Are Corporations Human?

[Emperor Nero]

Under current law (in the US at least) corporations have the same rights as human beings to operate as legal entity. Essentially a corporation has most, if not all, of the same rights you do under Constitutional law. What are your thoughts on this topic?

 

[SuF]

No they don't. No they aren't. No one can agree on what the Supreme Court decided but it certainly isn't that they have every right a person does. They have certain rights in certain situations.

 

[mage3158]

No they don't. No they aren't. No one can agree on what the Supreme Court decided but it certainly isn't that they have every right a person does. They have certain rights in certain situations.

Pretty much this. The amount of rights they have is greatly over exaggerated.

 

[Emperor Nero]

No they don't. No they aren't. No one can agree on what the Supreme Court decided but it certainly isn't that they have every right a person does. They have certain rights in certain situations.

A corporations right to donate as much as they want to a political campaign was recently decided under the guise of a first amendment protection. They can enforce contracts exactly the same way humans do and they can be tried for many of the same crimes humans are tried for. They have much the same protections.

 

[mage3158]

A corporations right to donate as much as they want to a political campaign was recently decided under the guise of a first amendment protection. They can enforce contracts exactly the same way humans do and they can be tried for many of the same crimes humans are tried for. They have much the same protections.

One huge difference is corporations do not have the rights to free speech, they can not lie and deceive the public.

 

[SuF]

A corporations right to donate as much as they want to a political campaign was recently decided under the guise of a first amendment protection. They can enforce contracts exactly the same way humans do and they can be tried for many of the same crimes humans are tried for. They have much the same protections.

One huge difference is corporations do not have the rights to free speech, they can not lie and deceive the public.

This. Under certain circumstances they have been given certain rights. They still can't run any ad they want, for instance.

 

[Snoopchicken]

I once heard a quote from somewhere, I can't recall where, but it was a discussion between two people in a company. It went something like this:

Employee: "Since our business is doing successful, may I suggest that we expand internationally? That way we can earn more money."

Boss: "The worst quality of the human being is greed, -employee's name here-."

Employee: "But we're not humans."

I thought it was pretty interesting.

 

[Rsaccounttrader]

The reason for corporate personhood is so that individuals cannot be individually prosecuted for actions done by their company. If this law did not exist, America would have trouble being competitive as executives would be constantly sued for wrongdoing.