PUBLIC VIEWPOINT Corporations Are Not Like People

Lonnie Hill (Public Viewpoint, Dec. 22) claims corporations really are persons, based on “common sense and historical perspective.” But common sense tells us that a corporation is not a person like you and me. Nor is it just an association of individuals like a club. It is a legal entity that is separate and distinct from its owners, with the right to enter into contracts, loan and borrow money, hire employees, own assets and pay taxes.

This legal entity (person on paper) has limited liability, which means shareholders have the right to participate in the profi ts, but are not held personallyliable for the company’s debts. (You’d better not try this at home!) Limited liability is a big advantage the paper person has over a natural person. That’s why merchants began to form corporations 400 years ago.

Another diff erence between a corporation and the rest of us is the corporation never dies - it is immortal. Legally, it is a super-person, with greater rights than us mere fl eshand-blood persons. Common sense tells me this is a legal fiction, not a “person” that should have the rights of a citizen.

Hill’s historical perspective dates from the infamous Santa Clara decision of1886. He needs to go back another century or so. What was the Boston Tea Party all about? It was a revolt against the British East India Co., a corporate monopoly with great infl uence over the British government. The American patriots were protesting tax cuts for this corrupt multinational that gave it an unfair advantage over all the little tea shops in the colonies. That is why they threw the tea into Boston Harbor.

Thomas Jeff erson and James Madison tried to get an 11th Amendment into the original Bill of Rights.

It would have prohibited “monopolies in commerce” and made it illegal forcorporations to infl uence elections. The fi rst Congress didn’t pass it, mistakenly thinking that state laws would be enough to constrain corporate power.

At the time, corporations were formed for specifi c purposes, such as building a canal. They gradually acquired more and more rights and powers. In 1826 Jefferson said: “I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial by strength, and bid defi ance to the laws of our country.”

CORALIE KOONCE

Fayetteville