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The owners of the corporate entity can purchase all of the outstanding stock and convert the entity into a wholly owned proprietorship and run it as they please as they have accepted all responsibility for the gains and losses, legal and illegal activities, and policies of the business. If they do not desire this responsibility they can incorporate to reduce the financial responsibility but at the cost of ceding personal control.
Businesses aren't people. Businesses are things. Businesses don't go to church, they don't have religious beliefs, they don't have any opinions at all. So, no, you can't have non-secular businesses. You can have businesses owned by religious people, that sell religious services or goods. And as long as those business owners don't legally separate themselves from the business, accepting all liability for the actions of the business, in my opinion those businesses can seek religious exemptions from the law. Churches can seek religious exemptions from the law. But when an owner severs himself from the business, by incorporating or forming a LLC or by subcontracting or by any other means, then no, he cannot on the one hand claim that the company is separate from himself and therefore avoid liability for the business or its actions, and on the other hand claim that the company is an extension of himself and therefore claim religious exemptions. And please note, the CHOICE to incorporate is the owner's choice.
Government doesn't make that choice for the owner. God doesn't make that choice for the owner. The owner makes it all by himself. Mr Green made that choice all by himself when he chose to incorporate Hobby Lobby. And the law doesn't compel him to open Hobby Lobby's doors on Christmas or on Sundays. He is free to negotiate with the mall and shopping centers where he locates his stores on the hours, on the types of goods sold, on rent and maintenance fees. And he does negotiate. Because the majority of malls and shopping centers in their tenant agreements, regardless if he owns or rents, require stores to be open certain hours every day of the week. He negotiates to get what he wants, and the government doesn't say boo. And this hullabaloo over insurance is just another negotiation. He's negotiating with the government about its insurance requirements. He's doing it in the courts. And he's losing, on the merits of his position. No one is limiting his personal freedom to worship. He CHOSE to make Hobby Lobby a separate entity. And that separate entity isn't a person, and doesn't have personal freedom to do anything. It has to follow the law. Just like other businesses have to follow the law.
So let me see if I get this straight in a way that even the atheist may understand it.
A person with moral principles cannot operate their business based on those moral principles unless those morals are allowed by law? Even an atheist has morals, so they say. Where those morals may come from, according to this argument, it doesn't matter as the government is now in control of how a business which is not a person, yet run by a person, their decision base is not allowed to be of their own liking. Yet people still maintain, they are free.
Not to send us off course, but it just occurred to me that corporations who contribute to campaign funding, it was declared that, the corporate entity, was indeed a person and that they could donate to the campaign of their liking as much of their money as they care to contribute.
PS: This also applies to the OP in who decides the teaching of our children and what we can and cannot "morally" do.
Last edited by Ellis Bell; 01-17-2013 at 09:12 AM..
Reason: ps
I'm not RC, don't follow the Pope's pronouncements, and don't know what his issue is with the nuns and their work. The Pope does not speak for all Christians, as I'm sure you know.
There are many who don't endorse same-sex marriage, but they don't demonize it. That may be your interpretation of what Christianity says about it. Not being in favor of it doesn't equate to demonization. Here you have the issue of being free to state one's faith without it being called "demonizing". Tolerance on both sides is needed in order for tolerance to have meaning. Calling something out as sin (based on the Bible) is not demonizing, just fact and, under religious freedom, cannot be restricted. You don't have to like it, but you can't silence it.
When your calling out is based on a false understanding of the Bible, sure it is. Condemning women as witches was demonizing them, despite the fact that the Bible was altered to condemn witches. Marriage in the United States is a secular institution. You can disagree with it on religious grounds all you want. But when you try to apply those beliefs to secular law, you are demonizing other people for something you frankly haven't the foggiest understanding of.
Apparently Fiyero, believes that the only way to stop the Christian is by empowering the----government through laws of dictatorship.
Nope. Your beliefs stop where mine start, and the government has been assigned to protect me from you if you seek to infringe on my rights. That's not a dictatorship, it's a Republic.
So let me see if I get this straight in a way that even the atheist may understand it.
Nice attack. It's not just atheists who disagree with you.
Quote:
A person with moral principles cannot operate their business based on those moral principles unless those morals are allowed by law?
They can operate their business based on their morals, so long as those morals don't cause them to use their business to break the law. Businesses are bound by secular law. If your morals conflict with said secular law, you shouldn't be operating a business.
If the owner legally separated himself from the business by forming an INCORPORATED business, then the owner is legally separate from the BUSINESS.
He can not have it both ways.
The government is in control of the atheist core values and their principles beliefs they may wish to incorporate into their business. Now aren't they having fun.
Either we are free or we are not as logic dictates, (on or off) their is no grey in the middle.
Nice attack. It's not just atheists who disagree with you.
They can operate their business based on their morals, so long as those morals don't cause them to use their business to break the law. Businesses are bound by secular law. If your morals conflict with said secular law, you shouldn't be operating a business.
So now who is in control of a person's movements and what they may or may not do in this country, which still calls itself a free nation?
Nope. Your beliefs stop where mine start, and the government has been assigned to protect me from you if you seek to infringe on my rights. That's not a dictatorship, it's a Republic.
You keep telling yourself that, because it is then you can sleep nights.
So let me see if I get this straight in a way that even the atheist may understand it.
A person with moral principles cannot operate their business based on those moral principles unless those morals are allowed by law? Even an atheist has morals, so they say. Where those morals may come from, according to this argument, it doesn't matter as the government is now in control of how a business which is not a person, yet run by a person, their decision base is not allowed to be of their own liking. Yet people still maintain, they are free.
Not to send us off course, but it just occurred to me that corporations who contribute to campaign funding, it was declared that, the corporate entity, was indeed a person and that they could donate to the campaign of their liking as much of their money as they care to contribute.
PS: This also applies to the OP in who decides the teaching of our children and what we can and cannot "morally" do.
Do you think a business should be allowed to deny service, or allowed to not hire women, or people of a different race if the owners morals say that they shouldn't do business with those people?
Should a business be allowed to fire an employee based on their religion, if the owner believes that they don't fir with their own morals?
ANYONE can create a "religion" that says anything they want. There would be no more laws regarding business if anyone could exempt themselves based on their "religion".
I'll open a business that says I don't have to pay taxes based on my religion. Someone else might open a business selling drugs and alcohol only to minors, based on theirs. Your neighbor might turn their house into a cat house, or a nuclear rod storage facility.
We have laws for a reason. If your religion doesn't allow you to follow the laws, then you shouldn't be in business.
So now who is in control of a person's movements and what they may or may not do in this country, which still calls itself a free nation?
You can do anything in this country so long as it's legal. And who said we're a "free nation"? That's a rather arbitrary term. We're definitely not the freest nation in the world. New Zealand, Canada, and Australia are all more free.
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