Humboldt County says no to "corporate personhood."

Published on Wednesday, June 7 2006 by The Nation
Citizens 1, Corporations 0
by John Nichols

In states across the country Tuesday, primary elections named candidates for Congress, governorships and other important offices. But the most interesting, and perhaps significant, election did not involve an individual. Rather, it was about an idea.

In Northern California's Humboldt County, voters decided by a 55-45 margin that corporations do not have the same rights -- based on the supposed "personhood" of the combines -- as citizens when it comes to participating in local political campaigns.

Until Tuesday in Humboldt County, corporations were able to claim citizenship rights, as they do elsewhere in the United States. In the context of electoral politics, corporations that were not headquartered in the county took advantage of the same rules that allowed individuals who are not residents to make campaign contributions in order to influence local campaigns.

But, with the passage of Measure T, an initiative referendum that was placed on the ballot by Humboldt County residents, voters have signaled that they want out-of-town corporations barred from meddling in local elections.

The rest of the article is at: http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0607-31.htm

years and at a great detriment to the rest of us. They claimed the rights of a citizen if it was to their benefit, they denied that they were held to the same standards and rules that an individual citizen is held to if THAT was of most benefit.

Humboldt County, now what else is it that they're famous for? Now let me see...

"activist judges" the Repugs are always bitching about because the Repugs can't afford to lose their corporate donors.

Hurry for Humboldt!

This probably isn't the last time we'll hear of this. A corporation as a person in politics?

I can imagine several nightmare scenarios. Corporations running for public office, corporations challenging election results, sponsoring bills openly, registering voters....

I'm surprised they got this far. Watch out for this.

legions of minions inhabiting the halls of Congress.

Some Congressmen are wholly owned susidiaries. And very profitable ones, too.

(Modern) "corporations are illegitimate institutions, they have no right to exist.
And their control is very fragile, they know it.
It’s in principal easy to dismantle them, they understand that.
A large part of the corporate effort to appear benevolent is to make sure that - you can read it in court decisions - "an aroused population will not take away their rights"".
-- Noam Chomsky

------

"In Europe, charters protected directors and stockholders from liability for debts and harms caused by their corporations. American legislators rejected this corporate shield. The penalty for abuse or misuse of the charter was not a plea bargain and a fine, but dissolution of the corporation."

"In 1776 we declared independence not only from British rule, but also from the corporations of England that controlled trade and extracted wealth from the US (and other) colonies. Thus, in the early days of our country, we only allowed corporations to be chartered (licensed to operate) to serve explicitly as a tool to gather investment and disperse financial liability in order to provide public goods, such as construction of roads, bridges or canals.
After fighting a revolution for freedom from colonialism, our country's founders retained a healthy fear of the similar threats posed by corporate power and wisely limited corporations exclusively to a business role. These state laws, many of which remain on the books today, imposed conditions such as these:

- A charter was granted for a limited time.
- Corporations were explicitly chartered for the purpose of serving the public interest - profit for shareholders was the means to that end.
- Corporations could engage only in activities necessary to fulfill their chartered purpose.
- Corporations could be terminated if they exceeded their authority or if they caused public harm.
- Owners and managers were responsible for criminal acts they committed on the job.
- Corporations could not make any political contributions, nor spend money to influence legislation.
- A corporation could not purchase or own stock in other corporations, nor own any property other than that necessary to fulfill its chartered purpose."


Then things changed

- Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad (1886)
"One of the most severe blows to citizen authority was seeded in the 1886 Supreme Court case of Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad.
Though the court did not make a ruling on the question of "corporate personhood", thanks to misleading notes of a clerk, the decision subsequently was used as precedent to hold that a private corporation was a natural person.
This meant that the 14th Amendment, enacted to protect rights of freed slaves, (could be) used to grant corporations Constitutional rights. Justices have since struck down hundreds of local, state and federal laws enacted to protect people from corporate harm based on this illegitimate premise."

- Minneapolis & St. Louis Railroad v. Beckwith (1889)
"Supreme Court rules a corporation is a "person" for both due process and equal protection."

"Of the 14th Amendment cases brought before the Supreme Court between 1890 and 1910, 19 dealt with African Americans, 288 dealt with corporations."

"Today, many U.S. corporations are transnational, but the corrupted charter remains the legal basis for their existence. A new generation of American patriots is learning this hidden history and recognizing that it contains many keys to successful action today."

source: Reclaim Democracy
http://reclaimdemocracy.org/
Corporate History Primer
http://reclaimdemocracy.org/pdf/primers/hidden_corporate_history.pdf
Timeline of Personhood Rights and Powers
http://reclaimdemocracy.org/personhood/personhood_timeline.pdf


See the documentary "The Corporation" (www.thecorporation.com) for more on the history and the impacts of corporations on society, and a few examples of succesful use of "these state laws" in civil action to limit the corporate power.

I did see "The Corporation" and I don't think anything has changed my views on socioeconomic systems quite like that film. I'd been pretty moderate on issues like deregulation, but not anymore. After seeing "The Corporation," I immersed myself in Zinn and Chomsky. It's been an eye-opener and a life-changer.

Nothing harder to fight than the belief that's "it's always been that way" when people have no idea of any history but the cartoon version.

A real bright spot, this is.

These are the real Americans right here. Lets overturn that 1886 Supreme Court decision and take our country back.

This needs to snowball. Corporations are NOT people yet they have more rights and fewer responsibilities.

They're not going to give up without a fight.

It's a heartening development in the battle against "corporate personhood", a cancer afflicting America for far too long.

well done Humboldt County!!!!

there was no court decision precedent

http://www.bodhitree.com/lectures/hartmann2.html


Then I walked a few blocks to the office of an old friend of mine who is a lawyer in town, and laid the copies out on his desk. "I want to ask you about the 1886 Santa Clara County case," I told him, and he answered, "Oh, you mean the one where corporations become persons." Really, that is how lawyers inevitably respond. Then I asked him to take a look at the last paragraph of the case. He read it, and said, "That's interesting." But when I had him read the first sentence of the head notes, his response was "Holy Cow!" or actually, something a little stronger. "Clearly," he said, "the head notes don't say what the ruling says." "Which means . . . ?" I asked. "Which means there is a mistake," he answered.

"A mistake?" I said. "A hundred and twenty years of American law based on a mistake?

~snip~

This is why the title of my book refers to "the rise of corporate dominance and the theft of human rights." Make no mistake: This was a theft, since the Supreme Court never actually ruled that corporations have the same rights as persons. No legislature has passed such a law, no governor or president has signed such a policy into law, and the public has never voted on such a law. In other words, it is not the result of any democratic process whatsoever. And yet, corporations have cited this principle in every sphere imaginable.

:yourock: