Sam Grant -Williams

12/2/15
Columbus State Community College
ENGL 2367
Scott O' Callaghan
Writing Project 3: The Persuasive Essay

The Danger Of Corporate Personhood

And What The American People Can Do To Stop It

The word personhood is defined as the quality or condition of being an individual person. So
by extension, Corporate Personhood is the quality/condition of being legally recognized as a person
and therefore no different than an individual human being. Some people might think that because
democracy is about preserving the rights of the people, they may wonder how is Corporate Personhood
a threat to democracy? After all if Corporations are run by people then they should have rights as
people, it could even be argued that Corporate Personhood is proof that democracy is working. The
problem with this is that by giving personahood to non-human entities you take away the rights of real
people. There are two kinds of Corporate Personhood: The first simply bestows upon corporations the
ability to engage in many legal actions (e.g. enter into contracts, sue, be sued, etc). However, corporate
personhood also commonly refers to the Supreme Court-created precedent of corporations enjoying
constitutional rights that were intended solely for human beings (What Is 1). The reason why
Corporate Personhood is a threat to democracy and should be abolished is because it undermines and
violates the rights of real people, leads to far reaching environmental and human-rights-based
consequences, serves private corporate interests, and corrupts the democratic process.
One of the most far reaching consequence of Corporate Personhood, is one that not only affects
America, but the rest of the world as well. As long as Corporate Personhood exists, big business will
continue to do things to maximize profits and make as much money as possible. Although some may

argue that Corporations will do this regardless of if they have Corporate Personhood and in some part
this is true due to our capitalist economy. What getting rid of Corporate Personhood does is it stops
Corporations from doing things that are out right illegal and immoral in order to maximize profits. If
Corporate Personhood continues to exist these problems will get worse such as when Corporations take
short cuts, and these actions lead to long lasting environmental damage and human rights violations
(Edwards 1). Corporations can get away with things like dumping waste into lakes and hiring child
laborers in developing countries because they have the right to privacy and free commerce. Because of
this, governments cannot regulate and reprimand the actions of these corporations (Hartmann 1). These
rights are given through an interpretation of constitutional amendments: commonly used ones include
the First, Fourth, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments (Edwards 1). People who support the rights of
corporations argue that they are allowed to do as they want outside of America because America has a
market economy. The problem with this belief is that it disrespects the ideals that founded this country.
Because America is a country that stands for the democratic ideals of freedom, justice and equality, it
cannot stand for human rights violations and needless destruction. The carelessness and greed of big
business is one of the greatest threats to democracy as it blatantly disrespects the American ideal. One
suggestion for people who wish to fight Corporations is to support human watch dog organizations that
monitor the actions of corporations. My mother who is very active in fighting Corporate Personhood
suggests I sign petitions, write to politicians, and engage in protest. However, the best thing that the
average person can do is boycott the products and services offered by these Corporations. After all
because America is a market economy you as a consumer can choose how you spend your money. If
you spend your money elsewhere then you can force Corporations into making better policies .

A more abstract reason why Corporate Personhood is a danger to the democratic process, yet
just as profound is how corporations harm the democratic ideal. Because corporations have rights as
persons, they have the right to privacy. This, however, becomes a problem when the right to privacy of

corporations takes priority over the privacy of individuals (Hartmann 1). If someone works for a
company, that company is entitled to a great deal of personal information. Granted this is justified as
the employer may need to know things like someones criminal background, because people really do
not want a convicted sex offender working at a Chuck E Cheese. The problem is that in an age of
information and technology, where anyone can learn nearly everything about an individual from a
computer and a camera, there is an imbalance in the right to privacy: Your employer can read your emails, monitor your computer use, secretly photograph you, and listen in on your telephone calls, etc.
(Hartmann 1). A corporation can learn anything about a person working for them, but that employee is
not allowed to know things like how much they pay certain workers, or donate to political campaigns,
or how they deal with any manufacturing waste (Edwards 1). It could be argued that there is nothing
wrong with this because when a person works for a business they are aware of the agreement and give
consent to corporations in order to work. In order to work people need to be willing to compromise and
be open to tell an employer anything! The problem with this belief is because America is currently
recovering from a time of economic struggle, people may only have a select amount of employment
opportunities. So in many cases if someone is working at a company, chances are that is the only place
they can get a job. Because of this many people just simply cannot chose to work somewhere else just
because their rights are being violated. The threat to democracy comes from the fact that the right to
privacy for corporations is taking priority away from the rights of American citizens, which are
supposed to be inalienable. According to some the best way to counter this is to take legal actions such
as amending the fourteenth amendment and support movements such as as Move To Amend. This
would allow us to organize thing like protests and petitions, movements such as as Move To Amend
help the average citizen in finding tool to use and information about corporations and federal laws.
We must also work to empower the labor movement to restore union powers.

The most dangerous and close to home reason why Corporate Personhood is a threat to
democracy is because of the Money-and-Media Election Complex (Nichols & McChesney 1). It is a
threat to democracy because it allows private interest groups and companies to spend endless amounts
of undocumented and undisclosed money to help sway the results of elections. Supporters of this policy
argue that they are exercising their right to free speech and their right to have a say in the election
process, and that money is only the medium by which they chose to support political candidates
(Nichols & McChesney 1). The main counter-argument against this policy is that an average person
only gets one vote, and that is how our election process was meant to be (Luo 1). Corporations
however, can spend millions of dollars on advertising and biased reports that sway public opinion in
favor of candidates who are bribed into supporting bills that help said corporations. This violates the
electoral system by putting officials in power, who only represent the interests of a small group with
money and power and leaves the rest of Americans to deal with the consequences. Another key point
raised by those who oppose the Money-and-Media Election Complex is that voters do not have the
right to know who is spending money on whom and how much is spent (Luo 1). They point out the
irony and hypocrisy of using the First Amendments right to free speech to violate other people's rights
such as the freedom of the press, which also comes from the First Amendment. What is more profound
is that by undermining the electoral process corporations set in motion a domino effect. As they put into
power more and more corrupt officials, the greater the freedom these companies have to undermine the
law and human rights for the sake of profits. Both corporatacracy, and the rise of an American
oligarchy, undermines the political, economic, and environmental advances that Americans had made
over the past 100 years and returns our nation to the days of the corruption of Tammany Hall; We must
support small grass roots efforts to better educate and inform voters, that we must not treat any election
as an off year.
As long as Corporate Personhood exists in America, there can never be a true democracy! If this
continues to last, then no election will be free of corruption, and the rights of workers will forever be in

jeopardy. The only way to stop this threat is to cut off Corporation's two main supplies of power: One,
the clause in Fourteenth Amendment that gives Corporations the same rights as human beings; Two,
stop giving them financial support as consumers (What Is Corporate Personhood 1). Americans have
become far too dependent on the products and services offered by these companies, and this gives them
the power to act as they please. This however, is easily corrected as America has a market-based
economy centered on the growth of free spending and fanatical gain. This gives all the power to the
consumer as Corporations are dependent on our money. If Americans protest by choosing how and
where they spend their money they can force companies that harm the environment, use labor from
developing countries, or add to election campaigns to make major changes. This in turn will deprive
corporations of their political power because they can no longer buy government officials in order to
pass bills that give them more freedoms. My Mother encourages me to vote with the almighty dollar
and boycott bad businesses. She refuses to support businesses which engage in human rights
violations, exploit workers (she calls Walmart the evil empire and avoids shopping there) or create
environmental harm; one such company she boycotts is Wendy's who refuses to pay the Imokolee
workers a penny for each bushel of tomatoes picked and has marched and protested outside their
headquarters; she also will not buy products from any Koch Brothers corporations such as Georgia
Pacific paper; she does this both because of their undue influence on politicians and elections and
because of their environmental record. After the actions taken by private citizens like my Mom, far
fewer corrupt individuals will be in our government and this will make it a lot less difficult in the future
to pass an amendment abolishing Corporate Personhood once and for all.

Works Cited Page.

Edwards, Jan, and Alis Valencia. "Corporate Personhood and the Right to Harm the
Environment." Move to Amend (13 May 2009): n. pag. Corporate Personhood and the "Right"
to Harm the Environment. Move to Amend. Web. 14 Oct 2015
Hartmann, Thom. "Humans v. Corporations: Unequal Privacy." Https://movetoamend.org. N.p.,
19 Sept.2011. Web. 17 Oct 2015
"International Dairy Foods Association V. Jeffrey L. Amestoy." Movetoamend.org. N.p., n.d.
Web. 17 Oct 2015
Luo, Michael. "Move to Amend." Anonymous Money Floods Political Races. Move to Amend,
20 Sept. 2010. Web. 18 Oct 2015.
Nichols, John, and Bob McChesney. "The Money & Media Election Complex." The Nation 21
Nov. 2010: n. pag. Web. 17 Oct 2015. <https://movetoamend.org>.
"U.S. Supreme Court- Louis K. Liggett CO. V. Lee, 288 U.S. 517 (1933)."
Https://movetoamend.org. N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Oct 2015

"What Is Corporate Personhood?" What Is Corporate Personhood? N.p., 20 Feb. 2011. Web. 16 Oct
2015

What Authority Newsletter. "Move to Amend." Why Abolish All Corporate Constitutional Rights.
Program on Corporations, Law and Democracy, 02 Mar. 2011. Web. 19 Oct 2015.

Dear Scott O' Callaghan,

Okay here is my project 3 Final Draft, I think I really did a lot better with this one as I find that you
give very good advice on how to fix things wrong with a paper. I did get a chance to use of the writing
center so there should not be a any spelling and grammar mistakes. I also fixed my works cited page. I
over all hope that I made it a least somewhat of a step up from last time. I hope you like it and that I
am going in the right direction.

Many Thanks
Samuel Grant-Williams