So we're clear, too, the Fourteenth Amendment grants citizenship to everyone born in the US and subject to its jurisdiction and protects civil and political rights
Its Citizenship Clause provides a broad definition of citizenship that overruled the decision in Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857), which held that blacks could not be citizens of the United States.
Its Due Process Clause prohibits state and local governments from depriving persons of life, liberty, or property without certain steps being taken to ensure fairness. This clause has been used to make most of the Bill of Rights applicable to the states, as well as to recognize substantive and proceduralrights.
Its Equal Protection Clause requires each state to provide equal protection under the law to all people within its jurisdiction. This clause was the basis for Brown v. Board of Education (1954), the Supreme Court decision which precipitated the dismantling of racial segregation in the United States.
Ain't America great? We don't try to extend the Constitution's 14th Amendment rights to citizens--in this case, African-Americans--hardly a lick but we crawl all over ourselves to advance those same rights to non-entity, really, corporations, just because of their big bucks.
As the old song goes, "It's money that matters, in the USA..."
Thanks and a hat tip to the following blogging colleagues for this political cartoon:
http://www.nocorprule.blogspot.com/;
http://www.poclad.org/?pg=Art&show=wuerker04.jpg
Link to Wikipedia definition/description of the 14th Amendment: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourteenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution
Posts
4 comments:
The Corporatocracy is self-promoting, self-involved, self-perpetuating and, according to the Supremes, alive. Ya just can't win throw up your arms and become an associate.
Corporations need to have something like rights--primarily property rights (because their stockholders have property rights) and due process. I won't argue hard against the idea that a corporation doesn't have actual rights by itself, but the owner's rights have to pass through to an extent--primarily property rights and due process.
I think a bigger factor in which cases get to the supreme court is complexity--most cases relating to the 14th and race are pretty simple, and can be decided at lower levels. Corporate stuff isn't so simple.
Sevesteen,
No one is saying a corporation doesn't or shouldn't have rights and/or due process. It's just that they shouldn't be considered a true "person" and be granted "personhood", equal to all us humans, as the Supreme Court has done. Their rights shouldn't supersede ours. The corporation should be subservient to the voters and, again, humans, in society, in all cases.
And as far as what gets to the Supreme Court, Sevesteen, this is another example of the "squeaky wheel getting the grease" and "them what has, gets." If you've got the money, you can and likely will get your case before a court. So it is with this example--corporations took their fights to the court. No one was out there fighting for the minority.
Post a Comment