Only 21% Say U.S. Government Has Consent of the Governed

It’s not big government per se than people are angry about. It’s big government in cahoots with big business. This new poll is well worth reading.

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/general_politics/february_2010/only_21_say_u_s_government_has_consent_of_the_governed

Only 21% Say U.S. Government Has Consent of the Governed
Thursday, February 18, 2010

The founding document of the United States, the Declaration of Independence, states that governments derive “their just powers from the consent of the governed.” Today, however, just 21% of voters nationwide believe that the federal government enjoys the consent of the governed.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 61% disagree and say the government does not have the necessary consent. Eighteen percent (18%) of voters are not sure.

However, 63% of the Political Class think the government has the consent of the governed, but only six percent (6%) of those with Mainstream views agree.

Seventy-one percent (71%) of all voters now view the federal government as a special interest group, and 70% believe that the government and big business typically work together in ways that hurt consumers and investors.

That helps explain why 75% of voters are angry at the policies of the federal government, and 63% say it would be better for the country if most members of Congress are defeated this November. Just 27% believe their own representative in Congress is the best person for the job.

Among voters under 40, 25% believe government has the consent of the governed. That compares to 19% of those ages 50 to 64 and 16% of the nation’s senior citizens.

Those who earn more than $100,000 a year are more narrowly divided on the question, but those with lower incomes overwhelming reject the notion that today’s government has the consent from which to derive its just authority. Those with the lowest incomes are the most skeptical.

Seventy-eight percent (78%) of Republicans say the government does not have the consent of the governed, and that view is shared by 65% of voters not affiliated with either of the major parties. A plurality of Democrats (44%) agrees, but 32% of those in President Obama’s party believe the government has the necessary consent.
From an ideological perspective, most moderate and conservative voters say the government lacks the consent of the governed. Liberals are evenly divided.

In his new book, In Search of Self-Governance, Scott Rasmussen observes that the American people are “united in the belief that our political system is broken, that politicians are corrupt, and that neither major political party has the answers.” He adds that “the gap between Americans who want to govern themselves and the politicians who want to rule over them may be as big today as the gap between the colonies and England during the 18th century.”

The book has earned positive reviews from Larry Sabato, Pat Caddell, Bill Kristol, Joe Trippi and others. In Search of Self-Governance is available from Rasmussen Reports and at Amazon.com.

Sixty percent (60%) of voters think that neither Republican political leaders nor Democratic political leaders have a good understanding of what is needed today.

Thirty-five percent (35%) say Republicans and Democrats are so much alike that an entirely new political party is needed to represent the American people.

Nearly half of all voters believe that people randomly selected from the phone book could do as good a job as the current Congress.

Organizational Responses to Citizens United decision

MINUTE ON HUMAN RIGHTS AND CORPORATIONS
Adopted by the Northeast Ohio American Friends Service Committee, February 8, 2010

A fundamental Friends belief is that every person has inherent worth and dignity regardless of religion, race, nationality, ethnicity, income, gender, physical ability or sexual orientation. Humans have the capacity for emotion, imagination, awareness, self-reflection, empathy, aspirations, reason, creativity, responsibility and more. Every human being possesses inalienable rights simply by being human. Government laws and constitutions have affirmed many of these rights.

Corporations are not human and possess no human traits. They have no inalienable rights. They are entities, chartered by the State, with a purpose to serve the public by providing goods and/or services. They are nothing more than a set of legal documents much like deeds, wills and other warrants.

Historically, corporations were created to be subordinate to human persons. The State can revoke a corporate charter if it does not follow its terms.

Despite the recent Supreme Court decision, Citizens United vs FEC, granting corporations greater political free speech powers to contribute to political campaigns and despite past Supreme Court decisions granting corporations the same legal status as living, breathing human beings, rights reserved exclusively for human beings under the Bill of Rights and other sections of the US Constitution should not apply to corporations.

Corporations are not persons. Equating the two is not only a perversion of laws and constitutions but a usurpation of self-governance and perversion of life itself.

The Northeast Ohio American Friends Service Committee is a Quaker-based social action organization that educates, advocates and organizes on justice, peace and self-governance.

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LINKS TO STATEMENTS FROM OTHER ORGANIZATIONS

Campaign to Legalize Democracy / Move to Amend
http://www.movetoamend.org/we-corporations

Alliance for Democracy
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-koehler/corporate-personhood_b_433615.html

Reclaim Democracy
http://reclaimdemocracy.org/corporate_speech/amendment_campaigns_launch.php

Progressive Democrats of America
http://www.pdamerica.org/articles/news/2010-02-02-11-16-28-news.php

Common Cause
http://www.commoncause.org/site/apps/nlnet/content2.aspx?c=dkLNK1MQIwG&b=4773613&ct=7867517

League of Women Voters of the United States
http://www.lwv.org/AM/Template.cfm?Template=/CM/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=14695

Green Party of the United States
http://www.gp.org/press/pr-national.php?ID=291

Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund
http://www.celdf.org/PressReleases/SupremeCourtHandsCorporationsUSElections/tabid/584/Default.aspx

Public Citizen
http://www.citizen.org/pressroom/release.cfm?ID=3031

Brennan Center for Justice
http://www.brennancenter.org/blog/archives/no_time_to_wait_for_the_effects_of_citizens_united/

People for the American Way
http://site.pfaw.org/site/PageServer?pagename=citizens_united_decision_edit_memo_plus_links

Reactions to Citizens United Decision

Below are some of the best and relevant articles, videos, radio interviews (and, of course, to maintain sanity) satire I’ve come across on the Supreme Court ruling, Citizens United vs FEC expanding political free speech powers of corporations. In the next few days, I’ll forward a list of statements from organizations on the decision.

ACTION: Read, watch and listen to what interests you, share the list with others, and gather several human persons (corporate persons are not permitted!) together to discuss the issue. Go to http://www.movetoamend.org/take-action for action ideas. If ambitious, plan a public program to let others know. For help planning an action, contact me at 330-928-2301 or gcoleridge@afsc.org.

Also sign up on the Move to Amend Facebook page.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Move-To-Amend/423436625530?ref=ts
OVER 60,000 HAVE ALREADY SIGNED THE PETITION AT WWW.MOVETOAMEND.ORG CALLING FOR A CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT TO ABOLISH CORPORATE PERSONHOOD!!

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The new American crisis
Op Ed by Ben Manski February 8, 2010
http://www.citizen-times.com/article/20100208/OPINION07/100208038/1006

Corporations have evidence to support their personhood
(a funny letter to editor) February 8, 2010
http://www.citizen-times.com/article/201002060015/OPINION02/100205027

Amend Constitution, restore our citizenship
by Ben Manski & Lisa Graves Sunday, February 7, 2010
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/s_665893.html

Senator Statements on Citizens United decision (including Sherrod Brown)
http://www.judgingtheenvironment.org/senators/?issue=&nominee=27575953&senator=&senator_party=&senators_state

Today’s Judiciary Committee Hearing On Citizens United
by Bill Egnor Wednesday February 3, 2010
http://seminal.firedoglake.com/diary/27959

Pelosi Taps Task Force To Counter Supreme Court's Citizens United Ruling
February 3, 2010
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/03/pelosi-taps-task-force-to_n_448536.html

John Kerry: Amend The Constitution In Response To Citizens United Decision
February 2, 2010
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/02/john-kerry-amend-the-cons_n_445842.html

Majority of Respondents Support Legislation That Would Regulate How Corporations Spend Money on Political Advertising
Feb 1, 2010
http://www.visioncritical.com/2010/02/americans-reject-supreme-court-ruling-on-election-spending-by-corporations/

Citizens United Fallout Already Being Felt
An Ongoing Case Points Up Just How Dramatically The Court's Ruling Has Changed Judicial Thinking
by Eliza Newlin Carney February 1, 2010
http://www.nationaljournal.com/njonline/rg_20100201_1698.php

Thank You Supreme Court
by Greg Coleridge January 29, 2010
http://createrealdemocracy.blogspot.com/2010/01/thank-you-supreme-court.html

Editorial Notebook: Hanging a ‘For Sale’ Sign Over the Judiciary
by DOROTHY SAMUELS
Published: January 29, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/30/opinion/30sat4.html?emc=eta1

The Supreme Coup
by Jim Hightower 27 January 2010
http://www.truthout.org/jim-hightower-the-supreme-coup56438

Commentary: Citizens United vs. FEC is an egregious exercise of judicial activism
by Thomas Mann January 26, 2010
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/homepage/story/82982.html

Editorial: How Will the Citizens United Decision Affect Sustainable Business?
by Steve Puma January 26, 2010
http://www.triplepundit.com/2010/01/editorial-how-will-the-citizens-united-decision-affect-sustainable-business/

Move to Amend radio interview of Ben Manski
Wisconsin Radio Network, January 25, 2010
http://www.wrn.com/2010/01/move-to-amend/

Democracy in America Is a Useful Fiction
by Chris Hedges January 25, 2010
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article24491.htm

Supreme Corp (Video)
John Oliver celebrates the Supreme Court decision to finally award corporations their long-denied rights.
Monday, January 25, 2010
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-january-25-2010/supreme-corp

The Supreme Court's Ruling: What Would Milton Friedman Say?
by Justin Fox January 25, 2010 |
http://blogs.hbr.org/fox/2010/01/the-supreme-courts-ruling-what.html

Supreme Court ruling calls for a populist revolt
by E.J. Dionne Jr.
Monday, January 25, 2010
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/24/AR2010012402298.html?nav=rss_opinion/columns

Money Grubbers: The Supreme Court kills campaign finance reform.
By Richard L. Hasen January 21, 2010
http://www.slate.com/id/2242209/pagenum/all/#p2
Are politicians failing our lobbyists?
The Onion (humor)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6LB30iPqIM

Murray Hill Incorporated is Running for Congress
Corporations are people too! (satire...or is it!?)
http://www.murrayhillincforcongress.com

Challenges to Citizens United begin
Proposed changes in Constitution
by Lyle Denniston Sunday, January 24, 2010
http://www.scotusblog.com/2010/01/challenges-to-citizens-united-begin/

Court's campaign finance decision a case of shoddy scholarship
by Ruth Marcus
Saturday, January 23, 2010
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2010/01/22/AR2010012203897.html

Keith Olbermann on "Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission”
January 22, 2010
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKZKETizybw

Activists push to abolish ‘corporate personhood’ in wake of Supreme Court decision
January 22, 2010 (radio interview of David Cobb, Ben Manski and George Friday of Move to Amend)
http://www.fsrn.org/audio/activists-push-abolish-%E2%80%98corporate-personhood%E2%80%99-wake-supreme-court-decision/6100

Editorial: The Court’s Blow to Democracy
Published: January 21, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/22/opinion/22fri1.html?hp

The Pinocchio Project: Watching as the Supreme Court turns a corporation into a real live boy
By Dahlia Lithwick January 21, 2010
http://www.slate.com/id/2242208/

The Anatole France First Amendment of Citizens United
by Brenda Wright, Director of Democracy Program, Demos January 21 2010
http://www.acslaw.org/node/15160

Whose Rights?
A new Supreme Court decision promotes corporate rights at the expense of the rights of citizens. What happens when the legal structure itself stands in the way of democracy?
by Thomas Linzey, Mari Margil January 21, 2010
http://cms.yesmagazine.org/people-power/whose-rights

The Word – Let Freedom Ka-Ching (video)
Colbert Nation September 15, 2009
http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/249055/september-15-2009/the-word---let-freedom-ka-ching

Thank you Supreme Court

United States Supreme Court
U.S. Supreme Court Bldg.
Washington, DC 20543

Dear United States Supreme Court,

Thank you.

In particular, the majority of you who voted in Citizens United vs FEC to grant corporations greater First Amendment rights to influence elections.

Thank you The Roberts Court:

John Roberts Jr.
Anthony Kennedy
Antonin Scalia
Clarence Thomas
Samuel Alito

I thank you both personally and professionally.

You have now made my life easier.

You see, for the past dozen years, a relative handful of people across the country have been ranting and raving about the dangers of corporate “personhood.”

We’ve discussed how corporations are treated just like human beings under the US Constitution. Protected, shielded and insulated by the Bill of Rights. Possessing 1st, 4th, 5th and other Bill of Rights Amendment protections, as well as 14th Amendment due process and equal protection rights.

We’ve educated, advocated and organized.

We’ve helped fellow citizens understand how such absurd constitutional doctrines are destructive to anything remotely resembling democracy, self-governance and self-determination.

We’ve worked to show how the presence of corporate constitutional rights was connected to an absence of legitimate elections, affordable health care, a clean environment, good jobs, and all the other issues average people care about.

And we’ve challenged the legitimacy of private corporate cash in public elections.

Yet for most of the time, our efforts have come across as merely provocative, quaint, historical, or interesting.

Not relevant. Not current. Not appropriate.

Not anymore. Thanks to you. Thanks to this decision.

Thanks to your blatant, revolting and in your face pronouncement that corporations are virtually identical to human beings when it comes to First Amendment political free speech. Nine unelected appointed for lifers extending in perpetuity political free speech life to entities that exist solely through legal charters imposed by the government of We The People.

The average human person with any amount of common sense knows that corporations have no body and no mind. They are not persons. They should have no speech.

But they have more now. Thanks to you.

It’s quite true that corporations using their previously granted constitutional rights ALREADY exert governing roles via their control of production, technology, jobs, capital, trade, and property. Investment and production decisions that shape our communities and rule our lives are ALREADY made in boardrooms, regulatory agencies, and courtrooms. In the public realm, corporations ALREADY dominate elections, write and pass laws, educate our judges in jurisprudence, and mold public policy debate. And they ALREADY exert influence on law schools, professors and students, on our educational system, and on our very culture.

But it’s not been all that clear or obvious. It’s never been a strong enough reality to supplant the myths and lore of democracy.

Not until now. Thanks to you.

You are following, in fact, a hallowed tradition.

A century and half ago those who came before you made what may be a comparable decision. It was called Dred Scott vs Sanford.

That’s the Supreme Court decision that upheld Article 4, Section 2 of the United States Constitution declaring slaves weren’t human beings but property.

Dred Scott affirmed that horror. To the anger, furor and outrage of people everywhere. It led not to further regulating slavery or creating a Slavery Protection Agency but to an abolition movement to do away with slavery forever.

Citizens United will do the same today.

It already is. It will continue. It will expand.

More than 40,000 human persons have just in the first few days signed a petition at MovetoAmend.org calling to amend the US Constitution. To abolish corporate personhood -- corporate constitutional rights. To legalize democracy.

Just like Dred Scott did 150 years ago.

Your decision will launch a movement that will eventually and inevitably amend the Constitution. To expand the rights of people. And abolish injustice

Slavery 150 years ago. Corporate constitutional rights today.

Thank you for making educating and mobilizing citizens everywhere into a social movement so much easier.

Not in the short run though.

Corporations will use their treasury funds now to directly fund political campaigns for and against candidates and to influence the public. This will make the job of those dedicated to justice, peace and self-governance much more difficult

But it will also make it easier to see the root of the problem. Not this single law or that particular regulation. Not this office holder or that political party. But the constitutional edict of corporate constitutional rights.

Making the long run effort to getting at the heart of the problem easier to recognize and solve. By abolishing in all its forms corporate personhood. By legalizing democracy. By humanizing our society. To protect people and nature.

Thank you Supreme Court.

Sincerely,

Greg Coleridge
Director, Northeast Ohio American Friends Service Committee
Member, Program on Corporations, Law & Democracy collective

Supremely Reducing Democracy

The Citizens United vs FEC decision granting business corporations free speech “rights” is the latest in a 124 year long history of legal absurdities by the US Supreme Court. The unelected, appointed-for-life robed ones have expanded entrenched Constitutional protections to entities that exist solely through legal charters imposed by the government of We The People. What’s next? Declaring that computers are human beings with Constitutional rights?

It all started when the Supremes, including three Ohioans, declared in 1886 that corporations possessed the same 14th amendment equal protection human rights as freed slaves. The High Court ruled seven years later for the first time that corporations possessed Bill of Rights (5th Amendment due process) protections. The judicial activism continued in 1906 when 4th Amendment Bill of Rights search and seizure protections were granted. It wasn’t until 1977 that the Supremes first anointed corporations political free speech rights.

Citizens United simply expands the bizarre legal concept that corporations should have 1st Amendment free speech rights – this time to donate or invest in campaigns to elect or oppose candidates for public office. This is a further assault on what remains of democracy.

As a member of the Steering Committee of the national Campaign to Legalize Democracy, I invite interested and concerned citizens to visit MovetoAmend.org. Join the more than 40,000 Americans who have in the first week alone signed up calling to amend the U.S Constitution to expand democracy and abolish corporate personhood.

Move to Amend: Legalize Democracy/Abolish Corporate Personhood

I've signed onto this. I hope you will too!


URGENT CALL TO ACTION FROM
HOWARD ZINN, THOM HARTMANN, MEDEA BENJAMIN, FRAN & DAVID KORTEN, BILL MCKIBBEN, BILL FLETCHER, JIM HIGHTOWER, TOM HAYDEN, REV. YEARWOOD, & MANY MORE . . .

www.MovetoAmend.org

Exxon. AIG. Enron. Blackwater. Edison. Halliburton. Diebold.

They've gone after our tax dollars. Our services. Our jobs. Our schools. Our military. Our votes. Our future. Our freedoms. And the federal courts have helped them every step of the way.

Today, with its ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the Supreme Court ruled that corporations are persons, entitled by the U.S. Constitution to buy elections and run our government.

Human beings are people; corporations are legal fictions. The Supreme Court is misguided in principle, and wrong on the law. In a democracy, the people rule.

We Move to Amend.

We, the People of the United States of America, reject the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Citizens United, and move to amend our Constitution to:

Firmly establish that money is not speech, and that human beings, not corporations, are persons entitled to constitutional rights.
Guarantee the right to vote and to participate, and to have our votes and participation count.
Protect local communities, their economies, and democracies against illegitimate "preemption" actions by global, national, and state governments.

www.MovetoAmend.org

Adrienne Maree Brown, Ruckus Society
Alec Loorz, Kids vs Global Warming
Andrew Kimbrell, International Center for Technology Assessment
Andy Gussert, Citizens Trade Campaign
Anne Feeney, musician
Ben Manski, attorney, Exec. Director, Liberty Tree
Benno Friedman, photographer
Benson Scotch, former Staff Counsel to Sen. Leahy, U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee
Bill Fletcher, Exec. Editor, BlackCommentator.com
Bill McKibben, founder, 350.org
Bill Moyer, Backbone Campaign
Brad Friedman, Publisher, The BRAD BLOG
Brad Thacker, Be The Change USA
Brett Kimberlin, Director, Justice Through Music
Brian McLaren, Christian activist & author
Carl Davidson, Progressive America Rising
Carolyn Oppenheim, Shays 2
Charlie Cray, Center for Corporate Policy
Dal LaMagna, founder, Tweezerman, Inc.
Dave Wells, formerly Board of Directors, Sierra Club
David Cobb, initiator of 2004 Ohio Recount
David Gespass, president, National Lawyers Guild
David Korten, author of When Corporations Rule the World
David Rovics, musician
David Swanson, AfterDowningStreet.org
David Wells, Jr., Nashville Urban Harvest
Dean Myerson, Executive Director, Green Institute
Diane Wittner & Margaret Flowers, Chesapeake Citizens
Dr. Jill Stein, candidate for Governor of Massachusetts
Ed Garvey, attorney at law, editor, FightingBob.com
Emily Levy, Velvet Revolution
Fran Korten, Editor, YES! Magazine
Frank Arundel, activist
Gary Zuckett, WV Citizen Action
George Friday, National Coordinator, IPPN
George Martin, United for Peace & Justice
Georgia Kelly, Praxis Peace Institute
Glen Ford, Executive Editor, BlackAgendaReport.com
Greg Coleridge, NE OH American Friends Service Committee
Howard Zinn, historian
Jackie Cabasso, Executive Director, Western State Legal Foundation
James Gustave Speth, Distinguished Senior Fellow, Demos
Jan Edwards, writer
Jane Anne Morris, author, Gaveling Down The Rabble
Jeff Cohen, founder, FAIR
Jeff Milchen, founder, ReclaimDemocracy.org
Jeffrey Short, Ph.D., Pacific Science Director, OCEANA
Jerome Scott, League of Revolutionaries for a New America
Jill Bussiere, Co-Chair, Green Party of the U.S.
James M. Cullen, editor of The Progressive Populist
Jim Hightower, author, columnist, and radio commentator
Joel Bleifuss, Editor & Publisher, In These Times
John E. Peck, Executive Director, Family Farm Defenders
John Nichols, Washington Correspondent, The Nation
John Rensenbrink, President, Green Horizon Foundation
John Stauber, author, Weapons of Mass Deception
Jonathan Frieman, social entrepreneur
Josh Healey, Youth Speaks
Josh Lerner, The New School for Social Research
Josh Silver, Executive Director, Free Press
Judith Pedersen-Benn, Unitarian Universalists for a Just Economic Community
Kai Huschke, Envision Spokane
Kaitlin Sopoci-Belknap, Democracy Unlimited of Humboldt County
Ken Reiner, inventor and founder, Kaynar Corp.
Kevin Danaher, Executive Co-Producer, Green Festivals
Kevin Zeese, Executive Director, TrueVote.US
Leah Bolger, CDR, USN (Ret), Bring the Guard Home! It's the Law.
Lewis Pitts, Lawyer, Legal Aid of NC
Lisa Graves, Executive Director, Center for Media and Democracy
Lori Price, Managing Editor, Citizens for Legitimate Government
Makani Themba-Nixon, Executive Director, The Praxis Project
Margo Baldwin, Publisher, Chelsea Green
Mark Crispin Miller, author, Fooled Again
Mary Zepernick, Program on Corporations Law and Democracy
Marybeth Gardam, Women's International League for Peace and Freedom
Matt Nelson, Just Cause
Matt Rothschild, Editor, The Progressive
Medea Benjamin, co-founder, Code Pink
Michael Albert, Z Communications
Michael Bonnano, OpEdNews
Michael Marx, Corporate Ethics International
Michael Shuman, attorney, economic, author of "The Small-Mart Revolution"
Mike Ferner, President, Veterans for Peace
Mimi Kennedy, actress, activist
Miriam Simos, Starhawk, activist and writer
Nancy Price, Alliance for Democracy
Nick Pavloff, Jr., Gulf of Alaska Aleut from Kodiak Island
Norman Solomon, author, co-chair, Healthcare Not Warfare campaign
Patrick Reinsborough, SmartMeme
Paul Saginaw, founder, Zingerman's, Inc.
Prof. Peter Gabel, School of Law, New College of California
Prof. Victor Wallis, Managing Editor, Socialism & Democracy
Rabbi Arthur Waskow
Rep. Michael Fisher, House of Representatives, Vermont
Rev. Edward Pinkney, Black Autonomy Network Community Organization
Rev. Lennox Yearwood, President, Hip Hop Caucus
Richard Mazess, Prof. Medical Physics, UW-Madison, CEO of Lunar Corp & Bone Care Intl.
Riki Ott, Executive Director, Ultimate Civics
Robert McChesney, professor, co-author, The Death and Life of American Journalism
Ronnie Cummins, founder, Grassroots Netroots Alliance
Sally Castleman, Election Defense Alliance
Sam Smith, Editor, Progressive Review
Sarah Manski, CEO, PosiPair.com
Shahid Buttar, Rule of Law Institute
Ted Glick, climate change activist
Ted Nace, author, Gangs of America: The Rise of Corporate Power
Thom Hartmann, nation's #1 nationally syndicated progressive talk show host
Tia Oros & Christopher Peters, Seventh Generation Fund for Indian Development
Tiffiniy Cheng, Executive Director, A New Way Forward
Tim Carpenter, Executive Director, Progressive Democrats of America
Tom Hayden, activist
Ward Morehouse, chair, National Lawyers Guild's Committee on Corporations
organizations listed for identification purposes only

www.MovetoAmend.org