The Round Circle of Slavery

One of the worst decisions ever made in American law was to determine that corporations are persons.

The Three-fifths Compromise made during the United States Constitutional Convention in 1787 counted many Americans, primarily slaves, as three-fifths of a person in terms of representation. It was included in Article 1, Section 2 of the Constitution of the United States.

The 14th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, adopted after the Civil War, was supposed to ensure that the Federal and State governments do not “deprive any person of life, liberty or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”.

The Bank of the United States brought the first corporate cases to the Supreme Court so corporations could own property, enter into contracts and sue and be sued like individuals.

In 1886 a California railroad company tax case melded the 14th Amendment to the idea that corporations are people. In 1888 a steel company pushed it further. Ninety years later in 1978 the Supreme Court declared corporations could spend unlimited money on ballot initiatives and in 2010 decided that political speech by corporations is protected by the First Amendment.

In 2014 the Supreme Court granted the right to companies not traded on the stock market to file for exemptions to federal laws on religious grounds.

In 2020 it seems a corporation could theoretically file for an exemption to hold slaves by citing the 14th Amendment.  

Isn’t that shocking?