:08:00
what they made or did
or maintained
:08:03
a turnpike whatever was
in their charter
:08:05
and they didn't
do anything else.
:08:07
They didn't own or couldn't
own another corporation.
:08:11
Their shareholders
were liable.
:08:13
And so on.
:08:15
In both law and the culture
the corporation was considered
:08:18
a subordinate entity that was
a gift from the people
:08:22
in order to serve
the public good.
:08:28
So you have that history
:08:29
and we shouldn't
be misled by it
:08:31
it's not as if these
were the halcyon days
:08:34
when all corporations
served the public trust
:08:36
but there's a lot
to learn from that.
:08:41
The Civil War and the
Industrial Revolution
:08:45
created enormous growth
in corporations.
:08:48
And so there was an explosion
of railroads
:08:51
who got large federal
subsidies of land.
:08:54
Banking heavily
manufacturing
:08:58
And corporate lawyers
a century and a half ago
:09:01
realized that they needed
more power to operate
:09:03
And wanted to remove some
of the constraints
:09:07
that had historically been
placed on the corporate form.
:09:12
The 14th amendment
was passed
:09:13
at the end of the Civil War
:09:15
to give equal rights
to black people.
:09:19
And therefore it said
:09:21
No state can deprive
any person of life
:09:24
liberty or property
without due process of law.
:09:27
And that was intended
to prevent the states
:09:29
from taking away life
liberty or property
:09:32
from black people
as they had done
:09:34
for so much of
our history.
:09:37
And what happens is the
corporations come into court
:09:40
and corporation lawyers
are very clever.
:09:42
And they say
:09:43
Oh you cant deprive
a person of life
:09:46
liberty or property.
:09:48
We are a person.
:09:49
A corporation is a person.
:09:50
And so supreme court
goes along with that.
:09:54
And what was particularly
grotesque about this was
:09:58
that the 14th amendment
was passed