Posted by Carol Riess on 09/23/09
Last updated 09/23/09

There has been an interesting development in the Supreme Court on the subject of corporate personhood. It came up during oral arguments on the case Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission.  Citizens United, a non-profit advocacy organization partially funded by for-profit corporations, was barred by the FEC from advertising or distributing their documentary Hillary: The Movie during the 2008 primary season, as an alleged violation of federal election financing laws limiting electioneering by corporations.

The government makes its case for the validity and enforcement of these laws in the interest of preventing undue influence on elections by large corporations.  The difficulty lies in differentiating between the huge corporations the law was intended to tame, and the 96% of corporations that are small companies or individuals in business for themselves, or even associations of individuals banded together for the express purpose of advocacy for some cause.  How can you limit the free speech of one without limiting the free speech of all?  You can't.  Citizens United argues to overturn the law and precedent and allow full 1^st Amendment free speech protection to all corporations.

But there is a more fundamental issue here.  Did the Founding Fathers intend the 1^st Amendment protection of free speech to apply to corporations, which are artificial persons?  I think not.  The Bill of Rights did not give us any rights; it was an acknowledgment of the God-given rights of natural persons.  Ascribing these rights - and personhood - to corporations was a later aberration, of the age of Darwin, which saw no difference between man and ape and corporation.

This came up, briefly, during oral arguments on September 9^th from, of all persons, Justice Sonia Sotomayor.  During questioning, Justice Sotomayor acknowledged that "... the courts who created corporations as persons, gave birth to corporations as persons, ... there could be an argument made that that was the Court's error to start with, ... the fact that the Court imbued a creature of the State with human characteristics." 

(Page 33 of official transcript of oral argument,
http://www.supremecourtus.gov/oral_arguments/argument_transcripts/08-205[Reargue
d].pdf)

Now, before you get too excited about this being the beginning of the end of corporatism, the chances of this making it into the final decision and overturning the corporate monster are approximately zero.  Corporate personhood is too firmly entrenched, and the case at hand is way too narrow to affect it.

But I thought it interesting that this has at least been questioned now, in the highest Court of the land.

(Thanks to Margaret Zonia Morrison, J.D., for the tip.)

Posted 10/03/09 Ike Hall Clarkston, GA

Thank you for this post. While I agree that corporate personhood is ridiculous on its face, I'm generally less worried about that than I am about corporatizing natural persons. I've heard much about the 14th Amendment's role in this but I am having a difficult time separating fact from exaggeration.

Posted 11/13/09 rickw Zionsville, IN

Thank you for the post - I have secretly thought for some time now that one of the big problems with our government is that the voices of the average citizens like you and me gets drowned out by the big corporate political donors, because "freedom of speech" includes "political speech," which includes the right to write a check to a politician. It's nice to have a sanity check and see that others feel the same way I do.

 
Posted by Carol Riess on 08/07/09

Interesting OpEd by Ralph Benco at WashingtonExaminer.com about the breakdown of the Left, citing scathing denunciations of populist MoveOn.org by the elitist liberal media and blogs, while action appeals to the rank and file are getting a weak response:

While the Right is bemoaning The Fall of Western Civilization As We Know It, so, on other grounds, is the ... elitist Left. Looks like the Left's having a power failure. ...

Let's take note that the Left's powerhouse rank and file are becoming strangely inert. But of greater significance is the hatred of the elitist Left for the populist Left.   Much of what is wrong with the many Obama prescriptions is not merely that they are leftist. They are elitist, implying a disdain for ordinary people's ability to manage their own affairs. ...

Elitists fear the values of democracy and liberty, more so from within their own movement.... Politics 2.0 is as much about populism vs. elitism as it is about Left vs. Right; and the shape of the future will depend as much upon whether the elitist Left or the populist Left prevails as it does upon the Left's emerging power failure.

(Read the rest here:
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columns/OpEd-Contributor/Dont-miss-the
-Elite-Left-vs-the-Populist-Left-52349522.html.)

This confirms something that I have long held to be a possibility:  that when things finally come to a head, the masks are torn away, and the rank and file Obama supporters wake up to what has been going on, we may well find many erstwhile liberals marching by our side as allies.

As we know, it's not really a matter of Republican vs. Democrat or Left vs. Right. It's Statism (Elitism) vs. Liberty (We the People). This is now shaping up among the Democrats, as it already has in the Republican party.

 
Posted by Carol Riess on 08/07/09
Last updated 08/07/09

Here is a copy of my letter to the editor of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

Re:  Arrests at Carnahan town hall

Dear Sir,

According to reports in stltoday.com and kmov.com, the man who was assaulted after the Carnahan town hall was a conservative activist handing out yellow flags - presumably his attackers were of the other persuasion. Of the six arrests, two were the (Democrat) assailants and three were arrested because they were videoing or taking pictures of the scene to document what was going on. So why are the conservative protesters being blamed for this?

In another instance of wrong target, PD blogger Wong laments the lack of civil discourse, implying the tea party protesters are at fault. But where is the civil discourse in Congress, with the Democrat leadership trying to rush the health bill through with no real debate?

This is classic Chicago style politics, to cause a disruption and then blame the other side for it.

Carol Riess

Posted 08/10/09 Carol Riess St Louis, MO

This letter will appear in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch on Wednesday, August 12th.

 
Posted by Carol Riess on 08/05/09

The results are in. The U City sales tax increase was defeated with 63% of the vote. A petition being circulated at the same time requesting an audit by the State Auditor's Office is getting an 83% favorable response (signing the petition).

This was entirely the result of a grass roots initiative by Citizens for Transparency & Accountability, which is just a group of ordinary people who decided they had had enough. Grass Roots Rules!

This is doubly significant, as University City is considered "uber liberal," with a demographic heavy with academics. We're even going to host Claire McCaskill for her Healthcare Listening Forum at the local high school!

Tax-and-spend liberals at all levels of government are hereby placed on notice: even your liberal base isn't buying it any more.

Posted 08/09/09 MarshaDuggan Ferguson, MO

I have written all members of Congress in my District and have put them on notice that they will be replaced in 2010! I am searching for Candidates in other Parties Marsha Clark