Corporations shouldn't be people though. This is a dangerous precedent.
Campaigning is done on corporate television. The print press is for profit corporations.
Can you imagine a free election without the New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, Twitter, Reddit, etc.
Why can't Koch brothers buy advertisements trashing Hillary Clinton when Jeff Bezos can buy the Washington Post and then run a hit piece on Marco Rubio?
Getting private corporations out of the speech business is probably impossible because of the internet. You could probably devise a system to attempt it, but it would be radical.
This. I've heard people joking refer to campaign finance laws as "enforcement of mainstream media relevance".
Juridical personhood is the defining characteristic of a corporation.
On 1) They aren't persons, but do have a limited degree of personhood. Among other things, that personhood is what allows us to sue them and such.
On 2) I don't have a problem with it. If companies have to abide the law, then I can't imagine how it would be that they shouldn't have input into its making.
I agree that corporate influence is a real problem, but would personally suggest that limiting the scope of influence available to lawmakers is a better alternative to fixing the problem than limiting people (who form corporations) of their first amendment rights.
That said, this debate is getting into the 'purely political' territory, and is probably not a great fit for an HN discussion.
That's the crux of the problem though. People who form corporations are granted free speech abilities that are beyond the means of everyone else. Those that own a corporation have no legal limit on the amount of cash they can lend to a political cause while those who do not have their allowed contribution amount capped.
Corporations such as -- to pick an example completely at random -- the New York Times?
One of the many, many problems with advocating limiting corporate speech is that virtually everything larger than complaining on a blog or tacking a sign to an electrical pole is done by a corporate organization. If the New York Times can say what it pleases using its vast financial resources and nationwide distribution networks, it's very hard to argue coherently that, say, General Electric can't.
What are you suggesting here? Increased direct democracy? Less lobbying, presumably thru regulation, thereby curtailing speech?
He was also chairman of BAE systems, The Chertoff Group, and other defense-oriented businesses. BAE is D.C.'s 8th largest contractor.
Chertoff was instrumental in mandating the FAA's adoption of body scanners for security in his capacity as a public official.
As a private citizen, The Chertoff Group represents lobbying efforts for security product companies and manufacturers.
Airports may or may not need body scanners. I think that the general HN audience is more familiar with Schneier's work enough to know of the 'security theater' that they represent, but even allowing for the possibility that they actually do some good, it seems absolutely absurd to me that the director of the NSA or the Secretary of Homeland Security has the power to mandate their purchase and installation with one hand, while selling them to the government with the other.
Assuredly this is neither the most or least egregious example of federal corruption, but I think it's the most illustrative. To me, the federal government has only the powers enumerated in the constitution. Mandating security devices isn't one of those powers, but the federal government has claimed it in its purview.
I don't necessarily have a problem with the federal government trying to keep us safe, if that's what they're doing, and I certainly don't mean to besmirch Chertoff as the archetype of corruption -- he may very well have the best possible intent... but at the same time, it would be silly of me, as president, to insist that only the software company I owned could possibly manufacture secure-enough solutions for the government and mandate their usage as vendor.
This isn't to suggest that all regulations are bad, mind you, but cui bono; wherever there exists a regulation, someone benefits from it. Sometimes it is legitimately the people who are customers / consumers of that business, but often it exists as the result of a mandated competitive advantage... and anecdotally speaking, the more expensive compliance is, the more likely that is to be the case.
Your solution to regulatory capture is to abolish government appropriations? Consumers, erm citizens, would then get essential services from corporations directly, mooting the need for governments?
I think I've seen that movie.
PS- Sorry about your Chertoff. Talking about it is an important part of the recovery process.
I bet there is at least some corner case where an action of the state government made a company give up operating (like pulling a liquor license or whatever).
Executing a corporation would be more akin to seizing all the assets, throwing the board and execs in jail, shredding any and all contracts, some high profile perp walks.
Now that I'm describing it... It'd look like a RICO case.
Why is it I lose my right to speak if I'm in a group? In that respect, what makes corporations different from unions or advocacy groups like Greenpeace?
Because you carry in your wallet a card that declares you a member of a corporation, you are not granted any rights, personally.
Near as I can find, corporations don't have carte blanche to give unlimited money to an individual campaign. In fact, corporations cannot give any money to an individual candidate's campaign.
Corporations can give money to Political Action Committees, but are limited by amount to the same as real people.
Corporations can give money to SuperPACs, but so can real people.
http://www.fec.gov/info/contriblimitschart1516.pdf
http://www.fec.gov/pages/brochures/citizens.shtml
If I am wrong, I welcome corrections, but I think you're off on what corporations can and cannot do.
So no more collective bargaining?
No one has suggested that you should. People have suggested that the corporation acting as such, including through its paid agents should not have the same rights as natural persons, acting alone or collectively, but that various classes of corporations should have constraints appropriate to their class.
One of the many reasons offered for this is that corporations are creations of government granted the use of the special form and legal fiction of personhood adn subsidized with various benefits with the purpose of achieving public benefit.
> In that respect, what makes corporations different from unions or advocacy groups like Greenpeace?
Unions and advocacy groups quite often are corporations. "Unions" and "advocacy groups" are descriptions of functions, "corporation" is a description of legal structure.
Who will decide what class a corporation falls into?
I get the uneasy feeling that, practically speaking, corporations expressing certain approved political opinions or supporting approved political candidates will have the least constraints.