The Readings
The Alaska Native Claims Association (ANCSA) readings.
In January 2010, the Supreme Court expanded the definition of “person” to include corporations. This controversial ruling eases restrictions on corporations contributing unlimited amounts of money to general, state and local elections. The controversy comes from the fact that corporate interests could outspend legitimate candidates, or promote candidates who will serve the interests of the corporation, and or create an incentive for candidates to appeal to corporations to “elect” them instead of their constitutes in home districts.
The ANCSA reading included a paragraph on corporations:
“The concept or idea of a corporation is often difficult to grasp. We may know one when we see it, but describing one can be confounding. The above definition can be more easily understood, if it is reversed and we think of a corporation as a person. In many respects, the law treats corporations like persons. Like any other "person," a corporation can apply for and receive credit from a bank. A corporation has a "birth certificate" in the form of its charter, which is issued by the state. The "birth certificate" or charter gives a place and time of birth. Unlike a person, a corporation does not have to die. It can "live on" indefinitely. "Death" occurs only when assets (if any) are sold and the corporation is dissolved.”
I would have to disagree that a corporation is anything like a person on one major bases, that the separate legal entity that a corporation is, is designed so that shareholders are not personally responsible for the corporations liabilities and debts. A person, in its traditional sense, is responsible for its liabilities and debts.
I personally found this subject the most interesting segment of the reading, just because in some cases in the country corporations were seen as a “person”. Now the Supreme Court’s decision uniformly makes all corporations “persons”. And as if big corporations are not already embedded into the law making process (Congress), corporations are now allowed to buy our elections.
Over all, my beef with this ruling has nothing to do with the ANCSA and their corporations, in terms of the reading. I am actually indifferent to corporations in general, but against the notion that they are “people” or “persons”.
I also noticed the debate over who should be able to form a corporation. In chapter 20 of the Alaskcool readings, the debate over whether or not Alaska Natives should have the ability to create and maintain corporations goes against the pro-capitalist, pro-business mentality that so many republican and conservative politians argue for. Opposing this option for Native peoples, conservative Congressman Wayne Aspinall of Colorado suggested that Congress should not allow this power to Natives because of the "lack of democratic controls in a large corporation, particularly with unsophisticated people." Clearly the issue was race, and not business. But I am impressed that Congress was able to push through this landmark Legislation that it did, even if it did take over several years.
I agree with Kalesha's assessment of Congressman Wayne Aspinall's comments as having racial overtones when he stated that "Congress should not allow this power to Natives because of the 'lack of democratic controls in a large corporation, particularly with unsophisticated people." In my opinion, when we look at the history of America, we will find that most of the early settlers, founders, etc.who made this country great weren't "sophisticated". Laws weren't written to prevent them from exercising their rights to land or any other rights as citizens because they were "unsophisticated" by someone's standard. While I am sure there were others in Congress with the same opinion as Mr. Aspinall, the passage of the legislation demonstrates that the majority of the members did not.
ReplyDeleteWhen I first read the part about "unsophisticated" people not being in charge of corporations I took it to mean "untrained" which I saw as a legitimate reason. I have absolutely no trianing in running a large corporation and I can guarantee you that you wouldn't want me to either! It made me think that there should have been something included in the law about training new people to run the corporations. It would have been easy to set up a mentoring program or something similar to help the new corporations get going.
ReplyDeleteI also took Congressman Wayne Aspinall's statement about people being "unsophisticated" to mean being uneducated.
ReplyDeleteI can see how it can easily be interpreted either way after reading your thoughts, but that wasn't how I initially took it.
Maybe that could have been worded better, so it would be less confusing and open to interpretation. But is there any way to clarify? I just don't think it was about race, but I've been wrong before.
I don't think unsophisticated was used in a derogatory way but to only read about it takes much of the context out which leads interpretation up to the readers biases.
ReplyDeleteKalesha,
I also thought the 2010 supreme court ruling was an enormous ruling. From my perspective it leaves a distince opportunity for the morals of society to be swayed towards the ethics of individuals. This in itself is a dangerous step away from our postmodern attitude we think so highly of ourselves for agreeing with.
When using generalities we must be careful. I would hope, there is at least one corporation out there that will not buy politicians to push there agendas.I think the problems come in when "persons" within corporations make bad choices.
ReplyDeletePS. Personally, I find Aspinall's use of the term "unsophisticated" highly offensive. Did he ever step a foot in Alaska or spend one day in a remote village? Why could he not use the term uneducated? What's Up?
I must say that a corporation does act in many ways as a person, but the justice department can not send a corporation to jail.
ReplyDeleteI am taking a leap to the bigger picture:
In the case of BP, I wish that the corporation was not held responsible for the disaster to our planet and death of those who died. I wanted to see top CEO or whatever go to prison for criminal neglect of catastrophic proportions. That there was no jail time (as far as I know) for any of the top individuates who may have foreseen the disaster and decided to not do anything about it because it would directly impact the bottom line of take home payouts.
That is one example. I am positive that if multi-million/billion dollar corporations' head board members and other decision makers knew that they could be criminally held responsible for the actions of their corporations, there would be a shift in policies.
To take away the punishment from those in high positions and be able to blame a "business" for wrong doings, was a bad idea.
I would like to point out that some synonyms of unsophisticated are: naive and inexperienced. Are these offessive words? I have been the general manager of several businesses and I am not qualifed to run a corporation. I wouldn't have the forst clue!
ReplyDeleteThe term person refers to in this case of ANCSA, like a person starting a corporation has a birth date, name, and a charter of it's history. But in the case of Aspinall calling the Native people 'unsophisticated" I feel he was expressing some racial comments about the inferiority of that culture of people. When it come to money and power race always have a place at the table.
ReplyDeleteKalesha, I agree that the similarities between a corporation and an individual person are only surface deep.
ReplyDeleteFrankly, however, I find the equation of person to corporation more interesting than corporation to person, if only because I have more experience with the former. Because I come from an economically disadvantaged family, achieved high marks in high school school, and have been involved in a variety of extracurricular activities all my life, I've received a number of scholarships to pay for my undergraduate degree at UAF. The university, my mother's union, and the Alumni Association have all invested in me in the same way that businessmen invest in corporations on the stock exchange. Although I am thankful that I don't need to work to pay for my education, I know that my "shareholders" are only interested in me as a successful student and an involved member of the community---as a person who fulfills a set list of criteria---rather than me as an individual human being. Sometimes I feel degraded and dehumanized by my shareholders' attitude toward their investment.
Sorry if this comment is off-topic. After meditating on eight or nine blog posts, I'm running out of new and insightful ideas.
I do find it legitimate that they said that we where unsophisticated. If they were to say that to an Alaskan Native, we would take it offensive, but we would also agree and ask for education on the matter. Now we almost have complete control through corporations, if we were interested in trying to become a member of the board in a corporation, we have the right, but we would also have to have the majority of the communities agreeing. It's a fair deal i would think, i can't think of anything better. If we did have complete control from the beginning, i think we would have problems but those problems would gradually be controlled.
ReplyDelete