Legal Question in Constitutional Law in New Jersey

The law calls corporate entities "persons", but it calls human beings "natural persons". And it treats natural persons differently from other types of persons in many ways. The idea that the law treats corporations just like people is simply not correct.

Mr. Hoffman is right to point out that corporations are not treated the same as natural persons. Natural persons -- human beings -- have a more limited lifespan, they have a conscience, they bleed if stuck with a knife, they have the ability to love and feel empathy, they can get angry and be happy, and so on. So, in effect, corproations are treated better. They are basically held to no "moral" standard, but are merely obligated to make as much money as possible for the shareholders without breaking the law. Even when they break the law, they cannot be sent to prison, and they will not fear for the wellbeing of their families.

"The law" has committed a huge blunder. Corporations are artificial entities that are, in reality, mere property. I'm a First Amendment lawyer, but to say that a corporation has First Amendment rights is like saying a megaphone has First Amendment rights. I, a human being, have First Amendment rights, including the right to speak using my megaphone -- or using a corporatino -- but that does not mean either my megaphone or a corporation also has First Amendment rights. A book store may be a corporation, and can certainly sue if the government censors books, but it would be quite simple to allow such suits as being derivative of the rights of the human customer or the bookstore, whose freedom of speech is being abridged, without necessarily confering First Amendment rights upon a piece of paper (for that is what a corporation really is) to sell a book.

You are not alone. Back in 2003, even before the Supreme Court came up with its baseless ruling to enable corporations to ebgage in human elections, a group called POCLAD was already at work trying to bring things back into balance. See the 30-minute interview of Mary Zepernick here: http://www.veoh.com/collection/StrategiesForSociety/watch/v6956881M5jMWsMA for a good overview.

I don't know your religious persuasion, but you might be interested in this website by the American Friends Service Committee: http://www.afsc.net/ejcorpdem.html.

I recently read Gavelling Down the Rabble -- it is a wonderful book on the development of the law in this area, but ably written by Jane Anne Morris, a non-lawyer who really did her research. See http://www.amazon.com/Gaveling-Down-Rabble-Trade-22-Democracy/dp/1891843397

For a bit of humor (since you noted both the humorous and the ridiculous results of this way of thinking), take a look at this corporation running for Congress: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHRKkXtxDRA

Murray Hill Corporation is owned by a friend of mine, and he was inspired to do that video after the Supreme Court's ruling.

CBS did a little story on it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_PUlloZVF4&feature=related

As for your question, "Are there any other rights that a corporation receives?", sadly, the Supreme Court's misguided analysis has opened the door for many. By pretty much allowing the government to decide whay fictional creatures of law have constitutional rights, it hearkens back the the Dred Scott days, when a similarly misguided Supreme Court held that blacks were inferior to humans. Here, the discrimination is not against blacks, but against the human race. If you look as the make-up of the Justices in the majority, those who have the coziest relationships with owners of corporations seem to have the least problem with letting this new "good ole boys" circle get better treatment than the average human.

As a lawyer, I want to tell you how much I appreciate your sensitivity to this important issue. Too many lawyers just don't get it -- perhaps because it is corporations that write the biggest checks to the biggest law firms.

John