On September 16, Dean O’Rourke was involved in an on-campus debate which included a debate regarding whether or not a Corporation has the right to free speech. Dean O’Rourke argued in favor of corporations holding this right. An article I came across on The Onion, however, points out a very negative side effect of this being the case.
Dean O’Rourke argued that because corporations are a large group of people, corporations themselves are people. From this conclusions, Dean O’Rourke went to claim that as people, corporations have the right to freedom of speech. Because endorsing certain bills, campaigns, or officials, is considered a form of speech, this supreme court ruling gives corporations the right to spend as much as they want to give support to different bills or campaigns.
In Dr. Rasor’s opinion corporation do not qualify as people. Each individual within a corporation has the option to offer endorsement themselves, so Dr. Rasor expressed that corporations should not be able to spend money on behalf of a corporation. For example, Dean O’Rourke explained that Virginia Wesleyan college is technically a corporation, and then went on to ask the audience if as people we felt that VWC was people. I found this argument to be very shaky at best. Dr. Rasor responded by stating that even people at this school come here willingly, does not mean that they would want President Greer to represent all of us or make political decisions on our behalf.
In this way corporate freedom of speech misrepresents people. Because a corporation is not a group formed based on one shared political opinion, corporations does not represent all of its members. Giving corporations free political speech and spending rights in this way misrepresents the free speech of man individuals and is in this way misleading and unfair.
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