Ben & Jerry's Co-Founder and Move to Amend to Stamp Dollar Bills with "Corporations are not People" and "Money is not Speech"

This summer, in collaboration with the Move to Amend campaign and Occupy activists across the country, Ben Cohen, co-founder of Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream, will distribute stamps with anti-corporate personhood messages to be printed on U.S. dollar bills. Slogans to be printed include, "Corporations are not people," "Money is not speech;" and "Not to be used for bribing politicians."

Move to Amend and Cohen plan to kick off the money stamping project in Philadelphia at the Occupy National Gathering on July 4 to encourage "thousands of people to buy rubber stamps and stamp any currency that comes into their possession," Cohen told Yahoo News this week. Later this summer the group will launch a giant traveling money stamping machine to visit communities across the nation. This campaign targets the highly controversial Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission Supreme Court decision that opened the floodgates to unlimited corporate money in elections.

"This action will be a way for citizens to express their outrage at the ties between big money and political corruption," said David Cobb, National Spokesperson for the Move to Amend coalition. "Politicians rubber stamp legislation that benefits profit over people. We are rubber stamping money to remind lawmakers that they serve 'We the People,' not 'We the Corporations.'"

Citizens can help launch the project by contributing funds and advance purchasing the stamps at www.MoveToAmend.org/stampede.

In the wake of the 2010 Citizens United decision, close to $2 billion is expected to be spent to influence the 2012 presidential election. Polling indicates that almost 80% of Americans are in favor of overturning this decision, with a majority supporting an amendment to establish that corporations are not entitled to Constitutional rights.

Move to Amend seeks to abolish corporate personhood by passing a constitutional amendment that says: 1) Corporations and artificial entities are not people; and 2) Money is not speech, and therefore regulating political contributions and spending is not equivalent to limiting political speech.

With over 100 local affiliates nationwide, Move to Amend is a national coalition that has seen many victories in recent months. Through ballot initiatives several cities have voted in favor of Move to Amend's proposed amendment including: Madison, WI; Missoula, MT; Boulder, CO; and West Allis, WI. In March, over 70 towns in Cohen's home state of Vermont, and the Vermont State Legislature endorsed the movement to amend, and over 200 City Councils have passed resolutions calling on Congress to send a Constitutional amendment to the states for ratification.

"The American people are speaking up loud and clear: only human beings should have Constitutional rights and money should not equal speech," continued Cobb. "To protect our Republic, Americans are getting involved by the thousands to amend our Constitution."

The Move to Amend effort has been getting traction on Capitol Hill as well. Next month the Senate Judiciary Committee will hold hearings to examine pending proposals to amend the constitution to remedy Citizens United and related cases. The hearings will be led by Constitution Subcommittee Chairman Richard Durbin (D-IL) on July 17. During the 112th Congress, 13 amendment resolutions have been introduced aimed at overturning this decision.

More information can be found at www.MoveToAmend.org/stampede.