The Kochs and Catholic bishops: A band of brothers?

Catholic Hierarchy Lobbies to Suppress Religious Freedom

Valerie Tarico, Away Point
Posted on February 10, 2012

What do Koch Industries and the Catholic hierarchy have in common? A determination to shift rights away from individuals and assign them to institutions.

Since the founding of the United States our ancestors have wrestled with the question of who counts.  Who gets the rights and dignity that define the promise of America? For two hundred years generations of Americans have fought to bring the rights of personhood and citizenship to those who had been excluded:  the landless poor, religious minorities, Blacks, First Nations, women, gays.  But always, as we have expanded those rights it has been with the goal of giving greater dignity and self-determination to individuals.

Now we have both multi-nationals and religious institutions seeking to do the opposite, to create rights/powers for organizations and ideologies that trump individual self-determination.  In their crusade to block medical access to contraception, marriage equality and death with dignity, religious institutional leaders are going after a non-profit version of corporate personhood. They want the organizations they control to have the legal rights of natural persons (in this case freedom of conscience/religion) just like multinational corporations want the legal rights of natural persons (in their case, free speech).  The only real difference is which rights they find most conducive to their ends.

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If corporations are people, can they be drowned in bathtubs?

Photo from Common Dreams


"If you’re conservative, you should be appalled that our Constitution has been perverted by the activist judges...."

Corporations are not people

Gaelan Brown
Vermont Times Argus

People are ensured inalienable or “God-given” rights such as freedom of speech, freedom from unwarranted search and the right to bear arms in our society because those rights are established in the Constitution of the United States.

Corporations existed back when the constitution was written, yet the word corporation is not mentioned even once in the document. Robots aren’t mentioned either. Corporations are built and run by people, just like robots. Can there be any way to interpret the founders’ intent as being supportive of the idea that corporations (or robots) have inalienable human rights?

You don’t have to be a constitutional scholar to see that the answer is clearly no. It doesn’t matter if you are conservative or liberal; this is just common sense folks. This is an issue where Ron Paul and Bernie Sanders agree, and one that should unite all Vermonters.

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Bill Moyers on fighting corporate personhood

Ask Bill: How can ordinary people help to overturn or nullify the Citizen United Decision? from BillMoyers.com on Vimeo.

Related links:

• Move to Amend
• Free Speech for People
• ReclaimDemocracy.org
• The latest on Google News