A Challenge For Progressive Lawyers

By TLB Contributor: Ken LaRive.

In the fall of 1995 a group of four men who understood the growing power that corporations are exerting on our Government, drafted a final definitive essay. They explained the current situation from an historical perspective, and gave a viable solution. The essay was called, “The National Lawyers Guide Practitioner.”

Under this heading it stated the current problems of both law and practice, and the need to take back corporate control from what was termed, “corporate welfare.”

To motivate the reader to study this amazing work, I present here just three small excerpts from that document. From them you will see that what we are dealing with is still relevant twenty years later, and has America by the throat… It is the real reason we are in debt, with an erosion of civil liberty. It is the reason we have the NDAA, The Patriot Act, and the loss of our Constitution.

First, under the subheading, “A challenge for Progressive Lawyers”, this was in the body…

“What has become clear is that accepting corporate law as it has been created by corporate lawyers and judges, and taught by law schools, means conceding to giant corporations dominance over our nation’s elections, laws, money, work, manufacturing, resources, health, education, culture and ecosystems— not to mention over the rest of the world.”

Under the sub heading “The Hidden History,” was this amazing assertion:

“By corporate decree, poverty is up, wages are down, and millions are literally working their way into poverty. Corporate leaders and their shills order Congress, state legislatures and local officials to fire teachers and public health workers; close schools, libraries, hospitals and parks; gut health and environmental laws; withhold legal aid and other services to young people, the poor, the sick and elderly. And our politicians: A New Your Times headline sums it up” “As city and state budgets are cut, millions in tax breaks go to companies.””

And finally, under the sub-heading, “Reclaiming Sovereignty”, is this emphatic truth…

“None of this will be easy or quick. But the only other choice is giving up and living under corporate rule. And failure even to try will abandon our children to the terrifying question posed by the philosopher Morris Raphael Cohen more than half a century ago: Never before have those absorbed in the production of material things had so much power in governance of human life… But their ultimate criterion is a very simple one of monetary profit. Can the ultimate interest of human life be safely left to be governed by that simple consideration.”

The four compiled essays were written by:

Richard L. Grossman

Ward Morehouse

Thomas Linsey

Robert W. Benson

The link to this informative and concise essay is found here. Richard. L. Grossman and Ward Morehouse are co-directors of The Program On Corporations, Laws and Democracy. Grossman was director of Environmentalists For Full Employment form 1976-1984. Morehouse, president of the Council of Public and International Affairs, is a human rights activists.

This essay is volume 52, number 4, drafted in the fall of 1995, and part of a larger body of writing…

Article originally featured here: http://www.examiner.com/article/a-challenge-for-progressive-lawyers