

misterman said:
You added the foreign part later. Please see my reply. Foreign corporations are also banned from giving money to candidates, as are individuals.
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Sorry about that.
 
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The Mark said:
I dunno, does campaign finance law restrict campaign contributions to US-only contributors? …
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Yes, you need to be a citizen to contribute to a political campaign. Or at least you use to have to be a citizen.

:confused:
 
The Mark said:
Ah.

It would seem to me that such ads could be used against the candidates they support, under the right conditions.

For example, if an ad supporting Pres. Bush's reelection in 2004 had been funded solely by one of the largest oil companies, or even worse, a group of the largest oil companies...
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Yes, freedom of speech used to deal with freedom of speech. Just how its supposed to work.
 
The Mark said:
Going back to the OP question, I have a question.

At what point in time did corporations gain any or all the rights of a person?

At the time, I assumed it was in reference to the recent SCOTUS decision.
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1886, in the Santa Clara decision noted above. This principle has since been affirmed in dozens of other decisions over the past 130 years. The fact that some random jackass claims it wasn't actually part of the record doesn't mean dick. We went over this exact issue almost a year ago:

http://www.debatepolitics.com/gover...orations-have-right-lobby.html#post1057901320

I was curious about this "Hartmann" guy, so I decided to see where he got his law degree.

By 1967, Hartmann was studying at Michigan State University and working as part-time news announcer at local country music station WITL while protesting the Vietnam War with Students for a Democratic Society (SDS). He received his C.H. (Chartered Herbalist) degree from Dominion Herbal College, an M.H. (Master of Herbology) degree from Emerson College, and a Ph.D. in Homeopathic Medicine from Brantridge in England.
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Yea, that's exactly who I want to be getting my views on 19th century jurisprudence from.
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NoJingoLingo said:
Do you believe Roe V Wade was a "good" legal decision?
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No. Point?
 
The Mark said:
Ah.

It would seem to me that such ads could be used against the candidates they support, under the right conditions.

For example, if an ad supporting Pres. Bush's reelection in 2004 had been funded solely by one of the largest oil companies, or even worse, a group of the largest oil companies...

Edit: Added another response.



Sorry about that.
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What the SCOTUS did was say that corporations can have political speech protected. Since they've ruled before that spending money on campaign ads is political speech and therefore protected speech, they can spend all they want on political speech. What we are arguing about it that the SCOTUS effectively gave corporations the same 1st amendment right as people. Corporations are not people, but rather entities COMPLETELY unlike a person and are not therefore protected like a person i.e. corporate personhood.

I even provided the legal definition of a corporation.

Corporations | LII / Legal Information Institute
 
NoJingoLingo said:
What we are arguing about it that the SCOTUS effectively gave corporations the same 1st amendment right as people. Corporations are not people, but rather entities COMPLETELY unlike a person and are not therefore protected like a person i.e. corporate personhood.
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Yes, you keep saying it, but you're wrong. You have your own theory of things which does not match what actually is. You made it up.
 
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