People, like myself, who are shocked by the Supreme Court's recent outrageous decision on campaign finance reform and who also have supported the AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION in the past, may wish to reconsider that support in light of their amicus brief to SCOTUS which supported the majority decision. They also challenged a Vermont attempt at finance reform in 2003. Enough!
Tony Vodvarka

Perhaps, as suggested in another discussion, we should incorporate as The People, inc.

Gary

Your mission if you choose to accept it is: How are the Five Members, who voted to destroy the Remnants of Our Constitution and its Amendments, being paid? Nothing should be hidden and if it is it must be found. Did Kennedy write the Majority Ruling via dictation? I am sure that there has been undo influence somewhere and blackmail. Pure, terrifying blackmail somewhere.
My Read. Anyone else? . This is a stab in the heart of an already collapsing Democracy.
Let us pray! I feel like a kid under my seat at school during bomb practice, NW B

ps I am sure someone watches the highest court in our land. We need you now to be watching this week-end. Toot suite. moments can't be lost An underground access?

The most interesting part of this post is the statement that "persons" cannot be prevented from expressing political speech, implying that protesters cannot be arrested.

I wonder if the lower courts will recognize and implement this idea, and how long it will be before cities (and the white house) try to prevent it from being implemented.

What are the precedents for 'reciprocal' dynamics of recognition in the constitution? (eg: if 'thus-and-such' is 'this', then this is thus-and-such)

A tough question.

searching for "reciprocal regognition of personhood in the constitution"

paragraph from a book review http://ndpr.nd.edu/review.cfm?id=16005

"On Pippin's reading, an agent can establish the relevant kind of subjective self-relation only if she already stands within institutional, norm-governed relations of reciprocal recognition to others. This objective element of free actions stems from the fact that Hegel understands justification to be a fundamentally social practice -- "the giving of and asking for reasons" by participants in a set of shared institutions. (24) Since it is the character of the agent's justifying reasons for her deeds that distinguish free actions from unfree ones, such justifying reasons will be simply those that are accepted by like-minded others. To argue for this point, Pippin defends a number of counter-intuitive ideas relating to individual responsibility that are central to Hegel's conception of agency. Since Hegel rejects the idea that being an agent means, first and foremost, being a cause of one's action, having an intention cannot simply consist in possessing a specific subjective state that produces a determinate action. Rather, according to Pippin, expressing an intention amounts to "avowing a pledge to act, the content and credibility of which remains (even for me), in a way, suspended until I begin to fulfill the pledge." (151) It is not until my intention is recognized by others and myself as being fulfilled or realized in my deed that I can identify my act as my own. Justification thus turns out to be more retrospective than prospective, a process in which, Pippin argues, the agent's own stance on her action is by no means authoritative. Being an agent -- being able to provide reasons to others to justify one's deeds -- is itself an "achieved social status such as, let us say, being a citizen or being a professor, a product or result of mutually recognitive attitudes." (155) On Pippin's account, Hegel's view is that rational norms are those that admit of mutual recognition -- those which can actually serve as justifications for actions within a community -- and he argues that the norms operative within the shared institutions of modern ethical life (Sittlichkeit) have this rational character. Hence, in addition to being essentially norm-governed, free agency is irreducibly intersubjective and institutional, and ultimately only possible within the specific social context of modern ethical life.

We need a confiscatory tax on all "personal" wealth above, say, $1 billion.

Here is the transparency we asked for.

We need to prosecute the corps for murder on a daily basis.

"Does anyone else see the ray of hope in this line of reasoning? Apparently, the government can no longer arrest protestors during political demonstrations . . . "

On what planet?

The cop does not write on the bust sheet "for exercising freedom of speech" any more than 0bama says he kills and tortures Afghanis for defending God and country.

More specifically, positing personhood for corporations is a specific tool for denying personhood to humans. The rights corporations claim they claim from others.

From 1861-1865 the bloody American Civil War killed over 600 thousand soldiers and caused many more casualties. The abolition of slavery no longer allowed people to be considered property to be bought and sold in the markets or on the street of the United States. In 2010 the Supreme Court of these United States ruled that the free speech of corporations, which are sold at auction on the New York Stock Exchange and traded on the streets OTC cannot be regulated because they are people. It seems that we have come to their logic that property and people are interchangeable in the minds of five justices. What else have they yet to convolute?

Seeing corporations want all the niceties that go with being a person maybe they should have to deal with some of the negative things that people can be confronted with, like when for example, they kill someone.

Maybe Black Water or whatever they are calling themselves nowadays should be charged with murder and if convicted be given the death penalty.

In all the articles I have read here since the SCOTUS gave the decision they have spent their lives waiting to "Render", no one has even mentioned Santa Clara vs SP Railroad in 1886. THAT'S the 'foundation' that was used 'with a wink and a nod' to give the corporate animals their 'beachhead'. I'm sure that tons of the posters here know about this and the writers MUST if they've got any handle on what's happening.

Short Version (if memory serves): At that time a VP from Eastern Railroad was acting as the Clerk of the Court hearing Santa Clara. THIS MAN inserted language in the Header of the decision by the court. His insertion had NOTHING to do with the case in question and his language in the Header has/had "No Legal Standing". He could have been writing a sonnet to his concubine for all the legal merit of his words.

THAT is the "Foundation" for the current "Dred Scott" decision, except now we are all Slaves in America in the eyes of the animal Roberts (another Taney if I ever saw one) et al.

This flew under the radar last week that clearly suggest the US is bending over to support the uber rich and corporate rule. Obama and a group of blue dog democats are planning another back door, closed door meeting after the November elections that will allow Obama to issue an....

"executive order to create an 18-member panel that would be granted broad authority with the power to propose changes/reductions in the tax code and in the massive federal entitlement programs — including Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security — that threaten to drive the nation’s debt to levels not seen since World War II".

These "changes" could lead to drastic cuts in Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid and changes in our existing tax laws without congressional approval.

The National Committee on Social Security and Medicare is fighting this committee and their proposals.

http://www.ncpssm.org/entitledtoknow/?p=803

My corporation is selling advertising space on its forehead. As my corporation's vision plan is to become a Faux News pundit, imagine the not-so-subtle prodding to buy Coke or McDonalds everytime I'm up there pontificating about our consumer cultural wasteland, which only a return to Jesus can combat.

The article suggests that individuals might wish to incorporate themselves to obtain the rights recently granted to corporations by SCOTUS. Sounds like a good idea to me and I understand it can be done relatively inexpensively. Does anyone happen to know what are the first steps to take in order to do this? Better yet, has anyone tried it and if so, how's the process going for you? Enquiring minds want to know.

WE could all form corporations, permutations of We, Inc., We Limited, We International, You, Inc., You and Me etc.. Conceivably, we could make Delaware very rich doing this. But what is missing? The money. Corporations are chartered to make money. Therefore, what is the difference between us claiming additional representation through incorporation and corporations doing it? Money. The right of free speech has been TRANSFERRED to money. Speech - and the representation and legislation it seeks - must now be paid for. It is not free.

In a very similar situation, the financial crisis transferred fraudulent paper turned into bad debt to the public. This was also made possible by the removal of legislative restraint, which was accomplished by the purchasing power of lobbying, financing elections and the control over national dialogue and understanding via a monopoly on the public "marketplace" of ideas.

Our money has been transferred to the multinational corporations, and they have used it to buy our freedom of speech, our right to have our grievances addressed, and our right of representation right out from under us.

I know that judges can be impeached, but I don't know the particulars of just cause. I would submit that the five justices who are unable to tell the difference between a human being with the rights of citizenship and an entity chartered for the purpose of making money should be excused for incompetence.

One problem with your suggestions is that most people are law abiding and would hesitate to do what you say. Large corporations on the other hand, are out and out criminal enterprises, or exist on the edge of lawlessness whenever and wherever their profit making imperative is concerned.

Our loss of democracy is a boon for politician's bank accounts so we can hardly depend on them to try to correct the SCOTUS' ruling. It will be up to We the People and I agree that mass demonstrations will be necessary and are long overdue. Maybe progressives can steal teabagger's thunder or they can join us.

When can we have one? What can we call it?

It's apparent that republicans are willing to cheat, kick, scratch, club, bomb, even make war, in order to advance their political agenda, and only a political dunce (enter Obama) would loose sight of that and try to offer fig leaves to the barbarous predators of the opposition party.

Too bad the Obama team didn't drive a wooden stake through the heart of conservatism when they had the chance right after they were elected. Instead, the Democrats held the naive notion that democracy in our country could flourish in conjunction with predatory capitalism, when, as the recent Supreme court ruling vividly demonstrates, the two have become mutually exclusive.

Supreme concerns regarding creeping corporatism

This posting initially is in response to Greenwald’s most recent article(s) regarding the Supreme Court Ruling and was posted on a different thread, yet it resonates with this article by Amster and seems to belong here:

“Since subject position is everything” to quote Patricia Williams from Alchemy of Race and Rights: Diary of a Law Professor, let me just say that I am NOT a constitutional lawyer, much less a lawyer.

Nevertheless, I seek to understand both AND law as a citizen. And thus, I’m trying to delve into Glenn’s deep ambivalence regarding this ruling, a ruling I oppose, because such a ruling seems to further cement the “creeping corporatism…a truly disturbing and nefarious trend,” “the virtually absolute domination of our political process by large corporations,” “a merger of government power and corporate interests which benefits both of the merged entities (the party in power and the corporations) at everyone else’s expense” (Greenwald) – and, most importantly, to use the Supreme Court and the First Amendment to accomplish these aims.

I want to understand more that’s coming out of this discussion and Greenwald’s (whose thinking I respect) ambivalence – and much goes back to “law,” constitutional or any other, and how we think about it and the uses to which it is put.

Glenn persistently makes the claim that this ruling has nothing to do with the legal status of corporations having personhood and thus free speech, that these principles are NOT what was being argued:

“More important, I want to note one extremely bizarre aspect to the discussion yesterday. Most commenters (though not all) grounded their opposition to the Supreme Court’s ruling in two rather absolute principles: (1) corporations are not “persons” and thus have no First Amendment/free speech rights and/or (2) money is not speech, and therefore restrictions on how money is spent cannot violate the First Amendment’s free speech clause. What makes those arguments so bizarre is that none of the 9 Justices — including the 4 dissenting Justices — argued either of those propositions or believe them. To the contrary, all 9 Justices — including the 4 in dissent — agreed that corporations do have First Amendment rights and that restricting how money can be spent in pursuit of political advocacy does trigger First Amendment protections.” (Greenwald in Follow-up on the Citizens United case at http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/01/23/citizens_united/index.html )
I would argue that those principles, just or not, (referred to by Glenn and commenters like myself), are, indeed, entailed in the Court’s ruling.

And therein lies the problem.

To return to Patricia Williams’s Alchemy, a brilliant book directly related to these matters – our understanding of “law” and its application: she opens with a vignette involving an 1835 Louisiana decision regarding the “redhibitory vice of craziness” involving a female slave named Kate. Williams does so with some humor, yet at the same time, great seriousness, as she herself – a professor of law – is a descendant of slaves. And, her “subject position” is everything in her analysis of law, as is ours in law – and everything else.

The decision involves a plaintiff who paid $500 to the defendant for a slave who later ran away; it was revealed that the defendant knew the slave was crazy before he sold her to the plaintiff. The seller contended that that Kate was not crazy – but stupid – and that therefore stupidity in itself was no “defect” in the merchandise. The final ruling was that the code had declared that any vice or defect rendered the merchandise worthless – and thus included Kate the slave, who was therefore declared “wholly, and perhaps worse than, useless” (Williams 3).

The ruling this vignette references – may seem more than a bit absurd in retrospect (and you are probably wondering why I am referencing it here and now regarding the Supreme Court’s ruling).

Yet such a ruling seems absurd NOW because of the premise it entailed and is based upon: the common and accepted belief at the time that certain human beings were deemed “things” – i.e. “merchandise” – and that the institution of slavery, protected by such rulings and established “beliefs,” was therefore just and not to be questioned, beside the fact. (Not to mention whether Kate’s escapades in running away proved her to thereby be, in fact, a very sly and smart PERSON, and not crazy or stupid, contrary to anything that the code or ruling declared – depending upon her, and our, “subject” position.)

This leads us back to the absurd premise that this Supreme Court’s decision entails and is based upon: That corporations are “persons” with “legal rights.”

And THAT premise – and its consequences – as seen in this ruling, we should and must question NOW, and overthrow as necessary as we did the “legal” institution of slavery.

(Although, as many claim, the institution of slavery – indeed survives, just more covertly – within the institution that Greenwald and others refer to as corporatism.)

Fight fire with fire! Incorporate!

'WePeople' has a little more zip to it.

Maybe there's another possible line of attack on the ridiculous ruling. Let X borrow five dollars from Y, making a promissory note. When Y comes to collect, X faces Y in person, and before witnesses and/or a TV camera, says "Five dollars. May I have a receipt for my payment?"

Then Y sues X to collect, and X argues that since money is speech, speech must be money, so he has in fact paid off the note. Now the matter rests with the courts in a succession of appeals, such that whoever loses files an appeal until it gets to the Supreme Court.

Now they get to think seriously about the consequences. If they hold that Y did pay off the note, then effectively all outstanding debts can be paid off in the same fashion at no cost, which is clearly unthinkable, given all the banks that hold the debt.

If they hold for X they would be reversing their recent fiasco, since that would mean speech is not money, from which it follows that money is not speech.

In order to go between the horns of this dilemma the court would have to decide what the word "is" means. Does it have the same properties as the mathematical equals sign, (=) or does it indicate a proposition of class inclusion, as in syllogisms? I think it would have to be the latter, since in math it has long been held that if A=B, then B=A. Equality is also transitive, i.e. if A=B and B=C then A=C.

If nothing else, this would put the court in a most awkward position.

Just to add - Google ANYTHING Justice Scalia has ever said or written in the Public Record. If you can understand it you are a better man/woman than I.

My sense is that this person is certifiable - i.e. crazy as a loon.

Since corporations are people, how long before one of them runs for President?

Substitute Progressive for Liberal in this interesting piece about what faces a real alteration to the current mess:

>>This is the central conundrum of modern liberal governance: While state power has grown, America’s anti-statist public culture has persisted. Our national default setting, from which we deviate only under extreme pressure, is suspicion of state power. Half a century ago, this took the benign form so pithily characterized by political scientists Lloyd Free and Hadley Cantril, that Americans were "ideologically conservative" but "operationally liberal." Today, after policy failures at home and abroad, many American object to larger government, not (only) on ideological grounds, but also because they doubt its competence and integrity. While the American people accept many liberal aims (including fundamental health reform), they mistrust the means by which liberals typically pursue them. As Obama is discovering, change we can believe in requires a government we can trust, which most Americans don’t think we now have.

Few Americans were pleased to see hundreds of billions of dollars flowing to rescue reckless banks, a miscreant insurance company, and auto manufacturers that had been losing market share for decades. The nearly $800 billion allocated to the stimulus package have yet to produce results that most Americans can see for themselves, and arguments that things would have been even worse without it, while clearly correct, haven’t gained as much traction as the administration hoped.<<
http://www.democracyjournal.org/article.php?ID=6719

Now if this doubt could carry over to SCOTUS and corporations...

Gary

"I went West and took part in the strike of the machinists - the Southern Pacific Railroad, the corporation that swung California by its golden tail, that controlled its legislature, its farmers, its preachers, its workers."
-- Mary Harris Jones

The Supreme Court by this ruling makes a Supreme Mockery of Wisdom, Reason and Courage. The fundamental decision to confer personhood to a lifeless, intellectual, mechanical configuration i.e., a corporation is seminally carnal and evil.

"We The People, Inc."

Write-offs:
Bad debts,
tank of gas,
medical expenses,
schooling,
travel, lunches,
co. car,
.....

"...Apparently, the government can no longer arrest protestors during political demonstrations, if we are to take this literally as a matter of "strict construction." First Amendment advocates have long sought such a validation..."

i realize the article is satire...

i'm dreading though... the circular thinking...

citizens... already had the right to freely assemble... and redress of grievances... and certain unalienable rights... uhhh... called the Constitution... from which... all other law drives...

how (or WHY) does THIS twisted convolution of "rights"... need to "validate" ANYTHING... esp. what ALREADY exists... even in jest...

corporations are "created" by the states... they exist soley on a piece of paper in the states' secretary of state office...

and... is it "non-violent" to knowingly put millions out on the streets to fare for themselves... through foreclosure to face the elements... to the denial of healthcare to fend off sickness and death even as one pays premiums for coverage... or usurious interest and fees... or hidden terms and conditions esp. for existing balances... unilaterally changing the terms of contracts without warning... exposing people to debts that can lead to homelessness...

in france... just the discussion... or the possibility... of scaling back workers' benefits... wages... and hours... sent 100's... 1000's... of "people" into the streets... burning cars... and other not-so-non-violent behaviors...

sorry... Mr. Obama... if nothing else... has proved... irrefutably... "making nice" ain't gonna change a damn thing...

The one thing that actually shocks me about this SCOTUS ruling that so many articles and postings are expressing SHOCK at this ruling. Keep in mind that THIS is essentially the same SCOTUS that acted outside of their constitutional powers in even agreeing to hear Bush v Gore. By not simply ruling that all votes must be counted to determine the winner, and appointing Bush, instead, was a clear violation of the law. The justification for this reads like a Marx Brothers' movie script. Most frightening of all, was the part where SCOTUS declared that this ruling was a one-shot deal, and could not be used as precedent in future cases brought before the court.

By doing this, perhaps inadvertently, the court actually set another precedent altogether. These clowns can now reverse, say, Brown v Board of Education and rule that THIS ruling can not be used as precedent in future cases. Or, Roe v Wade. Or others that they find nettlesome. I'm surprised they haven't tried it to THIS point.

So, somebody, please explain why you thought THIS SCOTUS would actually apply logic in THIS case??