The Supreme Court decision

[gwillen]

For those on my flist, if any, who support the Court's decision in /Citizens United v. FEC/, I would be interested to know your answers to the following questions:

Is a toaster a person?

Is a corporation a person?

Can you explain the difference?

What would it mean for a toaster to have a right to free speech?

What does it mean, precisely, for a corporation to have a right to free speech? This is not the same as the free speech rights enjoyed by any of the people involved as individuals -- this, as ruled by the court, is a separate right, belonging to the corporation as an entity in and of itself, completely independent of the rights of any of the individuals involved.

Can you explain the difference?

ETA: Justice Rehnquist's dissent in /First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti/
makes for excellent reading on the subject.

Comments

[wjl.livejournal.com]

i don't know anything about the court decision, but i think i can explain the difference between a corporation and a toaster: a corporation can enter into contracts and has to pay taxes, two traits not normally associated with toasters.

what's the excitement about with this case?

[beinsane.livejournal.com]

You have a point, but at the same time:

The New York Times Company can endorse candidates on its website.

The International Business Machines Corporation cannot.

Legally, both are business corporations established under the laws of the State of New York, publicly traded and subject to SEC regulation, etc. So why would silencing one of them violate freedom of the press, and the other would not?

(The wrong answer is "Because NYT is a media company." If IBM bought a weekly community paper in Armonk they'd be a media company too. Hell, employee newsletters probably count as "press".)

There is a fundamental contradiction between strong free speech rights and eliminating the problem of bribery via campaign contributions. And in my experience, the left doesn't recognize that there's a contradiction and the right doesn't recognize that there's a problem.

[drquuxum.livejournal.com]

I think the SC[r]OTUS fucked up royally here, but to answer your questions in a bizarre way....

A toaster does not have sentience, independent judgment, or an effective means of communication; therefore, you may be arrested for having sexual relations with a toaster because it is unable to give requisite consent.

A corporation, having all three of those attributes (arguably), can give consent. (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/oct/15/defence-contractors-rape-claim-block)

I know those have nothing to do with the case at hand, but it was in my head and I needed to unleash them upon the world. ;-)

[platypuslord.livejournal.com]

Before necessarily getting into an argument about whether the decision was correct, I think it would be helpful to make sure we all understand the details of the case. I read most of the Wikipedia article, but I'm concerned that wikipedia may not be completely accurate on a politically charged recent event.

As I understand it, a "conservative nonprofit" organization made a smear ad about Hillary Clinton before the primaries, and attempted to show it as a movie on Direct TV. The FEC ruled that this violated Law 441b, which said corporations could not directly spend money to influence an election.

(My corporation has a "Political Action Committee". They routinely ask you to give them some of your own money, so that they can donate the money as campaign contributions to a politician who can use it for advertising. I believe this twisted machination is intended specifically to avoid Law 441b.)

Anyway the Supreme Court overturned the decision, apparently arguing that corporations should have free speech. Wikipedia makes a rather pointed comment about "...the statement by then-Deputy Solicitor General Malcolm L. Stewart, representing the FEC, that the government would have the power to ban books...", but I'm not sure if that is real or if it's partisan wikinoise.

Wikipedia has a "Criticism and Support" section. All the supporters of the decision are described as "conservatives"; all the critics are described as "liberals".

[roseandsigil.livejournal.com]

Interesting. I will have to actually read the decision I guess. I had been assuming that the essence of the decision was that corporations were groups of people and to deny them rights was thus unconstitutional. However, you seem to be saying that the decision claims that corporations have rights in and of themselves, a position I find morally abhorrent.

I find the first idea (that corporations have rights as collections of people) to have disturbing consequences, but I am having trouble arguing against it from little-l liberal axioms.

[balseraph.livejournal.com]

And now, with respect, presenting the case *for*.

Or, put another way, the propaganda from the evil side of things.

The commentary so far has been largely interesting and intelligent, but I would like to put forward that it’s going completely in the wrong direction, because of incorrect preliminary suppositions.

To Whit:

The difference between a toaster and a corporation is as follows:

There is no such thing as a corporation, in the sense that there is a thing like a toaster.

A corporation is a method by which people who share a personal interest in a given subject and / or economic activity gather and self identify. Adopting this group identification carries certain legal ramifications, and for the purposes of simplicity, in many cases has the legal fiction of being an “entity”. The fact that this is a (legally relevant) fiction is self evident in that: if a “corporation” becomes liable for a legal malfeasance, then it is some or all of the people who have chosen that identifier who will pay any consequences for any violation of legal code by the corporate “entity.” This is true even if the consequences are purely financial and paid out of the “corporations” slush funds; those funds are now unavailable to the people involved for use in paying salaries, bonuses, or other activity that they would direct and design.

So, what we’re really talking about is: is it appropriate for groups of freely associating individuals to make political speech *as a group*, rather than as individuals? Further, is it appropriate for a group with a profit motive to be extended the same liberties as groups that claim to function not for profit?

I’m going to leave aside the purely interpretive legal argument; I’m not a legal scholar, and whatever else you might want to say about him, I believe it can be said that Justice Scalia can be trusted to present the best possible, unvarnished, bare bones *legal* interpretation / decision, though not necessarily the most (subjectively) morally or philosophically desirable outcome.

[physics-dude.livejournal.com]

Your question is totally ridiculous and has nothing to do with the issue! I will give you what I think is a totally ridiculous and logically sound answer.

First you have to define what a person is, I suppose. But a toaster is an inanimate object. A corporation is a collection of individuals working together. Inasmuch as it can have emergent goals and desires, self-preservation instincts, even procreative ability, that are not directly attributable to any one member's business decisions, it would seem reasonable to at least call it alive, as a distinct entity. "Person" is perhaps just a legal distinction; inasmuch as a corporation has emergent communicative behavior comparable in coherence to individual human speech, it makes sense to speak of freedom thereof.

[kartiksg.livejournal.com]

I think I may actually be in support of this decision in the interest of consistency. If we start from the assumption of corporate personhood, then they get free speech rights as well. As far as I can see, all that has actually happened is, now you can see "INTERNETS NEED TO BE FREE NOT NEUTRAL! VOTE FOR X! (tiny font: This ad was sponsored by the AT&T)" as opposed to "INTERNETS NEED TO BE FREE NOT NEUTRAL! VOTE FOR X! (tiny font: This ad is sponsored by People for the free Internet society pact group). It says that "all corporations can openly support candidates" as opposed to "most corporations can indirectly buy candidates through lobbyists and only a few like fox and msnbc can openly (for sufficiently twisted, legalese-ass-covered definitions of open) support candidates".

What I don't support is the double standard when it comes to duties. Corporations must either have the same duties and liabilities of a citizen (which weird.. citizens can't merge.. citizen's can't simply pass off responsibility). Or the idea of corporate personhood itself should be revoked. I would go for revoking personhood and only leaving the original purpose of corporations -- limited liability. As I see it.. limited liability? limited rights.

The more interesting question...

[(Anonymous)]

is why you oppose free speech for toasters.
-azana (who's too lazy to set up open id)