Submitted by Waddell & Magan, P.C.
Detail Shot #1
Detail Shot #2
Hey, Plebe - Not a PEEP Out of You!
Corporations are people, my friend.
-Mitt Romney
About two hundred years ago,
Big Business got a boon
When it secured the right to contract
Like natural persons do. (1)
It seemed then like a good idea —
This corporate protection —
But somehow it expanded to
A “person” designation. (2)
So businesses were “people” now —
They sued and could be sued,
And were protected constitutionally —
Progressives came unglued!
And with Citizens United, (3)
There were protests in the streets —
“The First Amendment shouldn’t shield
Just anything that speaks!”
“Free speech is not protected for
Non-humans without tongues…
I’d believe that corps were people
If Texas executed one!” (4)
But those High Nine were corporatists (5)
(Excluding just a few), (6)
They think and do things differently
Than little people do.
Our highest court says Money Talks
(They mean the one percent); now
Elections can be bought and sold on
Supreme Court precedent.
— Casey Magan
(1) Dartmouth College v. Woodward, 17 U.S. 518 (1819).
(2) Pembina Consolidated Silver Mining Co. v. Pennsylvania, 125 U.S. 181 (1888).
(3) Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, 558 U.S. 310 (2010).
(4) Based on signs used in the Occupy Wall Street movement.
(5) Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Samuel Alito, Anthony Kennedy, Antonin Scalia, and Clarence Thomas.
(6) Justices John P. Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Steven Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor.