Forty years ago this week, Justice Lewis F. Powell, Jr., an attorney from Richmond, Virginia, drafted a confidential memorandum for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that described a strategy for the corporate takeover of the dominant public institutions of American society.
Powell and his friend Eugene Sydnor, then-chairman of the Chamber's education committee, believed the Chamber had to transform itself from a passive business group into a powerful political force capable of taking on what Powell described as a major ongoing "attack on the American free enterprise system."
An astute observer of the business community and broader social trends, Powell was a former president of the American Bar Association and a board member of tobacco giant Philip Morris and other companies. In his memo, he detailed a series of possible "avenues of action" that the Chamber and the broader business community should take in response to fierce criticism in the media, campus-based protests, and new consumer and environmental laws.
Environmental awareness and pressure on corporate polluters had reached a new peak in the months before the Powell memo was written. In January 1970, President Nixon signed the National Environmental Policy Act, which formally recognized the environment's importance by establishing the White House Council on Environmental Quality. Massive Earth Day events took place all over the country just a few months later and by early July, Nixon signed an executive order that created the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Tough new amendments to the Clean Air Act followed in December 1970 and by April 1971, EPA announced the first air pollution standards. Lead paint was soon regulated for the first time, and the awareness of the impacts of pesticides and other pollutants -- made famous by Rachel Carson in her 1962 book, Silent Spring -- was recognized when DDT was finally banned for agricultural use in 1972.
The overall tone of Powell's memo reflected a widespread sense of crisis among elites in the business and political communities. "No thoughtful person can question that the American economic system is under broad attack," he suggested, adding that the attacks were not coming just from a few "extremists of the left," but also - and most alarmingly -- from "perfectly respectable elements of society," including leading intellectuals, the media, and politicians.
To meet the challenge, business leaders would have to first recognize the severity of the crisis, and begin marshaling their resources to influence prominent institutions of public opinion and political power -- especially the universities, the media and the courts. The memo emphasized the importance of education, values, and movement-building. Corporations had to reshape the political debate, organize speakers' bureaus and keep television programs under "constant surveillance." Most importantly, business needed to recognize that political power must be "assiduously cultivated; and that when necessary, it must be used aggressively and with determination - without embarrassment and without the reluctance which has been so characteristic of American business."
Powell emphasized the importance of strengthening institutions like the U.S. Chamber -- which represented the interests of the broader business community, and therefore key to creating a united front. While individual corporations could represent their interests more aggressively, the responsibility of conducting an enduring campaign would necessarily fall upon the Chamber and allied foundations. Since business executives had "little stomach for hard-nosed contest with their critics" and "little skill in effective intellectual and philosophical debate," it was important to create new think tanks, legal foundations, front groups and other organizations. The ability to align such groups into a united front would only come about through "careful long-range planning and implementation, in consistency of action over an indefinite period of years, in the scale of financing available only through joint effort, and in the political power available only through united action and united organizations."
Before he was appointed by Richard Nixon to the U.S. Supreme Court Powell circulated his call for a business crusade not only to the Chamber, but also to executives at corporations including General Motors. The memo did not become available to the public until after Powell's confirmation to the Court, when it was leaked to Jack Anderson, a syndicated columnist and investigative reporter, who cited it as reason to doubt Powell's legal objectivity.
Anderson's report spread business leaders' interest in the memo even further. Soon thereafter, the Chamber's board of directors formed a task force of 40 business executives (from U.S. Steel, GE, ABC, GM, CBS, 3M, Phillips Petroleum, Amway and numerous other companies) to review Powell's memo and draft a list of specific proposals to "improve understanding of business and the private enterprise system," which the board adopted on November 8, 1973.
In her 2009 book, Invisible Hands, historian Kim Phillips-Fein describes how "many who read the memo cited it afterward as inspiration for their political choices." In fact, Powell's Memo is widely credited for having helped catalyze a new business activist movement, with numerous conservative family and corporate foundations (e.g. Coors, Olin, Bradley, Scaife, Koch and others) thereafter creating and sustaining powerful new voices to help push the corporate agenda, including the Business Roundtable (1972), the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC - 1973), Heritage Foundation (1973), the Cato Institute (1977), the Manhattan Institute (1978), Citizens for a Sound Economy (1984 - now Americans for Prosperity), Accuracy in Academe (1985), and others.
Because it signaled the beginning of a major shift in American business culture, political power and law, the Powell memo essentially marks the beginning of the business community's multi-decade collective takeover of the most important institutions of public opinion and democratic decision-making. At the very least, it is the first place where this broad agenda was compiled in one document.
That shift continues today, with corporate influence over policy and politics reaching unprecedented new dimensions. The decades-long drive to rethink legal doctrines and ultimately strike down the edifice of campaign finance laws - breaking radical new ground with the Roberts Court's decision in Citizens United v. the Federal Election Commission - continues apace.
Although many new voices have emerged in the 40 years since it circulated Powell's memo, the U.S. Chamber has expanded its leadership position within the corporate power movement, leading dozens of judicial, legislative and regulatory fights each year. Measured in terms of money spent, the Chamber is by far the most powerful lobby in Washington, DC, spending $770.6 million since 1998, over three times the amount spent by General Electric, the second-largest spender. At the same time, the Chamber has reinforced its lobbying power by becoming one of the largest conduits of election-related "independent expenditures," spending over $32.8 million on Federal elections in 2010. The Chamber sponsors the Institute for Legal Reform, which has spearheaded the campaign for tort "reform," making it more difficult for average people who have been injured, assaulted, or harmed to sue the responsible corporations. Along with well over a dozen legal foundations, the Chamber has also helped shape the powerful "business civil liberties" movement that has been a driving force behind the Citizens United decision and other judicial actions that have handcuffed regulators and prevented Congress from putting common-sense checks on corporate power.
(originally posted at Greenpeace)
Kumi Naidoo: Don't Make a Wave: Greenpeace at 40
So instead of looking at this and considering that these people had a point, that business might need a paradigm shift to address the environmental crisis, they just tried to fight the changes. When people across the spectrum are telling you that what you're doing is wrong you might want to listen to them, to at least consider that you're position might actually be wrong. This corporate culture war is a large part of what's wrong in America today, with the number one problem being corporations are NOT PEOPLE! This idea underlies every other corporate problem.
What this really has done is move our country and espeacially our news media to the far right spectrum of political thought and deed. I believe it may be too powerful now to defeat, but I will always hope that more and more citizens will become aware of the driving forces that have kidnaped our once great country and somehow restore our democracy back into the hands of it's citizens.
One more point to be inserted. These elitist interests have moved into 21st century tactics. You don't need a massive military force nor an insurrection any more. German, Japanese, Chinese, Brazillian and numerous other growing economies have made the connection that while the U.S. "leadership" is mired in 20th century large standing and deployed military (yet another money basket for many of these "Chamber" of horrors despots). If you read up on the failed Fascist insurrection attempt, it was thwarted when General Smedley Butler reported them after he was approached to lead their pusch. Today they have bypassed the need for an army, or generals with morals. They have taken over and the duped populace has been lulled to sleep.
American lobby/politicos are standing at the ready to sell the interests of the American (working citizens) to foreign interests. Notice how Ben Bernanke dispersed a large portion of the $17trillion to foreign (German, Swiss, French, Scottish) banks. Imagine how silly it must seem to Hitler, Ceasar and all the great conquering despots through the centuries that you could just get a few clods to spout terms like "Free Market" and "international corporation" and bring a nation to its knees.
Two generations of (original plotter) Bushs have infiltrated the highest office in the land, a third creep Jeb is waiting in the wings.
They brought in pitchman Ronald Reagan with a new and reformed Republican Party that supported Family, God, America and told Americans it wasn't their fault, it was governments fault. They have been off to the races ever since.
Today it isn't Right or Left. It is getting representatives who won't work for the special interests. We need representatives that will work to help America first, last and always.
The biggest obstacle we face? The major parties. All they care about is getting re-elected. That means gathering as much money as possible. That means selling out to big money special interests. That means having politicians who will do what the party says. That means only letting party patsys on the ballots.
The people have to say "NO MORE". The first step is simple. Call your county registrar and tell them to register you as an independent. You don't have to change your vote to someone you hate or send money or go to a rally or call Washington. When you change your registration, you send a loud clear message that politics as usual is not good enough.
But the worst part is that we need them more than they need us. They are the wealthy and big business. They are apple pie and baseball. They are America.
We're just labor. We need jobs. They can find labor anywhere. They can compete globally. We can't.
Germans, Japanese, Chinese are all nationalists first and capitalists or communists second. We have no true American identity. We're mercenaries. All the iconic American companies failed or went global for the money.
Thanks for the great article. I never knew much about Justice Powell, and your article did a great job of introducing him and excellent strategic thinking to the readers. I will definitely read more about him and study his far-reaching and prescient views on the overreach by the State. We can only hope that he acted soon enough to counter the special interest damage being done by Big Labor and Big Green, as they all jostle to get a place at the public trough.
Thanks again.
Kai
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/union2.nr0.htm
Union Members Summary
"...In 2010, the union membership rate--the percent of wage and salary workers who were
members of a union--was 11.9 percent, down from 12.3 percent a year earlier, the U.S.
Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. The number of wage and salary workers be-
longing to unions declined by 612,000 to 14.7 million. In 1983, the first year for
which comparable union data are available, the union membership rate was 20.1 per-
cent, and there were 17.7 million union workers..."
"Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration." -- Abraham Lincoln
Manufacturing jobs have been declining since the late 40’s and private union membership has been falling since the late 50’s. Public Union membership has generally been increasing or staying stable. So I guess that has nothing to do with Justice Powell, though I would certainly love to credit him with this great service to our country if it at all possible. But alas, it was not him.
And you quoted Lincoln because he is known as a great economist??? If labor can exist without capital, in those countries with less capital labor should be richer, right? North Korea should be that utopia.
I prefer this quote ‘When unions get higher wages for their members by restricting entry into an occupation, those higher wages are at the expense of other workers who find their opportunities reduced. When government pays its employees higher wages, those higher wages are at the expense of the taxpayer. But when workers get higher wages and better working conditions through the free market, when they get raises by firm competing with one another for the best workers, by workers competing with one another for the best jobs, those higher wages are at nobody's expense. They can only come from higher productivity, greater capital investment, more widely diffused skills. The whole pie is bigger - there's more for the worker, but there's also more for the employer, the investor, the consumer, and even the tax collector.’-Milton Friedman
Kai
So crying "class warfare!" is just one tactic which falls under the description quoted above.
I especially love (sarcasm) the 2nd half of the last sentence, "... without reluctance... ",
that right there is the call to act and lie w/o shame.
When Republicans today rail against the EPA, what they are really saying is that they want companies to have the right to pollute rivers so much that they catch fire.
http://www.reclaimdemocracy.org/corporate_accountability/powell_memo_lewis.html
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/08/matt-stoller-power-politics-%e2%80%93-what-eric-schneiderman-reveals-about-obama.html
It is interesting that the approval rating of large U.S. corporations remains at rock bottom, right down there with our low opinion of Congress, but they have effectively eliminated alternatives to the level that we almost cannot withhold our meager dollars from them to express our displeasure.
If you have a different kind of business -- a co-op for instance -- make me aware of you and I will buy from you if I can.