Would you favor the following constitutional amendment?

[Citizen James]

Re: Corporate personhood:

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Why or why not?  What implications would you think would result from such an amendment?

[Nym90]

I think I'd mostly support it, though I can see the possibility of Section 2 having some undesireable side effects.

[John Dibble]

Still thinking, but I definitely agree with section 1 - corporations are not people.

[David S]

What exactly are you trying to achieve?

The Campaign Finance Reform Act did what you propose in item 3 for corporations and unions, but I disagree with it. True the corp is not a person and does not have first amendment rights to free speech, but isn't free speech as much about the right to listen as it is about the right to speak? I'm a person and I'd like to hear what the corporation or union would tell me. Don't I have first amendment rights to hear what they would say?

[Bono]

No, but I'd favor an ammendmentremoving the words "interestate commerce" of the constitution.

[A18]

Corporations are owned by people, and all actions taken by them are the actions of people.

If corporations do not have constitutional rights, neither do the people who own them.

Limit a corporation's right to free speech, and you have limited people's right to speak. To say otherwise is patently absurd, and would involve the belief that a corporation is a living entity -- which for some ridiculous reason is a belief you attribute to the correct side of this argument.

The first section is fine -- but does absolutely nothing to limit corporations.

Edit: Oh, right, the rest. It repeals every single constitutional protection any person in the United States has of any kind... I guess if you're a fascist, this is a decent amendment. I'm not.

[??????????]

Re: Corporate personhood:

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Why or why not?  What implications would you think would result from such an amendment?

Section three is hilarious. Do you wish to repeal the first amendment while you're at it? This garbage could never enter the constitution.

[A18]

The first amendment is already repealed under section 2, as Congress can take away anybody's rights by making them into this category of people called a "corporation."

[opebo]

SECTION 3. Corporations and other for-profit institutions are prohibited from attempting to influence the outcome of elections, legislation or government policy through the use of aggregate resources or by rewarding or repaying employees or directors to exert such influence.

Section three is hilarious. Do you wish to repeal the first amendment while you're at it? This garbage could never enter the constitution.

Well not really.  It is more of an organizational regulation - the owners of these corporations could still use their money to influence government officials, its just that they would have to do it individually, rather than through the corporation.

I think the net effect would be almost nil.

[David S]

Re: Corporate personhood:

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Why or why not?  What implications would you think would result from such an amendment?

Section three is hilarious. Do you wish to repeal the first amendment while you're at it? This garbage could never enter the constitution.

One would wish that you are right, but unfortunately the Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act did exactly this and the Supreme Court upheld it. Among other things the act prohibits corporations and unions from mentioning the name of a candidate within 60 days of an election or 30 days of a primary.

[Blue Rectangle]

SECTION 1. The U.S. Constitution protects only the rights of living human beings.

For instance, freedom of association.  Isn't forming a corporation an exercize of this right?  How can this amendment reassert this right and then go on to say that those who exercize it must lose other first amendment rights?

The amendment fails logical self-consistancy.

[Inverted Things]

BUT, you need to go to the gevernment in order to get incorporated. What the government can give, it can also regulate and take away.

[A18]

Like marriage?

[Blue Rectangle]

BUT, you need to go to the gevernment in order to get incorporated. What the government can give, it can also regulate and take away.

The government is second only to the Greeks when it comes to cynical gift giving.

Government "gifts" invariably come with strings attached that eventually cause more harm than the good intended by the gift.  The example of marriage was a very good one: once we allowed the government into the marriage business, we made tyranny inevitable.  Whether that tyranny will be forcing everyone to accept gay marriage or forcing gays to not marry remains to be seen.

[J.R. Brown]

Absolutely, there are a lot of people out there who seem to believe if the corporations are free to manipulate the market than they are as well.

The United States is an aristocracy of corporations covered by democratic rhetoric. We don't choose our representatives, money chooses them. Corporate giants choose them.

True Democracy has never existed in the United States. It's always been ran by the Corporate giants and the extremely wealthy.

 Anyone who advocates the rights of Corporations over the people either has vested interests in that corporation or is an idiot who has been brain washed by the media.

[A18]

The United States is an aristocracy of corporations covered by democratic rhetoric. We don't choose our representatives, money chooses them. Corporate giants choose them.

Idiot. Corporations influencing people can decide elections, yes. Guess what? That means people are choosing our representatives.

The fact that you don't like how influenced people are or aren't by corporations is entirely irrelevant. What you want is a socialist dictatorship.

[J.R. Brown]

The United States is an aristocracy of corporations covered by democratic rhetoric. We don't choose our representatives, money chooses them. Corporate giants choose them.

Idiot. Corporations influencing people can decide elections, yes. Guess what? That means people are choosing our representatives.

The fact that you don't like how influenced people are or aren't by corporations is entirely irrelevant. What you want is a socialist dictatorship.

Where did I say I wanted a socialist dictatorship? NO, how can I say this in the childish, adolescent language you'll understand? How 'bout. You are an IDIOT.

When I read the Constitution it was my impression that anyone who was a natural born citizen and 35 or older could become president. But in order to do that you need the backing of powerful corps. with money to create a huge smear campaign against your opponents. I assume you understand that influence equals control.

 I want a democracy thats not controlled by the wealthy. Dictatorship was not present anywhere in what I was saying. I mean do you even know what you are saying?

The way in which a corporation is designed is exactly like a dictatorship. Top to bottom control. Not bottom to top. So, actually I oppose dictatorial style institutions.
 Power to the People! Down with Corporations!

[phk]

During the student uprising in May 1968 in Paris, one of the slogans that arose was, ‘We’ll have good masters once everyone is their own.’ That, friends, is politics. And that brings us to our second question, as self-determination brings us to the question of democracy.

Democracy—this word is red with human blood. This word that means freedom, but also conjures up the sound of tanks rolling down city streets. The word carries with it centuries of hard struggle.

What is democracy? It is freedom, and freedom is self-determination.

When I talk about democracy, I'm not talking about voting. Democracy means popular control of the State. But voting is mediated control. It is mediated by secret handshakes behind closed doors. The fact is, we really shouldn’t call this State a democracy. And we can’t call it a Republic either. A Republic, properly speaking, is just. The State’s history does not reflect an interest in justice. I want to propose the term ‘capital-parliamentarianism’ for the so-called politics of this country. A State with a representative body that doesn’t represent the people, doesn’t represent you and I, but represents the market and corporate interests. Capital-parliamentarianism—the system of the Republic of Capital. The State doesn’t represent you or I. It doesn’t represent our interests. And it never will. Because we cannot control it. And if we cannot control the State then we aren’t in control of our own destinies.

You can't vote in a democratic system. That would probably receive a gasp from a lot of people in this country. But it’s true. You can't vote in a democratic system because in a democratic system there are not representatives to work for you. There are not politicians to deceive you. A representative government is not a democracy because then there is a hierarchy with men in designer suits who claim to represent the will of the people. The will of the people, in that form, is an abstraction, and in our country, it is a lie.

So what is democracy? This is democracy! Democracy is the politics of the street and it is totally revolutionary, always. It's real people taking care of their situations. When we have our humanity, true democracy will be there. And that will be our freedom.

This is democracy! You and I, here in this place, raising the cry for change. It isn’t pulling a lever in November during your lunch break. It is a struggle. It is here and now.

Yes, friends, the general will cries out for freedom. But somewhere freedom got all tied up with money and somewhere the meaning of that cry was lost.

Ever since capitalism got in bed with the state there's been no democracy in any governmental sense. Instead there is capital-parliamentarianism. I propose that we discuss our government using that term. It is government that represents not liberty and justice for all, but liberty and justice for the wealthy 5%. It is the parliamentarianism of consumerism, commodification, spectacular society: these are the enemies of democracy!

The cry of the general-will is the cry for self-determination. But the people want to find this freedom in the Party. Here today there are a lot of you who think the Democratic Party will deliver you from Evil, will take you to the promised land. But you know what? It won’t. It’s just the left wing of that same Party that took us into Iraq on the lie of ‘immanent threat.’ That same capital-parliamentary ideological unit that passes for bipartisan democracy today. And the Party is the enemy of democracy!

The Party is an organ of the State and want is preservation. Change is in the air and the Party is scrambling to keep the people at bay.

Politics wants change. The Party wants the State, and in the end, it wants the Party-State. Within our capital-parliamentary system how can you vote for any substantial change? In November, the poles will open to give the people a chance to change the guard. To elect a good master. But I say with students of the May ’68 uprisings, that, "we will have good masters when we are each our own!" When our wishes are no longer put behind the secret handshakes and back-room dealings of administrators under the maxim of "you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours", when our voice becomes so loud that it shakes the very foundations of this country, when true democracy, the will of an active and mobile people, becomes the way of life, then there will be peace. Then there will be freedom. Then there will be liberty and justice for everyone!

[A18]

In your post, dumbass. Anywhere people are restricted from influencing each other, you have a dictatorship, not run by the market place of ideas, but by, in your case, a socialist fascism, which seeks to cement itself as a dominant political force.

[phk]

Hobbes can suck it.

[Ebowed]

Section 3 is a violation of the first amendment.

[A18]

You are the most ridiculously oversensitive individual I have ever encountered.

This attempt of yours is the greatest assault on free speech ever proposed. Your amendment would lead to complete and total fascism, under which the government would even monitor and charge with crime anyone who got a pay increase for "questionable reasons" and used it to influence elections.

If I get a $2,000,000 pay raise one year and give it to the RNC, I'm sorry, but I need some snotty liberal's amendment bringing the government to charge me with a crime, because they have reason to believe a corporation was trying to influence the election by giving me a pay raise.

Frankly, you and anyone else who supports this piece of legislative garbage should be shot.

[J.R. Brown]

You are the most ridiculously oversensitive individual I have ever encountered.

This attempt of yours is the greatest assault on free speech ever proposed. Your amendment would lead to complete and total fascism, under which the government would even monitor and charge with crime anyone who got a pay increase for "questionable reasons" and used it to influence elections.

If I get a $2,000,000 pay raise one year and give it to the RNC, I'm sorry, but I need some snotty liberal's amendment bringing the government to charge me with a crime, because they have reason to believe a corporation was trying to influence the election by giving me a pay raise.

Frankly, you and anyone else who supports this piece of legislative garbage should be shot.

I'm all for individual citizens doing whatever they want. I'm against powerful groups of people banning together to make mountains of cash without helping the poor. You're probably going to call me socialist for advocating helping the poor. I admit there are some things in this amendment that need to be reworded. My goal is to empower the individual not control them. Do you really think these powerful money grubbing corporations give a damn about you? You sound more totalitarian than anything I've said. Saying I should be shot for speaking my mind.