October 2011
By What Authority
The Corporation as Crime
Richard Grossman on Usurpation
by Russell Mokhiber, October 6, 2011
Richard Grossman says that Occupy Wall Street activists need to go beyond greed and corruption and focus on usurpation.
As in - illegal seizure of power.
As in - the corporation has usurped - illegally seized - power from the people.
He quotes Thomas Hobbes as saying that a corporation is merely a "chip off the old block of sovereignty."
Grossman, the father of the "no to corporate personhood" movement, says the first step in taking back the power is to criminalize the corporation.
To that end, he has drafted a four page law - "An Act to Criminalize Chartered Incorporated Business Enterprises" (link).
"As of 12:01 a.m. on July 4, 2012, no incorporated business shall exist or operate within the United States and its territories, or with any State or municipality" the draft law reads.
"As of 12:01 a.m. on July 4, 2012, all existing business corporation charters granted by the United States, and by all States, shall be null and void."
"If people want to go into business, fine," Grossman said. "But this law would strip away 500 years of Constitutional protections and privileges. No more limited liability for shareholders. No more perpetual life. No more Constitutional protections."
Those local, state or federal officials "who fail to implement and sustain the prohibition - and criminalization - of chartered, incorporated business entities after 12:01 a.m. July 4, 2012, shall promptly be indicted and speedily tried for the crime of villainous usurpation - perfidious, felonious, illegitimate rule exceeding their proper authority - as well as for the crime of dereliction of duty."
In a footnote to the draft law, Grossman writes that "in a corporate state, law, culture, contrived celebration and tradition illegitimately clothe directors and executive officers of chartered incorporated businesses in governing authority."
"This is usurpation," he writes. "A corporate state nurtures, enables and expedites such illegitimate governing authority by violence enforced by courts, jails, police and military force and by historians. Less-overtly ferocious institutions - for profit and non profit - routinely reinforce that reality."
RUSSELL MOKHIBER edits Corporate Crime Reporter (link).