ATDTDA (5): The American Corporation

[Paul Mackin]

On Apr 5, 2007, at 1:40 AM, Chris Broderick wrote:

>
> Paul Mackin noted:
>> 3. As to the 14th amendment (equal protection under
> the law) , the
>> obvious presumption would be that if it's illegal to
> deny protection
>> to natural persons for reasons of race, color or
> creed, it would be
>> problematic to deny protection to groups a such
> people.
>
> I don't see how that applies.

Actually it doesn't really. It's fairly unimportant. That the 14th  
amendment came to take it's place in legal precedent in regard to  
corporation rights was a big fluke caused by the way the court clerk  
wrote up a famous case dealing with the rights of corporations. But  
the  actual decision was come to without  resort to the 14th-- 
notwithstanding the fact that the defendent Southern Pacific had use  
"equal protection under the law" as one of many of its legal  
arguments.  The thing of it was, the chief justice had made the  
remark by way of introduction to the  court session that the case  
that "equal protection" would not be something his court had to deal  
with.

To read about this google something like: equal protection santa  
clara person

> Corporations aren't
> people of single races, colors or creeds whose civil
> liberties can be or ever have been violated en masse.
> Giving corporations the rights of personhood is a
> perfect example of empowering the few against the
> many.  Unlike people, corporations don't die, they
> just get bought out.  If they're successful, they just
> get bigger & bigger, and so that person is a deathless
> machine worth billions.  It's exceedingly rare that
> even the most egregious violations against the public
> would cause a corporation to lose its charter, as was
> more common in the days even after the passage of the
> 14th Amendment.
>
> The biggest complaint that I have about corporations
> has to do with the fact that they are allowed to
> externalize incredibly huge costs (see the Exxon
> Valdez, Enron, or my favorite example, the fact that
> because they don't pay a living wage, Walmart has
> programs to help their employees get on public
> assistance.)  These are things that we end up paying
> for as taxpayers, all to make a small auditorium of
> stockholders happy.
>
> Or as TRP sez:
>
> "If we accept the notion that using power against the
> powerless is wrong, a clear enough set of corrolaries
> begins to emerge."
>
> It seems hard to argue against Pynchon standing on the
> side of such idealism.  And I think his evocation of
> anarchism in AtD is along those same lines.  It is of
> a piece with all of his attempts at historical
> linguistic accuracy that the Colorado & Ohio labor
> agitators (particularly the violent ones) are often
> referred to as anarchists, as were those who were at
> Cripple Creek or the Coeur d'Alene's.  They may not
> have been steeped in Bakunin (or whoever, I frankly
> have no clue) but they knew that they were being
> abused by the mining companies, and they fought back,
> hard and sometimes stupidly (see Big Trouble, a book I
> mentioned here at least once, if not 60 times).
>
> I do think that at least part of this novel is, in
> that context, a paean to anarchism, but certainly not
> a paean without rather large amounts of blowback.
>
> On another subject, Paul sez:
>
>> This "evolution" Pynchon is describing is of course
> more "weird
> science."
>
> 'Weird science' in this context may also be described
> as fantasy.  It's never been a distant thing in
> Pynchon's writing.  I've never been versed in magick
> (it's with a 'k', right?  Respect.), but I am enough
> of a fiction reader & bookworm to appreciate the
> ability of writers to imagine worlds both better and
> worse than and sidereal to our own.  Though, these
> days, reality is all like, try to top us you rat soup
> eating mf's!!
>
> One of Pynchon's chief obsessions is the sometimes
> errant paths of science and scientists, math &
> mathematicians.  Pynchon is a writer who obviously
> shows a great reverence for (& interest in) science.
> But as often as not, as a novelist, he is as
> interested in the blind alleys as much as (if not more
> so than) the true and shining paths.  Why are these
> blind alleys worth the rememberance?  One only has to
> reminisce upon Ned Pointsman with a toilet attached to
> his leg to see the level of respect that Pynchon
> affords scientists in general.  Still one has to
> balance that with the rapturous passage(s?) about
> Kekule & the benzene ring...
>
> -Chris
>
>
>
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