1886 SCOTUS: Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad 118 US 394, corporations are people too

[steve2470]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Clara_County_v._Southern_Pacific_Railroad_Co.

Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Company, 118 US 394 (1886) was a matter brought before the United States Supreme Court which dealt with taxation of railroad properties. A headnote issued by the Court Reporter claimed to state the sense of the Court regarding the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment as it applies to corporations, without the Court having actually made a decision or issued a written opinion on that issue. This was the first time that the Supreme Court was reported to hold that the Fourteenth Amendment's equal protection clause granted constitutional protections to corporations as well as to natural persons, although numerous other cases, since Dartmouth College v. Woodward in 1819, had recognized that corporations were entitled to some of the protections of the Constitution.

The headnote, which is "not the work of the Court, but are simply the work of the Reporter, giving his understanding of the decision, prepared for the convenience of the profession",[3] was written by the court reporter, former president of the Newburgh and New York Railway Company J.C. Bancroft Davis. He said the following:

"One of the points made and discussed at length in the brief of counsel for defendants in error was that 'corporations are persons within the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.' Before argument, Mr. Chief Justice Waite said: The court does not wish to hear argument on the question whether the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws, applies to these corporations. We are all of the opinion that it does."[4]

In other words, the headnote claimed that all of the justices believed that corporations enjoyed rights under the Fourteenth Amendment, adopted in 1868. In fact, the headnote was only a reporting by the Court Reporter of the Chief Justice's personal interpretation of the Justices' opinions. The issue of applicability of "Equal Protection to any persons" to the railroads was not addressed in the decision of the Court in the case.

Before publication in United States Reports, Davis wrote a letter to Chief Justice Morrison Waite, dated May 26, 1886, to make sure his headnote was correct:

Dear Chief Justice,

I have a memorandum in the California Cases Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific &c As follows. In opening the Court stated that it did not wish to hear argument on the question whether the Fourteenth Amendment applies to such corporations as are parties in these suits. All the Judges were of the opinion that it does.[5]

Waite replied:

I think your mem. in the California Railroad Tax cases expresses with sufficient accuracy what was said before the argument began. I leave it with you to determine whether anything need be said about it in the report inasmuch as we avoided meeting the constitutional question in the decision.

The decision here: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/118/394/case.html

[CanonRay]

1. The root of the problem

Thanks for posting

[gregcrawford]

2. Prior to his appointment to the SCOTUS...

Waite had been a career toady for the railroads. Even though his remarks did not constitute legal precedent, the Robber Barons ran with it, claiming First Amendment rights to "... petition the government for a redress of grievances."

And thus were spawned from the monstrous womb of pathological greed and malice... lobbyists.