By Charles Cleveland, EDC member

Representative Barney Frank’s Band-Aid approach, to make corporations and other entities get shareholder approval before they can use their “Free Speech” to influence law-makers, can buy us some time, but it’s not enough.  To put regulation of these entities back in the hands of Congress and state legislators we need a “Corporations are Not People” Constitutional Amendment.

Can we get it done this year?  Not a chance!  Can we get it done in 10 to 25 years?  Absolutely.

Keep in mind that the late Thurgood Marshall and other attorneys worked for decades laying the groundwork for the Brown v. Board of Education case and the resulting Supreme Court ruling, which began the lengthy and painful process of desegregating our nation’s schools.  They hung in there until they got the job done.  So can we!

And what about the Equal Rights Amendment?  After it failed to pass, most supporters evidently gave up.  I don’t remember them coming back again and again, which is what should have happened, and should still be happening today!

The point is, let’s get to work and hang in there until we get it done!  The stakes are too high for us to do otherwise.

Here’s my proposed wording for the “Corporations are Not People” amendment, followed by a strategy for getting it passed:

Corporations and other entities, other than actual persons, are not people, and do not derive any rights from this Constitution, but only from ordinary laws enacted by Congress and signed by the President.

To help get this adopted, we should introduce it together with one or more bills in Congress that would provide corporations with most of the rights they currently enjoy — but with the restrictions on political involvement which were in place prior to the Supreme Court Decision.  In other words, the status quo would be preserved.  Moreover this legislation would take effect only when the Constitutional Amendment proposed above is adopted.

Coupling the Constitutional Amendment with this legislation would immediately change the basis of any corporate rights from the Constitution to ordinary laws enacted by Congress, without disrupting any of their legitimate activities.  There would be no excuse they could put forward for not adopting the Amendment.

The Congress would then be free to pass additional legislation to regulate corporate activities in any way it deemed appropriate, including additional restrictions on political involvement.