| Friday, September 05, 2008 |
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The Attack on the Right of Petition is also an Attack on Property Rights
By Gina Liggett @ 1:00 AM   
Lobbying is often scorned, and commonly considered an unethical practice of influencing lawmakers. Even though there are thousands of lobbyists working at all levels of government for every conceivable interest group, it is corporations that often receive the most wrath.
For example, Barack Obama brags: "I am in this race to tell the corporate lobbyists that their days of setting the agenda in Washington are over. I have done more than any other candidate in this race to take on lobbyists - and won."John McCain has been criticized for being anti-lobby while at the same time courting the advice of several corporate lobbyists; but he's quick to wash his hands of this hypocrisy, saying, "At no time have I ever done anything that would betray the public trust."
But petitioning the government either as an interest group, private citizen, or corporation, is a fundamental right explicitly enumerated in the petition clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: "Congress shall make no law.... abridging...the right of the people...to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
And according to the First Amendment Center at Vanderbilt University, lobbying is considered a form of petition (with no guarantee that the lobbyist will get what he wants): "Lobbyists try to persuade government officials either to support or oppose various policy issues. Therefore, lobbying can be considered a form of petitioning the government for redress of grievances, subject to protection under the First Amendment's petition clause. Although there has not been a great deal of judicial analysis on First Amendment protections afforded to lobbying, the courts have carved out several parameters. First, the petition clause does not grant a lobbyist the absolute right to speak to a government official nor does it grant a lobbyist the right to a hearing based on his or her grievances. In addition, the clause does not create an obligation for a government official to take action in response to a grievance. Finally, any statement made while a lobbyist petitions a government official does not receive greater protection than any other expression protected by the First Amendment." So, with the political bias against corporate lobbying, how are companies supposed to survive when politicians attempt to make laws and regulations that threaten their businesses? Are they just supposed to shut up and accept any capricious violation of their property rights?!
Because there is no separation of state and economics in America---resulting in the mixed capitalist-socialist economy we have today---it is imperative that the right to petition government be upheld. It may be the only way, albeit indirect, to fight for property rights.
While some interest groups and companies improperly lobby for government handouts and preferences, and play the infamous "pork-barrel" game, this is not because the right of petition is wrong, but because the entanglement of government and the economy is wrong.
The essential point is this: politicians' flagrant disregard of the First Amendment right to petition is symptomatic of not only their power lust, but their arrogant disdain for the concept of individual rights, property rights and government's proper role as servant to the people.
And the "people" includes the companies which create the wealth and the necessities of our daily life. If politicians legislate them out of existence directly by regulations or indirectly by limiting their right to petition, then government will truly have total power over the economy--and you and me.Labels: Ethics, Law, Politics
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| Comments on "The Attack on the Right of Petition is also an Attack on Property Rights" |
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 | Friday, September 5, 2008 at 0:58:58 mst
Comment ID: #1
Name: Andrew Baker
E-mail: smoke_owner(at)mac.com
Reminds me of the rhetoric I have heard fighting special interest groups, which, as Thomas Sowell points out, is verbiage since whatever people support any politician are special interest groups.
I thank you for writing this because it cleared up for me what lobbying is. I just merely equated lobbying with campaign donations made to politicians because of the indignation sent to them. I see now that is a first amendment issue without the intermediary of money. It seems politicians are working to become answerable to even those who unwillingly pay them tax dollars.
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| Friday, September 5, 2008 at 1:20:46 mst
Comment ID: #2
Name: BrianS
E-mail: blspro (at) gmail
"While some interest groups and companies improperly lobby for government handouts and preferences, this is not because the right of petition is wrong, but because the entanglement of government and the economy is wrong." Exactly. Very good piece. Thank you.
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| Friday, September 5, 2008 at 4:39:28 mst
Comment ID: #3
Name: tjw
E-mail: sourcevive at comcast dot net
I agree that lobbying is a protected First Amendment activity, as is advertising ("commercial speech"). Unfortunately, I would venture to say that the majority of lobbying today consists of improperly "seeking government handouts and preferences." As you point out, it does not invalidate lobbying per se. However, without the welfare state, lobbying would hardly be necessary, as Ayn Rand reminded us: http://www.aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/lobbying.html
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| Friday, September 5, 2008 at 9:20:30 mst
Comment ID: #4
Name: Rob Abiera
URL: http://moralitywar.blogspot.com
Excellent post! I've just put up a response at my blog: http://moralitywar.blogspot.com/2008/09/lobbying-as-petitioning.html
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| Friday, September 5, 2008 at 11:09:22 mst
Comment ID: #5
Name: Steve D'Ippolito
"While some interest groups and companies improperly lobby for government handouts and preferences, and play the infamous "pork-barrel" game, this is not because the right of petition is wrong, but because the entanglement of government and the economy is wrong."
An excellent identification--if government didn't muck with the economy, business would not have to lobby just to get the parasites off their necks, and other businesses would not be able to lobby for improper favors, i.e., government coercion used to bludgeon their competitors.
This realiztion can be extended: A LOT of political issues are only such because the government has overstepped its proper bounds. As just one more example (outside of what is conventionally understood as the economic realm), prayer in schools simply would not be an issue were the government not the provider of the overwhelming majority of schooling in this country.
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| Saturday, September 6, 2008 at 13:50:24 mst
Comment ID: #6
Name: Evan
Out of curiousity, where does the first ammendment protect commercial speech? it protects only political speech of individual human citizens. It says nothing about corporations...which didn't even exist in their modern form until well after the civil war. And even then, the law doesn't change, simply how the supreme court interprets the constitution.
Secondly, while I sympathize with Adam Smith's critique in the "Wealth of Nations" that it would be best to allow the hidden hand to allow the free market distribute wealth downwards, rather than allow the normal pattern of government protecting the traditional power brokers in the "merchants and manufacturers" sector of the society, it should also be noted that at the end of the day, the idea that you can divorce a government from an economy is somewhere close to impossible. At the very least, in our modern economy, a government issues a currency. We can manipulate, as has been done in the past, the value of that currency. Most times, the value is protected, again, to protect the interest closest to "merchants and manufacturers", with some notable exceptions.
No matter what, barring an anarchist utopia forming, there will be a state. The only question is on whose behalf does that state operate, and which direction will wealth be distributed.
--Evan
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| Saturday, September 6, 2008 at 15:50:17 mst
Comment ID: #7
Name: Valda Redfern
E-mail: valda.redfern(at)gmail.com
URL: http://valzhalla.blogspot.com
"...the idea that you can divorce a government from an economy is somewhere close to impossible. At the very least, in our modern economy, a government issues a currency." But there is no need for a government to issue a currency, nor is it proper for government to do so. A currency backed by an objective measure and store of value needs no enforcement. Only fiat money requires government control, and only government could force people to use money backed by nothing. The sense in which you can't divorce a government from an economy is that a free economy requires government protection from the initiation of force and cannot tolerate government interference in its operation; so a certain kind of government is required for a free economy to exist. A free economy would use as many different currencies as were convenient, and government's only role concerning currency would be to enforce laws against theft and fraud. Currencies not backed by real money would not last long in a free economy.
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| Saturday, September 6, 2008 at 18:01:17 mst
Comment ID: #8
Name: tjw
E-mail: sourcevive at comcast dot net
Virginia State Board of Pharmacy v. Virginia Citizens Consumer Council (1976) is widely regarded as the benchmark Supreme Court case confirming that commercial speech is protected by the First Amendment, although the Court has not always been consistent in its approach. Fundamentally, however, a corporation is nothing more than a set of contractual relationships among individuals: http://www.aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/corporations.html What is rightly allowed to individuals is rightly allowed to corporations, and what is rightly prohibited to individuals is rightly prohibited to corporations.
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