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The Corporate Death Penalty
There's an interesting column on SiliconValley.com from Dan Gillmor (IMHO, one of the few smart columnists out there) about a probably-unimplementable idea: Killing illegal companies. The notion appeals to me though -- but even more, the idea of bad companies wearing electronic tracking bracelets amuses me. *grin*
You people amaze me...
If resorting to this kind of "communism" saves my tech-illiterate grandmother from being screwed over by a bunch of internet criminals, I'm all for it.
FIRST get a journalism death penality. But on the other hand a coder who codes for a living has a right to code. There would be great danger for any two people who worked for a company to start their own software company. How many times have you had a design issue disagreement with upper management? Form a new company to do it your way and you will be shut down for your obvious criminal activity? "Their twenty lawyers vs your 1."
Because the death penalty of a human being is abhorrent to the most of the civilized world.
Killing a company doesn't take a life from anyone. Preventing a rotten executive from starting another company and making him to earn his money like the rest of us (working for someone else) can only be a good thing.
Your analogy is incorrect, employees of a company aren't comparable to spouses or children, they are comparable to parts of the body, or even a conjoined siamese twin. The spouses and children would be other companies or people who rely on the infrastructure or products that company produces. I don't necessarily agree or disagree with the conclusion you draw from this analogy, it needs to be more closely thought out.
It seems odd, then, that he sets out looking for an analog to the death penalty for corporate entities. This whole exercise seems out of character for someone too emotional to consider the eugenic benefit of weeding the worst elements from our human population, but even in this less personal domain he can't maintain a rational point of view for long. Soon we are mired in second thoughts and rationalizations, and ultimately he falls so low as to use the cheapest cop-out in the colunist's bag of tricks: he leaves it up to us to write and tell him what to think.
I don't know why the big noise shashdotties think this guy is so cool. Oh, wait, you only said he was pretty clueful for a columnist. Okay, he might be, at that. You just have to remember that the most clueful of columnists plus fifty cents still won't buy you a cup of coffee most places.
Actually, Nicotine is more addictive than crack. Crack, being cocaine, is technically not addictive, but creates dependency very fast. Heroin is a good comparison for nicotine, since both are physically addictive.
In any case, nicotine is way more addictive than either one of those drugs. Indeed, it's probably the most addictive drug commonly available, by a long shot.
Don't let George Bush know. He'll kill the lot of them (if he could). So long as they don't pay him off nicely (many corp.'s are in the clear on that one).
p.s. - bonzoesc, you pretend that the individuals who make up a company are the same as the company. In the case of a corporation, this is most defintitely not true under law nor in practice. One of the greatest problems facing those dealing with corporate abuses is separating out the idea that a corporation is its own entity different from the people who run it. The corporation, as too few recognize, literally has a life of its own. And this can be taken from it - quite effectively - if our laws would allow it (or practice would ever permit it to occur).
A common practise in Europe but probably quite unfamilar to you Americans.
I dislike MS as much as the next guy, but really, we need a little more perspective. There's real evil being done in the world -- but it ain't coming from the world of computer operating systems.
So how do you give due process to the elimination of a corporation? I believe in due process, as much as corporations tend to manipulate it, and I wouldn't want to give it up.
Another possibility is that you simply make it much easier to charge the individuals in a corporation for their actions. But this has a lot to do with a lack of will on the part of the government, and unfortunately that's very hard to change. There seems like a lot of places where there have been large corporate conspiracies -- and there are specific laws about conspiring across state lines and what-not. But they only get used against organized crime, not organized corporate crime. I blame that on the prosecutors (and of course their bosses). More laws won't get the current laws enforced.
One way to help would be to eliminate much of corporation's right to privacy. I believe this would be quite reasonable, and if it was a true public disclosure then third-parties could raise objections and civil suits against the corporations and individuals when the government (predictably) ignores abuses. And if you want to keep privacy, fine, you just don't get limited liability.
I'm not sure how that would effect trade secrets -- not something I'm particularly happy with anyway, but without secrets it's not easy to gain advantage from novelty, and novelty (i.e., invention) is good.
Still, there's a good comprimise in there somewhere.
How do you fight the imaginary monster that's underneith the bed? Easy, stop believing in it. That's how you kill a corporation too.
I find it humorous that *any* concern to the people who would be harmed in a corporate death penalty, or in any corporate fine. No such considerations are ever given to *human* criminals who are punished. How often do you hear a judge say something like "I know you committed this crime, and you've admitted it, and normally I'd sentence you to life imprisonment for it, but since you have a wife and family who are depending upon you for financial support, and parents and siblings who would be emotionally harmed by your incareration, I'm going to commute you sentence to 60 days of probation"?
I'm a NAIC club member and stock investor. I'm also an employee. *Both* of these attributes have a certain amount of risk involved- the company I am working for may go out of buisness, or may simply downsize me, with little or no warning. The stocks I buy may declare bankruptcy, or plummet in price so far that the stocks may as well be worthless. You can't avoid risk, so you manage it. You don't put all your money into one stock, you diversify. That way if one company bombs, it doesn't take your entire portfolio with it. You keep you skills current, live in a city with many job opportunities, and keep technical contacts up, so when you loose your current job you can get another one. Risk is a fact of life.
Give me a break. I have never stolen anything that the RIAA or the MPAA was willing to sell to me (and I actually wanted). The flip side though is that there is a lot of music/movies that I would like to have (and would gladly pay for) if they were made available. For that kind of stuff, I have no problem downloading it off the net or getting it by another means because it isn't available at all.
My problem with the RIAA and the MPAA (and MS for that matter) does not stem from them wanting to be compensated for thier work. My problem comes from them wanting to control every aspect of the usage of their product, including when and where I might choose to listen to a song or watch a movie that I have already lawfully purchased a license for. They have no business (or right) to make that kind of intrusion into my personal life! The real fight with the MPAA and RIAA is about who's going to control what movies you watch, what music you listen to. Do they get to decide for you, or do you get to decide for yourself. It's getting very near to the point now where the only choice is to either consume what they present to you, or throw out your TV, your stereo, and your computer.
Finally, it's pretty obvious you do not understand what's at the foundations of the open source movement. As a scientist, I am well aware of the value of being able to look over someone else's work, and perhaps improve on it. That's how science works best, and that simple philosophy is what is at the core of the GPL. People like RMS (and I'm not saying I agree with him 100%, but he does make a good case), believe strongly that the best way to advance technology is to do so scientifically, with peer review. The good ideas are kept by consensus and the bad ideas are thrown out and technology advances. That process breaks down when companies like MS decide that they know what's best for everyone and then hide behind IP laws to avoid judgement about their ideas. Not to mention that I think MS (and the MPAA and RIAA) are just power hungry bastards more interested in maximizing profits than advancing technology and making everyone's lives better (which is something that a corporate charter is supposed to address before approval, if I'm not mistaken).
Shop Smart, Shop S-mart!
There's a four part radio series called "Corporation, Corporation" that details the history of corporate law. A corporate death penalty is actually not a new thing. Prior to the twentieth century, corporate charters could, and frequently were, revoked if the company broke serious laws.
If you get a chance to hear the program, I really recommend it. I don't think there's a copy online anywhere, but it's for sale on tape at 100fires.
See also Revoking Corporate Charters.
I can think of serveral instances in which corporations might deserve the "corporate death penalty." (I should probably note here that I do not support for the capital punishement, but since the journalist has used the term "death penalty", I guess we're stuck with it). Most of these instances involve a wanton and deliberate disregard for human life. Conspiracy to commit fraud might also be appropriate.
A question must be asked though-- did the crimes of the corporation stem from the actions of management (in which case, prosecution of the management might be more appropriate), or was the structure of the comapny such that the criminal actions were "par for the course," so to speak?
Of course the government has long used the RICO and conspiracy statutes to break up criminal organizations... These statues have long been criticized for puuting too much power in the hands of prosecutors.
Gilmore's musing "Perhaps, after the civil litigation was resolved, the remaining assets of the company -- at least those that were legally gained -- might go on the auction block, with the proceeds going to taxpayers." disturbs me as well. The government should not have a "profit motive" for attacking corporations. It should prosecute corporations for crimes, but should do so in accordence with the seriousness of the alleged offense, not merely because that corporation has assets it covets.
It's an interesting article, and such...
:(
But I'm a little bit confused by the contradiction this has with slashdot's typical editorial policy.
It appears that what this Avant! was guilty of was intellectual property theft. But on slashdot we're frequently innundated by editorials that claim IP laws are outdated and unnecessary.
Forgive me, it's just so hard to keep track of what I'm supposed to be for and against.
The first I heard of this idea was during the FTAA summit in Quebec City a few months ago.. on a televised debate on CBC Naomi Klein shouted out that multinationals that do things like employ children and poison local drinking water should face the 'death penalty'. Imagine what the world would be like w/o Nike and Monsanto. It struck me as odd at the time, but haven't we all called for Microsoft's demise before? and afaik, they don't even employ child laborers. ;-)
So long, and thanks for all the Phish
The 'Ltd' or 'Limited' suffix used in the UK indicates a limited liability company. It is used by companies that are not publicly traded; publicly-traded companies use 'plc' (public limited company). I think both kinds of company are corporations.
A real Libertarian would be opposed to the very existence of corporations, as they are a creation of government for the avoidance of responsibility.
Think about it.
~ a low user id is no indication I have a clue what I'm talking about.
As for the argument that corporations are created by the State, and are thus subject to destruction by the state (kind of like Bill Cosby's stand-up routine where he says to his kid, "I brought you into this world, boy, and I can take you out of it."), that's also just plain wrong. Just because the State has to approve the creation of a corporation does not mean the State created it--that's the same as claiming the State creates all houses because it has to grant building permits.
You can kill the corporation without taking any assets. Merely remove the corporation status and expose everybody who has stock in the company to *personal* liability. Watch it dissolve, with no action from the state beyond removing the protection the state gave it.
~ a low user id is no indication I have a clue what I'm talking about.
Limited liability corporations are a GOOD thing.
As it is now, owning stock is purely an asset, never a liability. This way people can invest in companies without worrying about the liability. And that assumes that they know about the liability; how well do you know the board of trustees of every company you own stock in? Even then, a system like this has huge potential for abuse, e.g. corrupt management that can commit crimes for their own personal good and then pass the blame onto naive shareholders who have been duped into thinking management was "nice".
Also, remember companies can also go bankrupt without doing anything illegal or even "mean", and lately on NASDAQ we've all seen plenty of them go that way.
Who wants to buy those stock options in their tech startup NOW?
The entire idea of "corporate death penalty" is ridiculous.
For a corporation to do something illegal, *INDIVIDUALS* have to do something illegal.
Prosecute the individuals.
What possible justification under a rational Constitution could there be for putting innocent people out of work just because their paychecks have the same logo as people who broke the law?
Corporations aren't trying to break free of anything; people are trying to break free. Examine why they feel the need to do that, and address it.
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[nod] And -- no big surprise -- corporations and their politician lackeys have been quietly working to get rid of those laws. When the US created the "corporate person" (in it's most common present form), we created an entity who has no long-term goal, and whose only short-term goal is by definition to accumulate financial resources.
Despite the usual corporatist rhetoric, that goal does not always jive with the interests of humans affected by corporations -- be they by-stander, customer, employee, or even stockholder. And now corporations are trying break free of one of the few things that might even theoretically control them.
Do we really want to share the planet with unkillable clumsy giants?
stantial share of the profits? Just because they call this profit sharing arrangement "taxation" doesn't make them any less guilty. If tobacco is the evil they say it is (and it is, to be sure), why don't they ban it outright?
Just because they do it for some drugs doesn't make it a good idea for all of them. It's a bad idea for all of them. It's one thing to harangue people about how bad something is, it's another to pass laws forbidding it. The second choice tends to lead to increased social chaos. (Another poster said: "Somebody had to put all that chaos in there." This is how it is put there.)
Caution: Now approaching the (technological) singularity.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Yes, limited libility certainly has it's points. Perhaps what is needed is a limited limited liability.
To my mind the rationale for limiting the liability of the investors is that they don't have any direct control over the corporation. This, however, does not apply to the boards of directors or to the CEO, or any of the top level of the management. Perhaps these are the people in whom the liability should vest. Just denying it isn't working well.
Caution: Now approaching the (technological) singularity.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Actually it's not so easy on the executives of the dead company.
"I was the CEO for Itchi Co. and I'm looking for work"
"Ahh and reason for losing former employment?"
"Itchi Co got killed"
"Next!!!"
But then if you rip off your company enough it won't matter.. retire.. of course you can never ever come out of retirement.. ever.. pirod.
I don't actually exist.
Urm you are confusing Bejamin Franklin with Jefferson again, sonny.
Nice Troll.
Since you are so fond of Jefferson, I have a quote for you.
"If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density in any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property. Society may give an exclusive right to the profits arising from them, as an encouragement to men to pursue ideas which may produce utility, but this may or may not be done, according to the will and convenience of the society, without claim or complaint from any body. Accordingly, it is a fact, as far as I am informed, that England was, until we copied her, the only country on earth which ever, by a general law, gave a legal right to the exclusive use of an idea. In some other countries it is sometimes done, in a great case, and by a special and personal act, but, generally speaking, other nations have thought that these monopolies produce more embarrassment than advantage to society; and it may be observed that the nations which refuse monopolies of invention, are as fruitful as England in new and useful devices."
- Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Isaac McPherson, August 13, 1813
Criminal corporations just have a lot more dependents than criminal individuals do, that's all.
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Do I look like I speak for my employer?
The person to whom the investor entrusts his money...the mutual fund company. If the mutual fund company invests in bad companies, the fund loses money. Just like now. Right now, I'm having a hell of a time finding funds that don't include Microsoft and show good growth, and I will not tolerate investing in Microsoft, even if it IS profitable.
Every investor is responsible for their own investments. If you proxy the mutual fund to invest for you, you better trust them to make good decisions. If you don't trust them, do it yourself.
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
I'm new to investing. Thanks to the kind advice of my betters, maybe I'll somehow figure out how to make a paltry sum someday...certainly not as much as market gurus like yourself, but I'll manage to eke out a pathetic existence somehow.
Even when I do, though, you'll still be a real asshole.
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
Look, swami, are you going to refute the POINT of my original post, or are you enjoying your ad hominem attacks too much? We've already established that I don't know dick about stocks. How much more would you like to belabor the point?
I'm going to go cry myself to sleep now, you bad scary person. I don't know HOW I'm going to continue living my life knowing you don't like me. I guess I'll just have to find a way.
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
That's the argument used anytime someone suggests doing something that businesses wouldn't like...
"Global economic collapse"
Bullshit. There'd still be a market for products, there'd still be people willing to make those products. They might not be willing to invest in any company that comes along, and they might demand more information about the day-to-day policies of the company, but they wouldn't refuse to invest at all.
Especially in this situation. If they took 'reasonable' measures (as defined by a judge) to ensure that the company wasn't breaking any laws, they wouldn't be guilty of contributory infringement. You need to either intend to break laws, or intentionally turn a blind eye to it.
So they'd be right where they are now, with their investment money at risk, but not their freedom.
I'd personally welcome laws like this. Everyone I know who supports Microsoft in the monopoly trials owns MS stock. They're hoping MS gets away with monopolistic and restrictive trade practices and outright law breaking simply because their stock will go up. With any decent laws they'd be held partly responsible in any judgement and they'd be trying to clean MS's act up, instead of encouraging it.
They're advocating ignoring gross injustice because it benefits them, but they'll be crying later when some other company (which they don't hold any stock in) does the same things.
I advocate leveling the playing field, making everyone follow the laws, and compete on the merits of their business. That's the capitalist way. If companies like MS can't compete in fair markets, they don't deserve to be in business.
You mean the right of the employees to associate in what the court has now told them are illegal actions? I suppose that's what RICO is for...
Starting nitpick: I think you're confusing 1984 and Brave New World. BNW had state-controlled eugenics, but the couples in 1984 made babies the good old fashioned way.
Also, neither ford nor firestone can be charged with murder, because one of the burdens of proof (motive) is not met. Neither entity *wanted* people to die, so it's not murder.
However, there exist various laws which do the trick, Criminally Negligent Homicide comes to mind, perhaps even Manslaughter, as you mentioned.
Of course you then imply that corporations should have no rights as entities, only for the people that run it.
Either corporations are treated as "persons" under the law, with both the rights and responsibilities of persons, or they should be treated with no more rights than a random association of people.
The whole idea of incorporation is to transfer the risk of an enterprise from the individual shareholders to the corporate entity. This has allowed corporations to have a life separate from their shareholders and has been the greatest reason that the United States has such prosperity.
But this has not been without problems. Ever since the U.S. Supreme Court granted corporations "personage" in 1800's, the rights and responsibilities of corporations has been the subject of debate. If they are to have the rights of persons, then they have the responsibilities of persons.
So, let's say your grandmother's pension plan is invested in a mutual fund that owns stock in a "death row" company. You think she should be liable? Come on.
Just don't extend the "corporate" protection to violations of criminal law, and make the executives responsible. That's way easier, and more reasonable.
You're forgetting that your average American stock-owner is some middle-class person with a family, not some rich fat white guy in a smoky room.
Also, what happens to multi-national corporations, which are probably the ones you hate most? If a company is incorporated in a different country, does business in forty nations, and is traded on four exchanges, who has jurisdiction? How do you execute it? What do you do about the resulting war (trade war or real war)?
Jesus, I can't believe the crazy "logic" that has led people to consider something like a corporate death penalty. Corporations are imaginary--they are a legal fiction. I have never seen a corporation, nor have you. The only reality is people. Trying to impose a "death penalty" on something that is no more than words on a piece of paper is just plain silly.
As for the argument that corporations are created by the State, and are thus subject to destruction by the state (kind of like Bill Cosby's stand-up routine where he says to his kid, "I brought you into this world, boy, and I can take you out of it."), that's also just plain wrong. Just because the State has to approve the creation of a corporation does not mean the State created it--that's the same as claiming the State creates all houses because it has to grant building permits.
If you were to "kill" corporation X, what happens to its assets? What happens to your grandmother who lives off a pension that is heavily in X's stocks and bonds? Just liquidating a company gives you its book value, which is generally nowhere near its market capitalization... What happens to the employees?
Corporations, in many ways, are similar to democracies, except the shareholders are the citizens. Even though we have a democracy, we don't punish citizens for the acts of the government they may or may not have voted for (the punishment of poor governance is generally enough). Likewise, we shouldn't punish shareholders for the actions of the corporate executive.
A much simpler and more reasonable solution is to make executives liable for any violations of criminal law committed by their company. The legal entity of the corporation should still offer protection against civil liability (e.g., getting sued for not honoring warranties, etc.), but not against criminal prosecution (suit for manslaughter for knowingly selling excessively dangerous products without proper warning to consumers).
i've read that until the late 1800s, when the supreme court made a ruling whose details escape me, corporations were obligated to serve the public interest. corporations that did not live up to their contract with the public had their charters revoked by the federal government; this happened regularly. i believe that since that ruling virtually no corporations have lost their charter, though a few trusts have been broken up.
The company might have *started* as a criminal ripoff, but did it create any value of its own?
If so, then the corporate death penalty starts to sound uncomfortably like a suggestion to kill all of the children of rape. They might have grown up into a widely respected teacher or judge, but they are still ultimately the consequence of a violent criminal act.
Even if this company was nothing but a ripoff, the same argument can be applied to far more organizations than you might think. Is West Virginia a state? (The US Constitution clearly states that states can only be carved out of other states with the latter's consent, but West Virginia was born out of the Civil War.) Is Hawai'i a state? (It was an independent kingdom until American agitators created an excuse for annexation). What about the country as a whole - our "Founding Fathers" were all guilty of treason to the Crown.
Even if we only focus on corporations, how many of the Fortune 500 started out questionably? A lot of the uproar over global enforcement of IP rights reminds me of the old saying about the guy who checks under the bed for hiding lovers....
That said, I think that a corporate death penalty can be warranted by a company's ongoing bad acts. If a person continually puts himself above the law he can be jailed. But what can you do about a corporation? Given the choice of jailing all of the executives (many of whom will be powerless to change the behavior) and a clean corporate execution I prefer the latter.
For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. -- H L Mencken
Good example. Another one is the campaign to revoke Unocal's charter.
No you aren't.
A business partnership is an example of free association. A corporation is an entity created by the state. They're two entirely different things.
There were plans to replace it with "Corporate Killing", with a different criteria, but these have not come to pass.
The best idea I have seen for this is to create an obligation on a specific boardmember of the company (the Chairman by default, but one can be appointed) for acts carried out by the company, and if the working practices we inadaquete then he is liable for manslaughter, and he can go to jail. Defences were that the rest of the board were told that the working practices were flawed and that they decided to do nothing about it (in which case they are on the hook), or that he was ignorant of the practice (which is easy to disprove). Ignorance via not listening does not count - if the safty man does not provide a conduit for these issues to be raised then he is on the hook.
It makes it in Mr Safety's best interest to bring up safety issues at board meetings, makes it imperative that he gets to know of safety issues, and provides the best motivation for the board to deal properly with safety issues.
Dunno how this would have panned out for Ford/Firestone, but I suspect that some people would have been going to prison.
"If shareholders could lose more than just their investment, and worse yet, be held criminally liable for behavior over which they had no control, then there would be a terrible disincentive for investing and our financial system would come to a screeching halt"
The incentive to invest would be the returns just like it is now. The main difference would be that the shareholders would keep a closer eye on their corp to make sure it behaves.
furthermore Shareholders do have control over the corporation and it's actions (fi they don't then who does?). If they are negligent in their responsibilities and let their corporation actually cause harm or death they should be held criminally responsible. A corporation is like a dog. If I let my dog out and he bites somebody I can be charged with a crime and my Dog can be taken away and killed by the state. It should be exactly the same with shareholders and their corporations.
War is necrophilia.
If my wife or child were executed for a crime they were innocent of then would I not be justified in hunting down the judge, prosecutor, executioner,......
After all, "Anyone who deliberately takes another's life deserves no better his or herself."
> Example: First, Phillip Morris would get sued into bankrupsy and beyond. Second, the debt would get passed onto the people who have held stock in Phillip Morris at the time of the abuses.
Slight problem: stock holders are essentially anonymous (in French, the word for "publically traded company" is even "société anonyme"). True, under normal conditions stock holders are easy to find out, but what if:
For many companies, all shares carry voting rights, even those sold to retail investors. I regular get voting bulletins from E*Trade for the various shares I hold with them. If you held paper certificates, you'd probably need to explicitly request the bulletins at some place (because they wouldn't know where to send them), but I'm sure it would be possible to vote those too.
> Anyway, my point is that the courts could just access these sorts of things by requiring companies to keep records of voting and have a persons have attached to each vote.
Ok, so you mean those people that actually made use of their voting rights.
> A car company starts cutting corners on safety to undercut their compeditors on price, but they lie about the safety issues.
One problem: usually the issues put up for vote are not directly related to any dodgy business practices, but are rather mundane: confirm the directors, share-holder rights plans, large mergers, etc. The decision of releasing the Pinto to market, although it was known to be explosion-prone was taken in a smoke-filled room behind closed doors, and not put up for shareholder vote. Voting shareholders would be responsible rather indirectly at best, by voting in place those executives that took the decision. Should shareholders be punished just because they happened to vote once for some completely unrelated item, such as secondary offerings, shareholder right plans, mergers, etc.? Loosing all invested capital is ok (that's part of the risk that investors take), but anything that goes beyond that is questionable, and difficult to enforce.
While it hasn't happened in ages, it is entirely possible for a corporation to have its charter revoked. Activists have been trying to get California to do this to Unocal for the past few years,
No changes in law are needed, only a change in the attitude of the people and the state toward corporate criminals.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | http://www.infamous.net/
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
Many people argie that the death penalty reduces the state (and hence the people) to the level of the criminal, and I agree with this to some extent.
I agree with you that getting Cable TV, etc, for committing a crime is abhorrent. I don't think that prisoners should have many rights at all (the punishment for a crime should be the removal of those rights that you abused when you committed the crime). Certainly not pool rooms, personal TVs, clean clothes, and the like.
Now does the civilised world want prisons for those who violated the right to live (but where the state will not reduce itself to the level of the criminal and kill them, and certainly not put it on TV - that is sick and twisted, and a sign of the end of civilisation when entertainment involves death)? How about pits in the ground? A remote island where they can fend for themselves against viscous wildlife (Real Survivor - live on Fox)?
Certainly prisoners who are expected to be released one day from prison should not be dehumanised, but rehabilitated so that they are not a threat once released. But should $70,000 per prisoner per year be paid for those prisoners who will die in prison for their crime? Why not make a large concrete lined pit, cover it with electric fencing, and stick those prisoners in there, with individual cells, and crappy food each day, so that they can muse and think about their crime every minute of the day?
Yes, I agree that a corperation without limited liability would not be very diffrent from a partnership, but it still seams reasonable to force the corperations to (a) "qualify" for having limited liability (i.e. be an essentual company like power) and (b) give up something *verY* importent (like 50% control).
Can partnerships trade stock easily? It would seem reasonable to have some companies with frequently traded stock and without limited liability, i.e. Tobaco companies.
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
Actually, it's the stock holder who you really want to feal the crack down since they are the only ones who would really change things. Clearly, the executive of a company should be liable for their actions too, but I think that should be considered discting from punnishing the company.
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
Yes, there are many way to try to fix these things, but if *someone* was going to jail (or the chair in Texas) for these sorts of crimes then there would be a lot less trouble.
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
Non-voting stock still has partial control over the company since it effects the stock price of voting stock, but it has *significantly* *less* control then voting stock and the courts would treat it appropreatly. The non-voting stock might only assume 10% of the debt that would have been passed on by the disolution of the company and all criminal charges might be totally dropped or reduced to misdameaners. Clearly, the courts would also try to factor "knowledge" into the equations when they felt it was appropriate.
Remember, a hit and run is still a hit an run even if you did not know that you hit someone, but the court might look at it diffrently and if it's been reduced to some misdameaner comtributory charge anyway then they might drop the charge totally.
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
The motual fund example dose not really need to be addressed since the answer is obvious: let the courts deal with it. Clearly, if you hold non-voting stock then your "crimes" are much lesser (i.e. misdameaners) or non-existant. It would be the courts decission to adjust things between these two cases based on a variety of circumstances.
Now, there are plenty of examples of the legal system going crazy (like mandatory minimums and the drug war). Yes, investors would be very much at risk if really bad courts were appointed, but I don't see any reason why investors mistakes should be more protected from bad courts then other types of mistakes.
Also, my point still remains that I can create a company to dump poison into someone's back yard and eventually kill them with no liability. If I manage to get other people to invest with me then they should be partially responcilbe too since they are contributing to manslauter. Clearly, they should not suffer a very stiff punnishment (that should be reserved for the board of directors and voting stock), but if you buy a murderer gun then you are partially liabile.
BTW> the courts might choose to let holders of non-voting stock off the hook unless the court suspected that it could prove the stock holder knew something. Remember, that people are supposed to be innocent untill proven guilty in our system, so if the courts required knowelgde for holding of non-voting stock to allow conviction then your mutual funds would never feal a thing. (Voting your shares of stock should always imply knowelgde of the companies actions)
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
You would be responcible if your company was a sole propriatership or partnership (without limited liability). Why should you get to forgo any responcibility for your actions simply because you got diffrent piece of paper? Ultimaly, my proposal is that most companies should be forced to return to the non-limited liability status of smaller companies (or give up pertial control).
Actually, there is one serious moral problem with my proposal: I distinguish between a voting stock holder who opposes the bad direction of the company and a non-voting stock holder. My system would expect the voting stock holder to sell his shares when he did not get his way and "reward" the non-voting stock holder. I do not really see a way to fix this, but it's not a huge problem since we currently treat non-limited liability companies the same way.
You still have not explained how this would "cause the collapse of our economic system." You are not really incuring any more risk by insesting they would would be by driving down the street. Loyds of London was a inshurance like company who was transfering the liability of various high risk corperations. Ordonary investments would not carry nearly as much risk.
Ultimatly, we are faced with two choices: make the stock holders take responcibility or make the governemnt take responcibility and regulate everything (how things currently work). Personally, I feal that a mixture of the two approaches is best, but I like the idea of allowing the mixture to be determined by a laise faire (sp?) approach. That means that the price for being a limited liability company must be high enough that many companies would choose not to become limited liability companies.
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
Actually, I would expect that the courts would not hold non-voting stock responcible for the ations of the corperations. Clearly, non-voting share holders are partially responcible, but it's pretty dilute by the time you start discussing them. Anyway, my point is that the courts could just access these sorts of things by requiring companies to keep records of voting and have a persons have attached to each vote.
Example: A mutual fund manager who votes the shares of stock for his fund might be held responcible for most of the blame which was assigned to those shares of stock.
Copnversly, we have the following example where non-voting share holders should be heald responcible: A car company starts cutting corners on safety to undercut their compeditors on price, but they lie about the safety issues. The car company starts doing very well and many people buy stock (but do not vote that stock). Clearly, these people are responcible for exploiting consumers and are profiting from a crime, so they should normally be treaded exactly like people who purchas stollen merchandise, i.e. the capital gains on stock they have sold can be taken away. OTOH, What they did was clearly worse the purchasing stolen merchandise since people died as a result. I donno..
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
Ok, here are two possible senarios: (a) a company you own part of kills some peoplel; (b) your pet dog kills someone; (c) some person antagonizes your dog until it goes and kills someone.
The only real diffrence from a legal point of view is the nature of the life form make the ultimate decission to kill someone, i.e. the dog is not intelegent while the corperate executives are intelegent. Yes, I see that this dose change things, but I do not see how it negates the blame. Yes, I agree that the corperate executives are more responcible then their stock holders, but that still should not absolve the stock holders of financial/civil liability.
Note: It might absolve the stock holders of criminal liability in *most* situations anyway since the standards of proof might require intent (as they should for all crimes invoking jail time). OTOH, If it was common to send people to jail when corperations killed people then there would be a lot more incentive for Mr. Safety at a corperation to record the fact that he told the stock holders or CEO.
Anyway, I'm just saing that the same laws should be applied to all "crimes commited by property" regardless of the property type and number of owners. I feal that (a) == (c) != (b) in the above examples, but I'm not shure that the property owners financial responcibility should be that diffrent in (c) and (b).
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
You think that people should be able to just throw money arround without regard to it's consequences? If I drop a heavy object from a great hight and it kills someone then I should be held accountable for my poor safty precausions. If I pay some idiot to carry heavy blocks arround when their is a high probability of dropping them and killing people then I should be held accountable. Why dose the fact that I have money and I can find someone dumb enough to do my bidding mean that I can get away with murder or manslauter?
No, stockholders are the owners of their companies and they should ultimatly be held responcible for it's actions. We would have a very diffrent system of investment without limited liability, but our world would not collapse. Instead, the wall streat jounal would offer analysis of the risks involved in purchasing stocks. Yes, there would be "innocent" investors occasionally hurt because they accedentaly invested in a bad company, but there are "innocent" drivers occasionally convicted of manslauter after they "accedentally" ran over and killed someone. They might be a good driver most of the time and have very good intentions, but that one night they made a mistake and the way we prevent those mistakes is by punnishing them harshly.
Also, you are bitching and moaning about "self serving politicos who run around excoriating all these evil companies," but I do not see you running arround compaaining about all the "self serving politicos who run around tring to crusifing people for driving accedents." We have a very good judicial system and those "self serving politicos" should be using the same laws to deal with companies as with individuals.
If I'm a snake oil salesman who sells you poison for "relaxation" then I should go to jail and get sued for wrongful death. The same laws should apply to Philip Morris.
BTW> The real "libhertarian" pssition is that there should never be any limited liability period, but I'm moderat/practical so I propose that a few especially dangerous companies which are especially neccissary should be given limited liability, but I want to see society charge a reasonable price for limited liability and the only reasonable price is sacrificing a significant portion of control.
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
Yes, I think it would be a good idea to decorperate many of our current corperations for various reasons. OTOH, I feal that people should have the right to organize and carry out activities without the fear of the governemnt telling them to go home because they are unfassionable this year. It's importent to remember that this revoking a charter was likely a creation of post-feudal europe, i.e. all the power was centralized arround the king.
Luckily, there is a simple comprmize which allows both the freedom to carry out activities without governement intervention and allows the people to restrict the actions of dangerous companies/.orginisations. Specifically, deny corperations limited liability protections for their stock holders (and fine the shit out of people for doing nasty stuff).
Example: First, Phillip Morris would get sued into bankrupsy and beyond. Second, the debt would get passed onto the people who have held stock in Phillip Morris at the time of the abuses. Third, once a few very rich people lost their houses no one would ever invest in a company they suspected of being dishonest, harming the enviroment, killing people, etc. It would also mean that companies would need to "sell" their "harmless nature" to their investors.
Now, there are essentual companies (like power) which would become impossible under this scheme. The solution would be to allow these essentual companies to give up 50% control to publically ellected officials in exchange for limited liability protection for stock holders. This would be a really good deal for the companies since these ellected officials would typically belong to diffrent parties and thus disagree, but it would still give the public the necissary ammount of control over the company.
(BTW nice quote)
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
That's really interesting. I've never met a libertarian who believed that the US should even have an office of the Surgeon-General.
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If tobacco is the evil they say it is (and it is, to be sure), why don't they ban it outright? So that tobacco goes away, like drugs have?
Trees can't go dancing
So do them a big favor
Pretend dancing stinks!
So, let's say your grandmother's pension plan is invested in a mutual fund that owns stock in a "death row" company. You think she should be liable? Come on.
Absolutely!
The point being that your grandmother would not find that kind of risk acceptable and would very quickly pull any and all money from any such business. Or even pay money to dump stock (selling stock at a negative price anybody???)
In all seriousness, investing in any business is a very risky proposition, and the role of a publically traded stock corporation only help to insulate average investors from those problems.
if the legal fiction that a corporation is a 'person' holds any weight then they must have the responsibilities of people as well as the rights - why shouldn't the courts be allowed to (even required to) 'lock up' a corporation?
(disclaimer - I've been in the past a happy customer of both companies in this dispute)
There already is a Corporate Death Penalty and it's called the Democratic Party.
Someone you trust is one of us.
While the corporate death penalty sounds like a good idea on the surface, take a look at the precedents it sets. Basically, you have the US government stepping in and abridging the right to freedom of association. More than likely the shareholders of the corporation weren't complicit in any crimes, yet they would be punished without due process in a criminal proceding. That's *very* unconstitutional. Class actions against shareholders are constitutional because they are civil and not criminal cases. (Anyone want to expand on that a bit?... I think I'm on the right track there but IANAL...)
Yes, it would prohibit freedom of association, in exactly the same way that sticking someone in prison deprives them of the right to vote and of freedom of movement.
To strip someone of some of their rights when they have broken the social contract in certain ways is commonplace. This simply puts crimes committed under the umbrella of a corporation in the same class as crimes committed when acting as an individual.
Ok, then how about if a company or officers of a company get convicted of say illegal dumping of toxic waste into the East River, then all employees and stockholders are forced to wear a tee-shirt saying
"My company, insert-company-name-here drumped insert-name-of-chemical-here into the East River."
The back of the shirt could give a phone number for the company, and a description of the harmful things the chemical can do.
They would have to wear the shirt whenever they are at work, or on company business or maybe just 9am to 5pm. Not wearing the shirt could also be a crime punished with say 1 day in jail.
How long the shirts have to be worn is set by the court.
Similar notices could also be placed on all their advertising, newpaper ads, tv commercials, websites, maybe even part of the annoucements any VRUs or secretaries answering the phone have to say, etc.
How would you like to be the ceo of a company that everytime your salesmen call on clients they have to wear a shirt like that? Or everytime go to the country club for a game of racket ball or golf, you have to wear such a shirt?
The current Slashdot moderation system is made by gay communists!
...serves time, and is released back into the community. That person has traditionally had a "clean-slate".
Not true in the USA, the "clean-slate" part: I believe that released felons are denied the right to own firearms, the right to vote, among other rights.
(How bad is it to reply to your own post?) To clarify: Only in some states in the USA, freed felons cannot vote for the rest of their lives.
No it wouldn't, it would just be different. People would take investments in public companies much more seriously than they do now. Sure, our financial system might be less of a 1000mph roller coaster if people were worried about liability, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. If I am considering becoming a partner in a private business, you can be damn sure I will want to know if any thing close to criminal behaviour has gone in with the business, who my partners are and what their past is like, etc. etc. And all that even though I'll still enjoy limited liabilty
If shareholders could lose more than just their investment, and worse yet, be held criminally liable for behavior over which they had no control, then there would be a terrible disincentive for investing and our financial system would come to a screeching halt.
No it wouldn't, it would just be different. People would take investments in public companies much more seriously than they do now. Sure, our financial system might be less of a 1000mph roller coaster if people were worried about liability, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.
In any case, the whole point to granting limited liability is the idea that the corporation is serving the public good. It's a tradeoff, similiar to the way we grant poor starving artists 1 billion year monopolies on their work, all possible derrivitives of their work, brain wave patterns indicating thought about the artists work in return for their creative.... oh uh.. nevermind.
If we aren't going to police corporations and their aims, and we allow them to exist with no justification save for making their shareholders rich, then why should they still enjoy limited liablity?
I think the idea of holding shareholders liable beyond their financial investment for a company's bad behavior is a very poor one indeed. If shareholders could lose more than just their investment, and worse yet, be held criminally liable for behavior over which they had no control, then there would be a terrible disincentive for investing and our financial system would come to a screeching halt. And living under such conditions would not be the utopia many people think it would be.
Furthermore, there are other ramifications. For example, if such policies were implemented, what would be my liability if the bank where I deposited my money invested in such a "bad" company? What about a mutual fund? The need to track the behavior of a zillion companies is well beyond the capabilities of just about anybody.
And while we're at it, how about the behavior of all the self serving politicos who run around excoriating all these evil companies -- tobacco being the most shining examples of the moment -- while making sure they help themselves to a substantial share of the profits? Just because they call this profit sharing arrangement "taxation" doesn't make them any less guilty. If tobacco is the evil they say it is (and it is, to be sure), why don't they ban it outright?
All Your Base Are Belong To Us!!!
Guns don't kill people -- people kill people.
But the guns seem to help a bit. (apologies to Eddie Izzard)
Well, I disagree completely with your analysis. I suppose we'll just have to wait until an experiment along these lines is actually attempted. I don't think it will happen in my lifetime.
For the record, we do police our corporations, and we hold accountable the people who should be held accountable -- the officers and other actual decision makers who commit criminal actions. But to hold shareholders criminally liable makes no sense in the justice system we have set up in this country (the US of A, just to be clear about my frame of reference).
All Your Base Are Belong To Us!!!
Guns don't kill people -- people kill people.
But the guns seem to help a bit. (apologies to Eddie Izzard)
Didn't say it would work. Just pointing out that these self serving public "servants" don't mind helping themselves to a share of the profits of the "evil" tobacco corporations.
Just out of curiosity: are you suggesting our government should legalize dangerous substances like cocaine and heroin and then tax the resulting profits? If so, what an interesting concept.
All Your Base Are Belong To Us!!!
Guns don't kill people -- people kill people.
But the guns seem to help a bit. (apologies to Eddie Izzard)
I must admit, I don't follow your logic at all. I don't think I suggested that people "throw money around without regard to it's (sic) consequences." I think I did make a few points which nobody seems willing to address. How about the mutual fund example? I invest in a mutual fund which invests in a corporation that engages in criminal conduct. How do I get assessed my "share" of the criminal conduct, even though I had nothing to do with it? I'll say again that such a method of dispensing "justice" would result in a financial system that would work very poorly, and the resulting society would not be one in which I would care to live.
Your analogies are terrifically flawed. The driver and salesman you refer to are directly involved in the actions for which are appropriately punished. The driver is not punished criminally unless he has been shown to be criminally negligent in a court of law. Same for the snake oil salesman.
Just out of curiosity. How would you expect to see me "running around comp(l)aining about all the 'self serving politicos who run around tr(y)ing to crusif(y) people for driving acc(i)dents?'" You don't know me, and I don't know you. How do you presume to know what I run around "bitching and moaning about" anyway? In fact, I don't think I was "bitching and moaning" about anything in my response to your comments. It would be nice if we could have a civil discussion of the ideas involved without launching ad hominem attacks on the people with whom we're discussing these ideas.
All Your Base Are Belong To Us!!!
Guns don't kill people -- people kill people.
But the guns seem to help a bit. (apologies to Eddie Izzard)
I would be more interested to see some substantive comments about the points I raised that highlight difficulties with the ideas you present in your original post. It seems to me that casually dismissing my mutual fund example is an attempt to ignore a serious issue with the concept you seem to be espousing. Obviously, the courts will have to deal with the problem, just like they would have to deal with the assignment of blame and punishment to the direct investors. However, the mutual fund example shows, IMHO, a flaw in the thinking behind your original idea. Ultimately, if your idea is to see the light of day in actual practice, the legislators who create the legislation necessary to implement your suggestions will have to answer questions such as these. And I suggest that there is no workable way to do what you propose.
To further highlight the problems inherent in your approach, how would the assignment of criminal blame be handled when there are literally tens of thousands of investors with voting stock in a company gone bad? I don't think there is any reasonable approach, and nothing I have seen posted so far seems to address the thorny issues involved. All I see is a bunch of ranting without much in the way of analysis. As I implied before, although the idea of punishing the owners of a bad company sounds good on the surface, its implementation raises too many issues that are extremely difficult or impossible to address. And I still say that doing so would lead to an economic environment that most would find intolerable.
All Your Base Are Belong To Us!!!
Guns don't kill people -- people kill people.
But the guns seem to help a bit. (apologies to Eddie Izzard)
AFAIK, corporations are not the same as individuals in our judicial system:
yeah, it's an old case, but I don't believe it's ever been overturned. If someone says differently, please provide a case site."The individual may stand upon his constitutional rights as a citizen. He is entitled to carry on his private business in his own way. His power to contract is unlimited. He owes no such duty [to submit his books and papers for an examination] to the State, since he receives nothing therefrom, beyond the protection of his life and property. His rights are such as existed by the law of the land [Common Law] long antecedent to the organization of the State, and can only be taken from him by due process of law, and in accordance with the Constitution. Among his rights are a refusal to incriminate himself, and the immunity of himself and his property from arrest or seizure except under a warrant of the law. He owes nothing to the public so long as he does not trespass upon their rights.
Upon the other hand, the corporation is a creature of the state. It is presumed to be incorporated for the benefit of the public. It receives certain special privileges and franchises, and holds them subject to the laws of the state and the limitations of its charter. Its powers are limited by law. It can make no contract not authorized by its charter. Its rights to act as a corporation are only preserved to it so long as it obeys the laws of its creation. There is a reserved right in the legislature to investigate its contracts and find out whether it has exceeded its powers. It would be a strange anomaly to hold that a state, having chartered a corporation to make use of certain franchises, could not, in the exercise of its sovereignty, inquire how these franchises had been employed, and whether they had been abused, and demand the production of the corporate books and papers for that purpose. The defense amounts to this: That an officer of a corporation which is charged with a criminal violation of the statute, may plead the criminality of such corporation as a refusal to produce its books. To state this proposition is to answer it. While an individual may lawfully refuse to answer incriminating questions unless protected by an immunity statute, it does not follow that a corporation, vested with special privileges and franchises, may refuse to show its hand when charged with an abuse of such privileges.
Hale vs. Henkel, 201 U.S. 43 at 47 (1906)---
Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.
www.teslabox.com
You say aryan as if that's an insult. Is there any derogative word towards white people really, besides white trash.
2 years and no mod points. Join reddit. Because openness is good.
In NZ once you have been charged with certain offences, then under the Companies Act you are not allowed to become a director of another company. The Govt maintains the list of company directors. Don't know how US law handles it. But I imagine its fairly generic. Everyone starts with the right to own a business, but if you commit personal crimes, or are convicted of crimes in a business then you lose all rights to run a business. Seem pretty fair to me.
There is precedent for doing this.
corpwatch.org has a well-researched article by Russell Mokhiber discussing cases going back more than a century of states revoking the corporate charter of corporations found guilty of crimes. The state granted the charter in the first place, giving "birth" to that corporation, and what the state gave it can take.
This post is so over-the-top that I'm almost sure it's a joke. If not, it's one of the most vicious racist screeds I've ever read, up there with anything produced by the Nazis or the KKK.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
There's no reason they shouldn't start another business. The idea is that they should not profit from their illegal acts. If they want to start over from scratch, without any of the assets they invested in the illegal company, more power to them.
"The legitimate powers of government extend only to such acts as are injurious to others." Thomas Jefferson.
What was Avant!'s crime? They stole intellectual property. Since when is stealing intellectual property considered a crime on Slashdot? Shouldn't we be applauding Avant! for taking a principled stand by refusing to recognize archaic and unjust intellectual property laws?
"The legitimate powers of government extend only to such acts as are injurious to others." Thomas Jefferson.
Therefore, it makes logical sense that something that is created entirely by the State can be killed by the State (lets thank god 1984 isn't here yet, when the State starts making babies, the same logic will apply =( ).
Note that a corporate death penalty can be taken to mean a couple of different things. For example, if Microsoft lost its case and was sentanced to death, does that mean:
A similar but unrelated question is "when should the corporate veil be pierced for investors in a corporation that commits criminal acts?" Shouldn't the investors/shareholders - who are the OWNERS be held responsible for the actions of the organization they are a part of? People would THINK a lot more on Wall Street if they were, and perhaps the mindless and ruthless actions of Transnational Corporations would be help back somewhat if the investors knew they would be liable (criminally or civily) for them...
Hmm.. another question, should/could Firestone or Ford be charged with murder? Manslaughter? If proven that they had knowledge of the fatal consequences of their actions and as a corporation did nothing about it - perhaps. Also... cigarette companies? Can they be charged with murder, since they're aware as a company that they are more or less responsible for thousands of deaths each year? Makes me wonder if Florida is a death penalty state...
So yeah, they should be treated exactly as people. =)
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"...and Maddest of all, to see Life as it Is, and not as it Should Be."
Actually, this has to be one of the worst ideas I have ever heard. According to the article, most of the top execs face penalites for their crimes, which would mean that they're probably leaving their jobs. Unless it's easy to hire a whole new executive board, this company has been (figuratively) decapitated and (essentially) executed anyhow. Not many start ups (or large companies for that matter) stay intact once it's been discovered that a large number of the company's execs have committed horrendous crimes. Calling it a "death penalty" officially would mean pork legislation to the effect which would probably contain additionaly unneccessary and dangerous stipulations that would make the whole thing worse than it already is. At first, I thought that this article didn't deserve a post on Slashdot because it is essentially insignificant, but then I recalled that Slashdot is really in to this whole anti-corporate collective manifesto. *Smacks head* How could I forget?
-------------------------
Stupid people suck.
European law is much harsher on bankrupt companies than U.S. law. US law allows for "debtor in possession" operation ("Chapter 11"), where the existing management remains in control of the company. (PG&E is in this state). In Europe, companies are brought into receivership earlier, the executives are fired, and their "golden parachutes" are void.
I find it somewhat frightening that corporations are often held to LOWER standards than people. I recal reading about a case where a corporation admitted that a factory fire that had killed several people had been not just preventable, but predicatable (to the point of "It was gonna happen eventually"). The company was fined. An individual would have been charged with manslaughter at the least.
Its disgusting that courts give corporate entities all the freedoms of individuals (especially the "freedom of speech" to give huge campaign donations) but don't hold them to responsibilities the way real people are.
Kahuna Burger
...will work for Chick tracts...
While this would work (and is happening) in the specific case mentioned, it wouldn't in many others. The entire point of a corporation, in some ways, is to protect individuals from responsibility. In a large, multi executive company, the plausible deniability of any given individual is huge. Thats why most sexual harrassment cases are made against companies and rarely individuals. The individual offender wasn't warned so he didn't know it was a problem, and the supervisor didn't think there was anything he could do because the department manager didn't hear enough to take it seriously, and the vice president didn't make a policy because he wasn't even in that position when it started, and the executive vice president who was in that position certainly can't be held responsible for NOT doing something that long ago and is in London now anyway....
In some cases, the corporate veil is more like an onion - you lift all the layers and then it turns out there's nothing there. So do you throw up your hands and say "guess there's no one we can hold responsible", or do you you declare the whole onion rotten and take what you can out of it?
Kahuna Burger
...will work for Chick tracts...
Bollocks. If you want people to reform then you have to make the effort to rehabilitate them. Let them find a belief that they don't need to break the law. locking them in a box for x years isn't going to help on its own. Game theory shows that trust once is a far better survival mechanism than endless faith
Special Relativity: The person in the other queue thinks yours is moving faster.
Part of a criminal penalty for corporate executive wrongdoing (fraud, embezzlement, etc) is often being proscribed from becoming an executive or director of any corporation for a number of years... for example, three years in (minimum security) prison and then an additional ten years blocked from corporate management after that in a fraud case I just read about yesterday?
Part of a typical criminal penalty for corporate executive wrongdoing (fraud, embezzlement, etc) is often being proscribed from becoming an executive or director of any corporation for a number of years... for example, three years in (minimum security) prison and then an additional ten years blocked from corporate management after that in a fraud case I just read about yesterday?
This has been used against individuals as part of the drug war. This has been used unfairly and unjustly. One person who had been arrested for drunk driving lost his car, though he was found not guilty. A woman lost her car, because her husband was arrested in it for getting a blow-job from a prostitue.
The same penalty applied to a corporation could take all assetts of a corporation since it would be intermingled. No money -- no corporation.
Fight Spammers!
A while back some politician proposed a law that would require the government to try to deal exclusively with corporations that hadn't violated the law lately. Not an outright forbiddance, but if corp A hasn't violated the law and corp B had, than the government would deal preferentially with corp A. It never even made it out of committee.
If we can't even get the government to try to deal exclusively with law abiding corporations, how can we expect to get them to execute illegal corporations?
"Mission Accomplished" -- George W. Bush May 1, 2003
A corporation is just a way to organize a business. The stockholders put up the capital. This gives them the right to appoint the directors who actually run the business.
Because they do not control the corporation, the stockholders are not personnally liable for anything it does - beyond the value of their stock. But they can lose their entire investment.
On the other hand the corporation is civilly liable for its actions, and the directors and the managers they hire have unlimited civil and criminal liability for their actions.
Corporations are neither good nor evil. People can be either, and most of us are mixtures.
IMHO unreasoning fear and hatred of all corporations is just a way to avoid dealing with the individuals who cheat, bully, or steal.
Unreasoning hatred has a cost. Destroying the option to form and run corporations is an excellent way to destroy jobs.
If your business gets large enough you might need to become a public organization or you want to fend off takeover attempts you'll often re-incorporate in Delaware or possibly Nevada.
As long as the name chosen for the corporation is not being used by someone else and you pay the fees, the corporation will be issued a charter and it is now legally in operation.
That these are granted routinely does not override the fact that one still needs to ask permission of the government to incorporate, and that the government can, in some cases, refuse this permission and may, in egregious instances, revoke the permission which had been granted.
As it stands, if you fail to file a tax return to that state and/or pay the fees for the corporation the next year, the corporate charter will automatically be cancelled.
This is what is being referred to as the "death penalty" for corporations.
If the people who operate the corporation fail to perform certain acts, or in some cases violate certain laws as a corporation, one of the penalties that can be imposed is loss of charter. In effect, the corporation reverts to an "unincorporated organization" or a "partnership." Or it is simply liquidated and its assets, minus any liabilities, are redistributed back to the stockholders, if any.
In really bad cases, the (Federal) government confiscates everything (The brokerage firm of Drexel Burnham Lambert's liquidation after Ivan Boesky comes to mind; the customer accounts - probably worth several billion dollars as assets - were given away to another firm; the stockholders were never compensated for the value of their customer lists) and as a result the stockholders are ripped off by the Government even though they are innocent of wrongdoing.
The lessons of history teach us - if they teach us anything - that nobody learns the lessons that history teaches us.
Not that sending M$ to the chair wouldn't make me happy.
Tell me what makes you so afraid
Of all those people you say you hate
Rtmark came up with the idea originally I think. Basically if a corporation is a person therefor it is deathsentancable. That was the basic Idea
Excuse the Unicode crap in my posts. That's an apostrophe, and slashdot is busted.
Who votes stocks held by mutual funds?
ourpla.net is your planet
And by the laws of most states, in situations where the corporation becomes a menace, the law often requires the states to take action and revoke the charter.
/. editors and SiliconValley columnists. But it's still the law.
In practice, this virtually never happens, since a corporation that's dead can't lobby or donate to a re-election campaign. And the news media in the US (or its corporate owners) has no desire to point this fact out to most citizens who may not even know about it, including possibly
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The problem is that corporations seem to be handfled mostly under civil law, and not under criminal law. I think that Corporations could be subject to similar legal penalties as individuals. How, where, and why is another issue. Penalties certainly are the easy and sexy thing to discuss about this.You could have, for example:
- Freezing of all assets for a set number of years. (Imagine this for someone like MS. Unable to do business for 5 years, all funds frozen)
- Prohibited from conducting business (selling and distributing product) for a certain number of years
- Fines
- Split ups. such as in the MS case.
Crimes that could be contemplated or considered include- all normal crimes already on the books, including fraud, murder, etc.
- crimes against other companies, including corporate rape, murder, assault, etc. of another company. or for example, a country or nation. The current rape of the rain forests come to mind here. along with various incidents of genocide, etc given the many examples from WWII
This is an area that requires a lot more thought.Check out the Vinny the Vampire comic strip
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
"The death penalty for human beings is wrong. It is applied with gross unfairness, mostly to black and brown people and to those who don't have enough money to hire competent lawyers."
There are plenty of white and yellow people executed, and many who have expensive lawyers. If black and brown people are the ones who get more frequently executed then *gasp* maybe they commit the majority of the capital crimes? I'd love to see more premeditated murders executed. It is shit that someone decides to take someone's son or daughter away and gets rewarded with cable TV, three meals a day, and a library with internet access for the next twenty to forty years at on average seventy thousand dollars a year. Anyone who deliberately takes another's life deserves no better his or herself. I only wish that a terrorist who blows up a building or a wicked husband who beats his spouse to death with a hammer could receive the same consideration.
Of course I'm just a ignorant, savage american what do I know. All the smart people come from Europe and Canada.
1. Yes, so much more barbaric than someone who killed someone for money or because they felt like it. If they are dead they will NEVER kill again. Ted Bundy escaped from a holding cell and killed more people. He's not the only exampple of this.
2. No, the death penalty is not a deterrant. If it was intended to be a deterrant then people convicted of first-degree murder who are executed would have to outnumber the amount of people hit by city buses each year.
3. So we should treat murderers to the chance that they may change their behavior? Their victims can't change their behavior. It is then dumped on the citizens of a state to pay 70,000 per POS per year on average.
What sort of idiotic trolling is this?
If only all of Slashdot would read this ignorant hate-filled post of yours, as you just made the strongest case AGAINST gun control I have ever read. Those jews spat in the face of tyranny and stood with both feet firmly planted in the principles of freedom.
We can all learn from that sort of example.
Yeah, too bad Aryans have continually proven themselves inferior to just about every other "race" out there. I don't know of any other group to get their asses kicked repeatedly by their "inferiors". WWI, WWII, before even becoming a nation, they were the bitches of Europe for hundreds of years. Probably naturally smaller penises too. Fucking garbage philosphies only followed by the stupidest of the stupid, the bitches of slaves.
Maybe you ought to buy a history book and have a look. The "WHITE MAN" didn't even have the concept of the number zero until he took it from the black, Muslim Moors from Moroco (in Africa) who conquerered much of Spain and held on to it for several hundred years.
I'll assume that you are a "proud" white protestant for a minute and suggest you go read the Old Testament. You might notice somewhere in it, that it is full of jews, and that they lived where Israel is today.
Now, let us move on to the "f--ing jews killed Jesus". Perhaps while you looked in the Old Testament you noticed that the jews were enslaved in Egypt, led out by Moses, and into Israel. Then, they were conquered by just about everybody else, including the Roman Empire. Now, as I'm sure you know, one of Hitler's first moves as Chancellor of Germany was to enact a strict gun control act. He also established military gov'ts in his conquered territories and disarmed citizens in those territories. Well, Hitler took a page right out the Roman's book, as they did the same exact thing more than two thousand years before him. The jewish officials were replaced with Romans, the people were largely disarmed. The jewish leaders handed Jesus over to Pontius Pilate (a Roman). Pilate questioned Jesus and sent him to Herod (another Roman). Herod questioned him further, then had him scourged by Roman centurions and returned to Pilate. Pilate then, at the request of the mob, sent Jesus with his soldiers to be crucified. He was crucified and when dead, a Roman centurion lanced his side. To the victor goes the spoils. The jews were conquered by the Romans. The Romans were running the show. Jesus was executed by Romans, using their traditional method of execution for non-Romans. You can rent the movie Sparticus if you would like to see several more examples of the Roman's methods. But, regardless, the thing that set Christianity apart from other ancient religions was that it emphasized forgiveness. Perhaps after just under 2000 years you ought to give it a try, and maybe even attempt to act and speak like Christ did, like a christian.
When a corporation leaves the law behind, the best thing to do is to open criminal prosecutions against the individuals who made the corporate decisions.
"Killing" a corporation sounds tough, but in fact, its only non-symbolic effect is financial. Whereas many criminal corporate acts call for stronger penalties, which by definition cannot be imposed on a legal fiction.
On the other hand, the death penalty should be given a lethal injection rather than "expanded", even in jest.
-- look, cheese ahoy!
Well, we could apply the same rules to all industries as the ones that apply to the pharmaceutical industry. We might not even need to keep them from forming another company. As an example, if a pharaceutical company is caught falsifying records during an FDA trial of a product, the following sanctions are enforced:
- the company can NEVER again submit a product for review by the FDA
- no other company in the industry can hire ANYONE who was employed by the offending company EVER
That works now... I believe that's a bit harsh for the technology industry, but if the people want it bad enough, Congress can make it happen...A lot of the problems concerning criminal actions committed by corporations arise from the relative personal immunity granted on the the indiviudals running the corporation. SInce companies by themselves don't make the decision to break the law, the people who make these decisions should face a share of the penalties. I propose that most corporate entities be required to establish a Responsible Party(RP) or Chief Responsible Offices(CFO).
This role would an individual or group of individuals possessing authority in the organization, who agree to take a degree of personal legal and fiscal exposure for the actions of the corporation at large. Thier exposure could be narrowly tailored to a certain subset of situations where the corporation faces risk in regards to its actions. (i.e. They would be exempt for shareholder suits based on say, a one time mistake in an earnings report, but would be exposed to bringing action for willfull or repetive criminal violations). Of course, these positions would pay extremely well.
Obviously, executives would balk at the notion of exposing themselves to any sort of personal fault, but I think society on a whole would benefit if the individuals making these decisions had to worry about putting the own butts in a sling before committing these crimes.
The Revolution. Now available as a convienent six tape series from PBS.
But we didn't create a society--we created a nation. Besides, what is society without the individual? And without freedom (including the freedom to make as much money as possible), what is the individual?
"Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?"
This is the kind of penalty that needs to be applied to fraudulent, monopolistic, or exploitative companies like Micro $oft -- the complete liquidation of their stock and the publicization of any of their "intellectual property." This is the only way to prevent companies like M$ from forming monopolies, using their financial powers abusively, or performing otherwise illegal activity(i.e., Pepsi hiring child laborers in China/India). As for the people who invested in these corporations -- tough: you take a chance when you make an investment. As for the people who had jobs, we can't let their predicament stop us from doing what's right. We don't refuse to punish rapists and murderers because they have families that would be negatively affected by their punishment: in fact, such crap shouldn't even enter into the decision regarding punishment. Neither should we consider how our punishment to a company that has done something illegal will affect its employees: that is irrelevant.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
even more, the idea of bad companies wearing electronic tracking bracelets amuses me
Yeah, but how do you fit them around those huge company ankles?
"And like that
Corporate Survivor
A TV network buys majority holdings in ten different companies. Each week, the management teams are given a set of challenges which can be handled in a variety of ways. At the end of the show, viewers get to phone-vote on which management team performed the worst and the majority holding is then used to fire them all. You could even have speciality series, picture "Corporate Survivor - Telcos" - though "Corporate Survivor - DotComs" would probably fail as the odds of any company making it the full ten weeks anyway are minimal.
On an interesting level, it would decide once and for all whether the US public prefers ethical of financially successful companies (as many arguments claim that the current state of affairs is because most people ultimately want comfort over ethics).
I think it's time we tie those leashes back on. Whenever you hear a deregulator complain that companies won't do business here with too much regulation, I say look at the world around you. Take a drive. Thanks to deregulation, they've already left for Mexico, China, Taiwan, anywhere they can get cheap labor. No self-respecting corporate exec wants to leave the US - there's too much money here.
Wise man say, choose your enemies carefully, for you will become like them...
Before a court ruling in 1876 that gave corporations the right of naturalized persons under the 14th amendment, all corporate charters were subject to revocation and they were only meant to last for the duration of their narrowly defined stated purpose and mission. If a company violated
1) Their purpose or mission
or
2) Violated their charter They were subject to the revocation of their charter.
This is still possible in this day and age but many large corporations have been attempting to get laws passed that prevent the revocation of charters or that strike the laws for revocation of charters from the books. Charters are and were meant to limit FINANCIAL risk not as a mask for illegal practices. They were originally social intruments meant to be used for the undertaking of large projects fundamentally for the good of the people. It is my belief that many corporations are or have taken the priviledge of their charters well beyond their intended purpose. In other words corporations are a priviledge but not a right and as such they should be treated that way. One example of how this priviledge has been abused is Union Carbide complicity in the Bhopal incident. Of course there are thousands of examples on a lesser and greater scale than this one. All the way from the cartels represented by the RIAA and the MPAA, to the atrocities in Burma.
The Program on Corporations Law and Democracy has a large array of articles on Corporate charters their history in the United states and the power that citizens have to retain their authority as sovereign agents over corporations.
As a side note also read this and start thinking about the role of banks.
I hope we shall take warning from the example and crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country.
(Letter to Logan, 1816). THOMAS JEFFERSON ON DEMOCRACY 138 (S. Padover Ed. 1953).
NO LOGO
Better yet, lets start having government reviews of the companies that are already running, so they can decide which ones can stay running. Then, we can set up a "think tank" of government appointed citizens to decide which companies can start up. Of course, this council will need to full disclosure from the company, and maybe even a stake of its shares. Then, if a company does something politically incorrect, the government will put them out of business so we wont have to make the bad decision of buying their inferior product. This council (formerly the Council on Commercial Affairs, now known as the Ministry of Commerce, or "MiniCom" in newspeak) could then even decide which product in a market is the best for us! No more need for endorsements or unfair competition! This council will even anticipate our need for new products, and will personaly reward the innovators with a bonus on top of the MiniCom approved salary level. All workplace discrimination will _COMPLETELY_ disappear, as our unions will decide who is employed where, and at what level. As the evil corporate nightmare we have today disappears before our eyes, we will shower our thanks upon the wide politicians who boldly led us into this brave new world. Socialism - Why regulate industry when you can own it! Facism - Why own industry when you can control it! Communism - Why own industry when you can own the people! Vote Libertarian and vote for freedom
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I have not yet begun to procrastinate!
I don't know if you are refering to capitalistm, but if you are, that is not what capitalism is about. In a complete free-market, one still couldn't make a legal living by being a hitman.
Why would you want to punish the corporation instead of the executives? It's just an imaginary thing anyway.
I'm sure the executives at Avant! would have rather had the corporation killed than having to pay $27 million dollars out of thier own pockets.
That's why you form a corporation in the first place. The primary purpose of a corporation is not to IPO. It's to tranfer liability from you personally to this imaginary fixture.
Trolls throughout history:
Trolls throughout history:
Jonathan Swift
I have a modest proposal for a "bad-spelling" death penalty. Offenders would have their slashdot charter revoked.
hight safty precausions ultimatly responcible diffrent streat jounal accedentaly punnishing compaaining tring crusifing accedents accedentally pssition moderat
Honorable mention: "it's" instead of "its". Did I miss anything?
Curiously, he managed to spell "excoriate" correctly...
That Corporations, and therefore all companies have 'legal rights' in much the same way a living breathing person does. A corportation can declare bankruptcy, regardless of the fact that it's CEO and board took the money and ran. A coporation can also earn income and pay taxes (when it doesn't find a way to wriggle out of them via all the business-targeted loopholes in the tax code.)
The real crime here is that while a corporation or a company is realy a posession even if it is owned by hundreds or thousands of people, it serves as a protective sheild for real criminal behavior.
It is said that a society grows more corrupt the more laws it has. Well, rather than imposing new laws that punish a corporation or its members for wrongdoing, I propose instead removing laws and tax code that grant corporations 'person status'. Remove the laws and tax code that allow a corporation to profit instead of its owners. Remove everything that grants rights to a corporation, and I think you'll start to see a little better accountability.
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
I think the corporate death penalty idea could work, but is fraught with legal landmines. I think if it can be proven and ruled that a company is entirely based/founded on fraudulent or criminal behaviour, then it should lose it's corporate charter. Plain and simple. Avant! would seem to an example here, but I'm betting there are not that many cases this cut-and-dried.
However, I'm willing to guess that there are tons of companies out there where perhaps a portion of their business could fall into the 'death penalty' area. What about those? Can you kill part of a company? What kind of legal rangling would we see in these cases?
I dunno...this all seems tricky - and it's lunchtime. Mmmm.
CrazyLegs
"Pork!!" said the Fish, and we all laughed.
However, I don't believe a company can vote...
________________________________________________
________________________________________________
suwain_2
"Julius Finkelstein, the deputy district attorney who persisted in his pursuit of justice, told a grand jury last year: ``Avant!'s entire existence is a fraud.'' If he's correct, as Tuesday's plea bargain strongly suggests -- if Avant! was founded and funded with criminal acts -- what right does it have to exist?"
There are miles of legal and corporate history that are brushed over by making such a paragraph. Gillmor hasn't even acknowledged that there are other considerations, precedents, that might help us form rational arguments and reach a rational conclusion. One might be suspicious of Gillmor's motives when he takes the typical exagerated courtroom rhetoric seriously. Before one could fully realize how strange that paragraph was, however, Gillmor springs another paragraph that is truly bizarre for this discussion. How can he in good conscience go from asking what right a company has to exist to making the dogmatic statement,
"The death penalty for human beings is wrong."
Nice segue! While Gillmor had the reader distracted with the issue of corrupt businesses, he snuck in a fly ball from left field that informs us without any discussion or consideration that the US Supreme Court and several million voters are simply wrong for supporting the human death penalty. What does the human death penalty have to do with this topic? Unfortunately, Gillmor doesn't really tell us. He simply starts hacking away, answering in a moment a controversial issue that much better minds than his have pondered for years.
Apparently, California's cities aren't the only things out there suffering power failures.
Taking stuff apart since 1969 (TM)
even if this law passed, those loveable evil mulitnational coorporations would find a way to use it to crush smaller opposition, its giving too much power to to companies that can afford the sleaziest lawyers
--rock me like a huricane? NO rock you
For a start, considerring the way death panalty is handled in the US, it would take a century to kill a company, all this time the tax payer would've to pay it money.
Oh, and since making money is the sole justification of a company, prefer to see all of Linux's companies on death row.
--
Two witches watched two watches.
Which witch watched which watch?
...it's called revoking a corporation's charter, and up till a hundred years ago was done when a corporation was found to be no longer serving the public good. There is currently a petition underway to revoke Phillip Morris' charter.
t ml
For more on this, see the AdBuster's web site:
http://adbusters.org/campaigns/corporate/tour/1.h
--
Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies.
Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies.
- Nietzsche
Don't get me wrong, I'm as much for small government as anyone, but there's an additional point here.
We have laws and penalties for a reason - to even out the playing field as much as possible. The sensible argument that you or I should be able to start a business with as little government interference as possible DOES NOT SCALE when we're talking about corporations with budgets bigger than many countries.
To maintain that this principle must be adhered to mindlessly, regardless of its practical effects is simply dogmatic. Big companies represent substantial power blocs within society. If they can do as they wish with no legal control, then we are left with Corporate Anarchy.
The desire to make corporations exists within an enforceable legal framework is NOT communism.
I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength, and bid defiance to the laws our country. - Thomas Jefferson, 1816
Yeah that Jefferson - what a damn pinko.
Actually I think I agree with you. I my original post I said "start a business" not "form a corporation". There's a big difference. A corporation is a very specific legal entity, and the assignment of this status to a business should probably be more tightly regulated than it is (along with entities such as "religous institution", and "charity").
That being said, I can't help being a small-c conservative. I want to exist in a country (AND world!) which is under the Rule of Law. However, I think governments should stay out of our lives to the maximum extent practical. The notion of the "free market" finding answers to problems has been abused and contorted for the political ends of all sorts of unscrupulous people over the last couple of decades, but at the core there's an important point there.
Leaving people to their own devices typically causes them to find a balance that works for them. The legal framework is there to act as a constraint (high cost) to simple but grossly unfair solutions. Communism took things to the other extreme - leaving nothing unregulated in an attempt to maximize fairness. The result was an unmitigated disaster which scarred the face of the 20th century and will likely echo through most of the 21st. A more ecological (in the true sense of the word) approach is usually more successful.
There would have to be some legal limitation (a la bankcrupcy) on the surviving individuals once the corporation was killed. Maybe... a lifetime ban on starting, owning stock in, or managing any company of any kind.
Otherwise, we already have a death penalty. Its called going-out-of-business.
The approach that is needed is to apply charter revocation more in small, clearcut cases. Once sufficient legal precedent has been built up, there is at least a chance that one can go after bigger companies.
It might also be worth waiting for a less right-wing supreme court. The current supreme court seems to be able to call "black" "white" and get away with it.
The writer says that if it weren't for an unlawful act, Avant! would never be. But throwing out all the indians was hardly a lawful act that either, and the US shoudln't cease to exist just because fo that. Very many nations are in the same predicament, in some places that very problem causes wars, like in northern ireland, Israel and Sri Lanka. And look at us: what is the odds that on the long path of our ancestors, one of our great-grandparents unions were less-than-consensual?
But if there comes a corporate death penalty I want it enacted on Microsoft. Now.
xkcd is not in the sudoers file. This incident will be reported.
The american bill of rights applies to corporations. That's odd to say the least, and it's one of the love-to-hate objects of Adbusters and Kalle Lasn.
xkcd is not in the sudoers file. This incident will be reported.
IANAL but wouldn't that violate freedom of association?
Toronto-area transit rider? Rate your ride.
Many Australians would have been glad if this had been applied to HIH
I was reading through this article and picked up on a few things. First of he refers to corporations as persons, this is not true, they are not considered natural persons, only citizens. Thus they do not have protection of the 5th amendment (right to not incrimenate ones self). Read the laws carefuly, if it says persons it means real people, if it says citizens they mean everyone that is a legal citizen of the US. Also this would not neccesarily be the place for federal regulation. The federal government only has juisprudence over interstate commerce (because of the interstate commerce clause), so they could technically only apply regulation to corporations which operate accross state borders, but then the question would be what gives the federal government the power to force a state to revoke a license (or permit) that they offered. This is not a simple issue, the next issue that would have to be resolved is, what is preventing the founders/owners of the "killed" corporation from simply re-incorporating. Rembember that you do not have to incorporate in the state that you conduct your primary business withing. This is not a simple "cut and dry" issue and may be one where punitive damages are the most effective ones. Remember, just because there is a problem doesn't mean we need legistlation to fix it.
Taking over one bit at a time...
Jefferson also said this at at the Philadelphia Constitutional Convention of 1787:
I fully agree with General Washington, that we must protect this young nation from an insidious influence and impenetration. The menace, gentlemen, is the Jews.
In whatever country Jews have settled in any great number, they have lowered its moral tone; depreciated its commercial integrity; have segregated themselves and have not been assimilated; have sneered at and tried to undermine the Christian religion upon which that nation is founded, by objecting to its restrictions; have built up a state within the state; and when opposed have tried to strangle that country to death financially, as in the case of Spain and Portugal.
For over 1,700 years, the Jews have been bewailing their sad fate in that they have been exiled from their homeland, as they call Palestine. But gentlemen, did the world give it to them in fee simple, they would at once find some reason for not returning. Why? Because they are vampires, and vampires do not live on vampires. They cannot live only among themselves. They must subsist on Christians and other people not of their race.
If you do not exclude them from these United States, in their Constitution, in less than 200 years they will have swarmed here in such great numbers that they will dominate and devour the land and change our form of government, for which we Americans have shed our blood, given our lives our substance and jeopardized our liberty.
If you do not exclude them, in less than 200 years our descendants will be working in the fields to furnish them substance, while they will be in the counting houses rubbing their hands. I warn you, gentlemen, if you do not exclude Jews for all time, your children will curse you in your graves.
Jews, gentlemen, are Asiatics, let them be born where they will nor how many generations they are away from Asia, they will never be otherwise. Their ideas do not conform to an American's, and will not even thou they live among us ten generations. A leopard cannot change its spots. Jews are Asiatics, are a menace to this country if permitted entrance, and should be excluded by this Constitutional Convention.
Charming. A most useful quote for any anti-semitic American, given the unwarranted hero-worship he seems to get.
Does a Christian soccer team even need a goalkeeper?
One major problem that we have and which will get worse is the growing "personhood" of corporations. Corporations were never originally intended to have rights equal to or better than actual flesh-and-blood citizens, but that is precisely what is happening. Citizens' freedom of speech is restrained in favor of intellectual-property rights of corporations. I can think of at least two things wrong with that.
What better way to make corporations more powerful, to give them more rights originally intended for persons, but to treat them like people by having a "death penalty". Revoking a corportate charter is an administrative/civil matter (and is functional equivalent of a death penalty). If we make corporations face criminal trial/punishment, we only affirm that they must have the same rights as people. Probably not in the long-term interests of people.
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Stay in school, kids! Peace out, Dubya
The Jews' rights were taken away not all of a sudden, but little by little, first the "less significant" rights, then the more basic ones. Which do you think would happen first: banning of firearms, or forced relocation to ghettos?
"In AD 2101, war was beginning..."
You are not even white so shut the fuck up loser.
...and you can't blame meteors for everything.