Could we fight this SCOTUS decision with local legislation?

[cascadiance]

I've heard of many local laws already in place to say that corporations don't have personhood rights. I wonder if some of these efforts could be expanded to keep in place the restriction on corporations contributing to politicians' campaigns, and specifically in each of these new laws we could base our decision on that corporations don't have "personhood rights", and cite directly that the flawed derivation of such from Santa Clara vs. Southern Pacific Railroad, so that if any higher courts were to challenge these laws, they'd be forced to deal with that unconstitutional "creation" of corporate personhood rights.

Perhaps we can get some ideas here on what sort of things could be restricted at the local level that could confront this decision directly as possible, to either mess with it a lot so that the floodgates aren't as open, or force higher courts to deal with it and directly the question on corporate personhood.

Thom Hartmann has noted that SCOTUS under Rehnquist had avoided such cases in the past when confronted with the case history of Santa Clara vs. Southern Pacific as he knew that it would be hard for them to rule on such cases without overturning it.

There's a local Dem county meeting here next week in Beaverton. Would be a nice topic to discuss with people if we can get some good ideas here.

[Davis_X_Machina]

1. Google on "Federal preemption..."

[cascadiance]

3. The goal would be to get a higher court to challenge the local laws...

If the local laws derive from constitutional law, and are crafted carefully to do so, and the SCOTUS ruling is grabbing CRAP out of thin air and Court Clerk head notes to rationalize their rulings, then in this case it would be harder for them to shut down the local ruling without confronting them on the details of the crafted laws. And the GOAL would be for them to have to deal with the language of well written local laws that root themselves in constitutional law, which this ruling DOESN'T!!

So Yeah, BRING EM ON if they want to try to confront it with "federal preemption". That would be the point of doing something like this!

[galileoreloaded]

2. No. n/t

[cascadiance]

4. There are already "corporate personhood" ordinances that are being put in place...

http://www.celdf.org/OrdinanceLibrary/tabid/61/ctl/Edit/mid/397/ThompsonCorporatePersonhood/tabid/87/Default.aspx

[Zebedeo]

5. The Constitution is the supreme law of the land

A local ordinance that attempts to restrict free speech rights is subject to being struck down as unconstitutional under the federal Constitution. Therefore, the answer is no.

[cascadiance]

6. And how is this ruling CONSTITUTIONAL? That is what this would be about!

Now if you tried to write laws that would confront LAWS or the CONSTITUTION, then yes, that would be contrary to this rule and be a waste of time! But if you are trying to write laws that SUPPORT our constitution and our laws that arguably this SCOTUS decision didn't, then you have perhaps a way to confront these courts on that decision, if you write your laws properly. The SCOTUS DID NOT support the constitution or other written law when they support the MYTHICAL notion of "corporate personhood" which is not supported in any laws or even JUDICIAL rulings (just a former railroad exec Court Clerk's opinion in a head note of the case used to base all subsequent rulings on). If that needs to be drug through the courts based on what you are citing here, then so be it! That makes it better as it forces them to take up this issue. If they have to pick apart the law, and it is well written to force them to read beyond the head note of Santa Clara vs. Southern Pacific, then they will have a tough time trying to support corporate paymasters and doing what justices are supposed to do in interpreting law and not just making arbitrary decisions.

Laws written here would be supporting our constitutional laws for free speech for who its intended for, and note that it doesn't include what the constitution and written laws say it doesn't. SCOTUS would have to find a way of challenging our written laws and constitution when they have no basis to do so, especially when those supporting this are arguably against "judicial activism". They'd never be able to shut down Roe v. Wade if they had to wade through a court decision like this one to openly engage in "judicial activism".

SCOTUS isn't the constitution itself. They *interpret* the constitution, or they are supposed to interpret the constitution. They need to be forced at times to do this properly!

[Zebedeo]

7. I sympathize with your feelings about this,

but the SCOTUS has the final say on what is constitutional, and they have just said that corporations are persons that have constitutional rights under the 1st Amendment. There is no higher court to which to appeal to overturn this ruling, and any laws that are enacted which conflict with this ruling would, if challenged in court, be struck down as unconstitutional. The only way to overcome this ruling would be to amend the Constitution - which just isn't going to happen on this issue. People don't care enough about it.

- Zeb

[cascadiance]

8. So we are ruled by the rulers and not laws! Great!

I understand the notion that SCOTUS is the final arbiter on constitutional matters. But what would happen if local communities craft laws that support constitutional law and challenge their ruling? Would they get thrown in jail? If not, then the worst that could happen is that they go to court. Now there are costs to that but that's a small price to pay to force SCOTUS to explain their ruling on how this ruling is constitutional. Perhaps if in defending their ruling, they make a mistake that reveals they aren't ruling on law but by arbitrary opinion (paid for or not), then that could also be fuel for later impeachment proceedings if that's a route we decide to take too to correct the problems with our court now.