December, 2011 arrived bearing gifts for those opposed to the concept of "corporate personhood" as set forth in the U.S. Supreme Court Decision "Citizens United." On December 6th, after 45 minutes of public testimony from a crowd that swelled past capacity into an overflow chamber of LA's City Hall, the Los Angeles City Council voted unanimously to support a resolution calling on The United States Congress to amend the Constitution to clearly establish that only living persons -- not corporations -- are endowed with constitutional rights and that money is not the same as free speech. The vote makes Los Angeles the first major city in the U.S. to call for an end to all corporate constitutional rights. Albany, New York made a similar resolution also by a unanimous vote.
In January 2010, in the case of Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission
a bitterly divided Supreme Court ruled that the government may not ban political spending by corporations in candidate elections.
The majority in the 5-to-4 decision claimed the ruling upholds the First Amendment's most important free speech principle, the protection of political speech. The dissenters said that allowing corporate money to flow unchecked into the political marketplace would corrupt democracy.
"If the First Amendment has any force," Justice Anthony M. Kennedy wrote for the majority "it prohibits Congress from fining or jailing citizens, or associations of citizens, for simply engaging in political speech."
The LA City resolution came on the same day as the U.S. Attorney's Office announced the largest settlement ever in a government investigation of a mine disaster, as Alpha Natural Resources agreed to pay $209 million in restitution and civil and criminal penalties for the role of its subsidiary, Massey Energy, in a mine explosion last year that killed 29 men in West Virginia.
Defending the settlement in response to anger on the part of family members of the deceased who wanted to see jail time, U.S. Attorney Booth Goodwin said "there are limited ways to punish a corporation. It is not a life. It is not a being. It can't go to jail. The only thing that it can do is help make sure something like this doesn't happen again."
Corporate personhood has been espoused by prominent Republicans, not just the conservatives on the Supreme Court. On the campaign trail in August, Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney issued a defense of corporate personhood stating
"Corporations are people too." Romney elaborated after the crowd expressed shock: "Everything corporations earn goes to people. Where do you think it goes? Whose pockets? People's pockets. Human beings, my friend."
But U.S. Attorney Goodwin's comments regarding the mining disaster settlement point out that as it stands, although corporations may be made up of real people, they aren't burdened with same exposure to penalties for illegal behavior as real people. The status of corporate personhood is fictional and fictional entities don't go to jail.
A corporation is a business structure for individuals to run a business and to share in profits and losses. The rights and responsibilities of a corporation are independent and distinct from the people who own or invest in them. Corporations are established in part to shield shareholders from personal liability for the actions of the corporation.
In a press conference after the Los Angeles City Council vote to support amendment of the U.S. Constitution to restrict personhood to people, Council President Eric Garcetti stated:
"I want to thank Move to Amend and this entire coalition that has come together... Every struggle to amend 
the constitution began as just a group of regular Americans who wanted to end slavery, who thought women 
should vote, who believed that if you're old enough to be drafted, you should be old enough to vote. These 
are how American amendments move forward from the grassroots when Americans say enough is enough."
Following on the heals of the LA City Resolution, on December 8th, U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) introduced the "Saving American Democracy Amendment" to the U.S. Constitution to overturn the holding of Citizens United regarding corporate personhood. Rep. Ted Deutch (D-FL) has introduced a companion measure in the U.S. House.
"There comes a time when an issue is so important that the only way to address it is by a constitutional amendment," Senator Sanders said. He had previously described the Citizen United ruling as "basically insane. Nobody that I know thinks that Exxon Mobil is a person."
Read more: http://www.care2.com/causes/bernie-sanders-files-amendment-to-overturn-citizens-united.html
Following reports of serious financial abuses in the 1972 Presidential campaign, Congress amended the FECA in 1974 to set limits on contributions by individuals, political parties and PACs. But politicians exempted the commercial press, because the 1st Amendment prohibits abridging their freedom of speech and the press.
2 USC 431 (9) (B) (i) The term "expenditure" does not include any news story, commentary, or editorial distributed through the facilities of any broadcasting station, newspaper, magazine, or other periodical publication, unless such facilities are owned or controlled by any political party, political committee, or candidate;
It is normal for all large businesses to make serious efforts to influence the news, to avoid embarrassing publicity, and to maximize sympathetic public opinion and government policies. Now they own most of the news media that they wish to influence. - Excerpt from The Media Monopoly by Ben H. Bagdikian
For those looking for an alternate perspective, Ira Glasser has it closer than just about anyone IMHO.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ira-glasser/understanding-the-emcitiz_b_447342.html
It seems it's OK to give a lawmaker any size gift as long as the giver is DATING the lawmaker. Wow. If it weren't so sad, it would be funny. I can see a great SNL skit on this.
My favorite amendment is H.J.Res. 88, which reserves rights for natural (real) persons. Text is at thomas.loc.gov.
Also, its true that "A corporation is a business structure for individuals to run a business and to share in profits and losses."
But the decision refers to ALL corporations, even non-profits and not-for profit ones. So while opponents think of Exxon or Philip Morris "buying elections" - what a reversal actually additionally would do is LIMIT the types of speech made by MoveOn, Greenpeace, unions, Harvard or any other group of people who seek to speak.
If overturned then blogs, films and other media can and would be banned if paid for by any such group of people in the stated time period before an election.
The original decision was over the Federal government BANNING A FILM which was political in content.
So why the misinformation and massive movement to limit free speech in an unprecedented way? Because the major two parties know that Americans are tiring of their act and are scared to death of OWS, the Tea Party, MoveOn and anything else they cant control (even though they will try as hard as they can to use & manipulate those groups) --- overturn CU and virtually all spending, speech and power is solidified in the hands of the two party system.
Dont like it? Better speak up now, soon this kind of talk might get you locked up.
Indeed, banning ALL corporate donations (including unions, PACS, special interests, etc...) to politicians would be ideal: a federal and state elections tax can be levied (solely for elections and not for the General Fund Black Hole) whereby ALL campaign funds used by candidates comes from this fund, and it is divided equally among all candidates running for an office. Some Board would have to be in control of the funds (determine costs, amounts of funds, etc...). This would give us politicians that can get their best message out effectively, and we all like efficient and effective people in office, right?
This is better than having corporations pay for a campaign, and then own the politicians while s/he is in office. The federal government had no business banning a political film: if no one wanted to see it, they did not have to buy a ticket. Corporations do not belong in government. They are run by people who already have one vote each at the polls. They do not deserve to select who is running for office.
The overturn of CU and the idea for black hole campaign funds are both driven by the major two parties who are scared to death of groups like MoveOn (even while they try to use them when they can) and scared of the power of the Internet. They'd much rather have a system where thier $100+ million campaigns are entirely controlled by themselves and if you and I want to speak out against them our only option is a personal donation to the opponent in the other of the two parties.