The concept of legal personhood for an organization reportedly dates back to Roman law. In our present experience, we often think of the concept of a fictitious person as it applies to corporations, but it can also apply to governments and other institutions. Merriam Webster defines a fictitious person as;

“A body formed and authorized by law to act as a single person…”

This concept serves as a convenience for society to interact with an institution and as such, establishes rights and responsibilities associated with its actions within society. Legal rulings have gone so far as to extend the concept of citizenship to corporations under some circumstances. The term ‘Corporate Citizen” has been in our common usage for some time and we seldom think deeply about it when we hear the term or use it ourselves. In our communities, we often refer to a Good Corporate Citizen as one that donates to a charitable cause, sponsors a Little League team, or encourages its employees to participate in community service projects.

Many institutions belong to associations that are formed in common cause. This may be true of corporations, governments, unions, or almost any collection of like-minded entities you can imagine. Often, their purpose is to help and support one another, but it is also true that they act politically within our society, and as such represent a special interest that is skewed toward the beliefs or expectations of their membership. Legal rulings have affirmed the right of free speech to corporations, and one of the most recent and impactful rulings, Citizens United, judged that the expenditure of money by a corporation in a political activity is free speech. This, I believe, is where the logic train has come off the rails and has so skewed our democracy as to be extremely harmful.

In our consideration of the rights of a corporation, it should be remembered that corporate personhood is a fiction; which as Meriam Webster tells us is: “ a useful illusion or pretense.” I would argue that illusions don’t have rights. The only rights that a corporation, union, or institution of any kind should have, would flow from the citizens who are represented by the institution. Thus, if persons of the corporation wish the corporation to speak for them on issues of common cause, they are free to lend their voices to the corporation, (or union, trade association, government, etc.). Such a use of a person’s right requires consent. The same concept should apply to money associated with that speech; individual contributions from citizens within the organization can be used by the organization to underwrite the cost of the “speech”. However, the institution should not undertake speech that is not authorized or funded by the citizens it represents.

The problem arises, as is the present case, when the institution acts on its own and produces or underwrites “speech”. The activities and associated costs are controlled by a few individuals within the institution who may or may not be citizens as would be the case for a company with foreign investors or ownership. Thus, we are giving a voice to foreign influence in our political process. Additionally, the institutional costs that are internalized in the organization are spread throughout the organizational structure and are being underwritten by the membership, whether or not each agrees with and wants to contribute to the speech. In the case of institutions providing goods or services to the public, the cost of that speech becomes integrated into the cost of the goods and services and is thus underwritten by the public as a pass-through cost. In this manner, relatively few individuals, in control of institutional revenue streams, speak through a megaphone while the voices of individual citizens are relegated to background noise.

This needs to be fixed. This once useful illusion is killing our democracy.

 

 

by Kevin Deeny, a lifelong resident of Levittown, PA.