Americans Disagree With Mitt Romney: Corporations Aren't People

Whatever Mitt Romney says, the American people aren't buying this whole "corporations are people" thing.

More than half of Americans said corporations aren't people, and they shouldn't be given the same constitutional rights as citizens, according to surveys conducted by Legal Progress, a program ran by the left-leaning think tank Center for American Progress.

The poll, conducted throughout 2010 and 2011, also found that most Americans, by a margin of three to one, say there should be a limit to the amount corporations can contribute to campaigns.

The debate over corporate personhood has intensified in the wake of the Supreme Court's 2010 ruling in the famed Citizen United case that corporations have the same constitutional rights as people to choose their elected officials -- and therefore have the ability to make unlimited political contributions.

Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney only added fuel to the fire when he declared corporations to be people last August.

Some inside the Occupy movement have also zeroed in on the issue of corporate personhood, with protesters demonstrating in front of the Supreme Court and in Zuccotti Park on the second anniversary of the ruling earlier this month, the Washington Post reports.

But corporations do not currently enjoy all the rights guaranteed to citizens, corporate law expert Kent Greenfield wrote for the Washington Post. They cannot, for example, plead the fifth or avoid self-incrimination.

That grey area has been a source of material for political satirists such as Stephen Colbert. His "deep and abiding interest in the matter of corporate rights" goes so far that he has argued that parents should let their daughters date corporations, The New York Times reports.

See the chart below for the results of Legal Progress' surveys. This material "Americans Agree: Corporations Aren't People" was published by the Center for American Progress:

Comments

[MikeEM]

01:49 PM on 06/03/2012

The Constitution Preamble probably should read:

We The Corporations and Special Interests of the United States, in Order to form a more Profitable Union, establish A Lucrative Marketplace, insure Customer Complacency, provide for the Industrial Military Complex, promote the General Consumption, and secure the Blessings of Materialism to our Customers and their Posterity, do Ordain and Establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

[TarzanWannaBe]

10:13 AM on 02/29/2012

"Americans Disagree". Haha. A little late to mull that over? We are a rather stupid people. It was a Reconstruction idea. SC decided that corporations were people helping pave the way for the Gilded Era. The corporations-are-people (when advantageous!) is about a 130-140 year old idea. It's probably too late to change this flaw. What do you think?

[Bob Grace]

09:39 PM on 02/21/2012

A person has feelings and a mind. A person will die if they are too cold, too hot, if their heart doesn't beat, if they don't breath for more than a few minutes, etc. We have loved ones. We are loved by others. We are living beings. Corporations simply are not. No one will attend their funeral. We as individuals cannot even hope to compete against most corporations. To cater to the merchants over individual demands of the people would have horrified the founding fathers and will only lead to more demonstrations across the nation until the SCOTUS reverses itself, are impeached or, Congress enacts a bill to overrule the court.

[American in Taipei]

11:23 PM on 02/01/2012

I'll gladly welcome corporations to the fold of "personhood" once the government can find a way to imprison them for their crimes. Because, you know, when a person commits a crime (like fraud or theft) he is put in prison. Fair's fair!

[moonlightesq]

06:51 PM on 02/01/2012

This article totally took what Mitt said with respect to "corproation are people" out of context.
I couldn't beleive the headline, so I watched the video. What Mitt said was that earnings of corproations goes to the people (shareholders who own the corporation), and corporation are just like people when it comes to earnings and paying taxes. He did not say corporation are people period.

Why all the false propaganda that it must be all or nothing when it comes to a legal concept distinguishing corporations and people??? The laws distinguishing corporation and that of a natural person have been laid down for a long time. Just as the recently retired Supreme Court Justice Stevens explained in the interview with Colbert, in some ways corporations have the same rights as people, but not all rights afforded to natural persons are afforded to corporations, examples like drinking water, the right to privacy and procreation.

[American in Taipei]

11:29 PM on 02/01/2012

In the same manner, not all corporations subjected to all the limitations and responsibilities that people are. The biggest is that you can't imprison or execute a corporation for committing crimes. And corporations never die.

So given that they have a different set of rights that people do (with some overlap), and different limitations that people do (with some overlap), why do we compare the two? It's like saying "basketballs are Mars, because they're both red and round".

I like how Judge Posner on the 7th Circuit once described corporations: "A corporation is not a living person but a set of contracts the terms of which determine who will bear the brunt of liability."

[moonlightesq]

02:32 PM on 02/02/2012

Judge Posner described a corporation well. It is true that not all corporations subject to all the limitations and responsibilities that people are. But I disagree that corporations never die.

A corporation's assets can be froze, confiscated, or put under a receivership by a court order - as though it is imprison. A corporation's status can also be suspended, defunct or revoked, rendering it unable to defend to any lawsuit - like death.

[acorus]

04:42 AM on 02/01/2012

romney makes in less than 8 hours of every day what the average american tax payer makes annually = $33,000.00...he is thus a tool of the corporate interests, he is the corporate interest whom controls this government, thanks to citizens united, the lobby treachery, etc. mitt is shamelessly power-elite, and unless you too are power-elite, he will not represent you, but rather enslave you.

[Kenny Thompson123]

02:18 PM on 01/31/2012

wow the wording on that poll isnt biased at all. "Corporations shouldnt have more rights than people" "corperations should have the same rights" Obviously corporations shouldnt and dont have more rights than people. They should and do have the same rights as people. The wording on that question is amazing blatant liberal bias

[3dtrix]

03:17 AM on 01/27/2012

There will be NO significant reform of predatory corporatism until corporate personhood is rescinded.

What could be more obvious?

[l78lancer]

12:51 AM on 01/27/2012

Because they are people, then must have ID to vote. That's rght, they don't vote. So again, why are they people?

[Jeff Roxette]

11:36 PM on 01/26/2012

Newt inadvertently got it exactly right last Tuesday night — but he'll be the last to admit it. He reserved the right to tell the truth about Mitt Romney in his non-victory speech after getting trounced in the Iowa Caucuses. This came after his stratospheric ascension and rapid free-fall in the polls leading up to the election.

Romney’s super PAC also reserved the right to ravage Gingrich over the last few weeks. Corporate (they're people, too) money can’t buy you love, but it sure can stop love from going to the other guy. Newt was visibly upset. We thought he might cry in public again, and not about his mother. But this is the height of hypocrisy. Newt has refused to attribute the Romney onslaught to the 2010 U.S. Supreme Court “Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission” decision. Instead, he claimed to be “Romney-boated,” in reference to the vicious, slanderous attack on John Kerry during the 2004 election cycle by the perjuriously named Swift-Boat Veterans for Truth.

Jeff Roxette
http://www.politicsclarifier.com/FrontPageFeed.html#IDoReserve-2012-0105

[Rush Libraughl 83]

10:13 PM on 01/26/2012

If corporations are people, then people are corporations. So I need to know how I can charge my bank a fee when they put a 2 day hold on my checks.

I mean when you are late on a bill you get charged extra right? Well I need information on how I make sure Comcast gets charged my MeMySelf and Inc can charge them a $35 "messing up my day fee" and how to charge BOA a $10 "I'm charging you because you don't give me enough interest fee."

[Flaming Moderate Wacko]

09:01 PM on 01/26/2012

If corporations are people, then so are UNIONS!

[rationalitymatters]

01:58 PM on 01/27/2012

I agree, Flaming Moderate, but let's "unpeople" corporations, rather than include unions.

[Flaming Moderate Wacko]

03:45 PM on 01/27/2012

Like your 40 hour work week?
Like your vacation?
Like having sick leave?
Like having health benefits?
Unions are people my friend. The minute you forget that and cave in to "right to work for less," then you give yourself no voice in the work place. Do you like having no voice where you work?

[rory talbot]

08:11 PM on 01/26/2012

This is the most inane article I've ever read on HP. Who care what percentage of Americans believe whether corporations are people?!? All it takes it 5 people to believe it and it is so: Scalia, Thomas, Kennedy, Alito and Roberts.

[Scurvydog74]

06:37 PM on 01/26/2012

...and science fiction writers fantasized about robots or apes taking over, when, in fact, it was corporations we should fear all along.

[tbsa]

03:21 PM on 01/26/2012

They aren't people. They never will be, they don't eat, or sleep.