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Articles 1 - 17 of 17
Full-Text Articles in Law
Fascism And Monopoly, Daniel A. Crane
Fascism And Monopoly, Daniel A. Crane
Michigan Law Review
The recent revival of political interest in antitrust has resurfaced a longstanding debate about the role of industrial concentration and monopoly in enabling Hitler’s rise to power and the Third Reich’s wars of aggression. Proponents of stronger antitrust enforcement argue that monopolies and cartels brought the Nazis to power and warn that rising concentration in the American economy could similarly threaten democracy. Skeptics demur, observing that German big business largely opposed Hitler during the crucial years of his ascent. Drawing on business histories and archival material from the U.S. Office of Military Government’s Decartelization Branch, this Article assesses the historical …
Of Bodies Politic And Pecuniary: A Brief History Of Corporate Purpose, David B. Guenther
Of Bodies Politic And Pecuniary: A Brief History Of Corporate Purpose, David B. Guenther
Michigan Business & Entrepreneurial Law Review
American corporate law has long drawn a bright line between for-profit and non-profit corporations. In recent years, hybrid or social enterprises have increasingly put this bright-line distinction to the test. This Article asks what we can learn about the purpose of the American business corporation by examining its history and development in the United States in its formative period from roughly 1780-1860. This brief history of corporate purpose suggests that the duty to maximize profits in the for-profit corporation is a relatively recent development. Historically, the American business corporation grew out of an earlier form of corporation that was neither …
What Corporate Veil?, Joshua C. Macey
What Corporate Veil?, Joshua C. Macey
Michigan Law Review
Review of Adam Winkler's We the Corporations: How American Business Won Their Civil Rights.
Texas Gulf Sulphur And The Genesis Of Corporate Liability Under Rule 10b-5, Adam C. Pritchard, Robert B. Thompson
Texas Gulf Sulphur And The Genesis Of Corporate Liability Under Rule 10b-5, Adam C. Pritchard, Robert B. Thompson
Articles
This Essay explores the seminal role played by SEC v. Texas Gulf Sulphur Co. in establishing Rule 10b-5’s use to create a remedy against corporations for misstatements made by their officers. The question of the corporation’s liability for private damages loomed large for the Second Circuit judges in Texas Gulf Sulphur, even though that question was not directly at issue in an SEC action for injunctive relief. The judges considered both, construing narrowly “in connection with the purchase or sale of any security,” and the requisite state of mind required for violating Rule 10b-5. We explore the choices of the …
China's 'Corporatization Without Privatization' And The Late 19th Century Roots Of A Stubborn Path Dependency, Nicholas Howson
China's 'Corporatization Without Privatization' And The Late 19th Century Roots Of A Stubborn Path Dependency, Nicholas Howson
Articles
This Article analyzes the contemporary program of “corporatization without privatization” in the People's Republic of China (PRC) directed at China's traditional state-owned enterprises (SOEs) through a consideration of long ago precursor enterprise establishments--starting from the last Chinese imperial dynasty's creation of “government-promoted/-supervised, merchant-financed/-operated” (guandu shangban) firms in the latter part of the nineteenth century. While analysts are tempted to see the PRC corporations with listings on international exchanges that dominate the global economy and capital markets as expressions of “convergence,” this Article argues that such firms in fact show deeply embedded aspects of path dependency unique to the Chinese context …
Citizens United And The Corporate Form, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah
Citizens United And The Corporate Form, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah
Articles
In Citizens United vs. FEC, the Supreme Court struck down a Federal statute banning direct corporate expenditures on political campaigns. The decision has been widely criticized and praised as a matter of First Amendment law. But it is also interesting as another step in the evolution of our legal views of the corporation. This article argues that by viewing Citizens United through the prism of theories about the corporate form, it is possible to see that the majority and the dissent departed from previous Supreme Court jurisprudence on the First Amendment rights of corporations. It is also possible to then …
The Cyclical Transformations Of The Coporate Form: A Historical Pespective On Corporate Social Responsibility, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah
The Cyclical Transformations Of The Coporate Form: A Historical Pespective On Corporate Social Responsibility, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah
Law & Economics Working Papers Archive: 2003-2009
This Article describes the transformations underwent by the corporate form from its Roman origins to the present. It shows that every time there was a shift in the role of the corporation, three theories of the corporation (the aggregate, artificial, and real entity theories) were brought forward in cyclical fashion. However, every time the real entity theory prevailed, and it is the dominant theory during periods of stability in the relationship between the corporation, the shareholders, and the state. The article describes this evolution in detail, and then attempts to derive normative consequences for the legitimacy of corporate social responsibility …
Public Research And Private Development: Patents And Technology Transfer In Government-Sponsored Research, Rebecca S. Eisenberg
Public Research And Private Development: Patents And Technology Transfer In Government-Sponsored Research, Rebecca S. Eisenberg
Articles
This article revisits the logical and empirical basis for current government patent policy in order to shed light on the competing interests at stake and to begin to assess how the system is operating in practice. Such an inquiry is justified in part by the significance of federally-sponsored research and development to the overall U.S. research effort. Although the share of national expenditures for research and development borne by the federal government has declined since 1980, federal funding in 1995 still accounted for approximately thirty-six percent of total national outlays for research and development' and nearly fifty-eight percent of outlays …
Cook And The Corporate Shareholder: A Belated Review Of William W. Cook's Publications On Corporations, Alfred F. Conard
Cook And The Corporate Shareholder: A Belated Review Of William W. Cook's Publications On Corporations, Alfred F. Conard
Michigan Law Review
A Review of A Treatise on the Law of Stock and Stockholders, as Applicable to Railroad, Banking, Insurance, Manufacturing, Commercial, Business, Turnpike, Bridge, Canal, and Other Private Corporations by William W. Cook
The Birth Of A Public Corporation, Jon C. Teaford
The Birth Of A Public Corporation, Jon C. Teaford
Michigan Law Review
A Review of Public Property and Private Power: The Corporation of the City of New York in American Law, 1730-1870. by Hendrik Hartog
Canadian Merger Policy And Its International Implications, Eric K. Gressman
Canadian Merger Policy And Its International Implications, Eric K. Gressman
Michigan Journal of International Law
The implications of Canadian merger policy are of deep concern to U.S. and other foreign investors who have invested or are considering investing in Canada. U.S. interests own 60 percent of Canada's manufacturing industry. In 1978, approximately 250 mergers in Canada involved a foreign-owned or foreign-controlled buyer (usually U.S.). Therefore, it is not surprising that Canada's merger policy is no less important to the decisions of foreign investors in Canada than the Justice Department's policies are to domestic investors in the United States. At the same time, the Canadian government and public are concerned with their merger policy as a …
Perlman V. Feldmann: A Case Study In Contemporary Corporate Legal History, Jan G. Deutsch
Perlman V. Feldmann: A Case Study In Contemporary Corporate Legal History, Jan G. Deutsch
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
The author gives the following introduction to this article: “When I was a law student, taking a course in introductory corporate law, what was heard around the halls was that most of corporate law would be learned if one understood Perlman v. Feldmann. I agree with that statement, and I have agreed more strongly each year I myself have taught introductory corporate law. Indeed, I now believe one would also learn a good deal about the significance of-the corporation in American life during the past two decades. Unfortunately, however, it seems to me-on the basis of having read everything …
Religious Corporations And The Law, Paul G. Kauper, Stephen C. Ellis
Religious Corporations And The Law, Paul G. Kauper, Stephen C. Ellis
Michigan Law Review
This article will attempt to present a picture of the legal status of religious organizations, with particular reference to the enjoyment of the corporate privilege. Necessarily, this will involve at the outset an historical review tracing the development of that status, beginning with the practice of granting special charters to churches and culminating in the now familiar general incorporation statute. Special attention will be paid to distinctive problems that arose in Utah, Pennsylvania, and Virginia concerning corporate status. The historical review is followed by a summary survey of the current state laws relating to the incorporation of churches. The last …
Corporations And Express Trusts As Business Organizations, Horace L. Wilgus
Corporations And Express Trusts As Business Organizations, Horace L. Wilgus
Books
The advantages of incorporation have long been recognized and frequently referred to in our law ... Upon the other hand the special advantages of Express Trusts have recently been stated .... It is my purpose to compare these two, -- Corporations and Express Trusts, -- in such detail as my time will permit, to discover, if perchance we may, something of the strength and weakness of each, for business purposes, under present day conditions.
Corporations And Express Trusts As Business Organizations, Horace Lafayette Wilgus
Corporations And Express Trusts As Business Organizations, Horace Lafayette Wilgus
Articles
PRESIDENT BUTLER of Columbia University is reported to have said in an address before the New York Chamber of Commerce in 1911, that "the limited liability corporation is the greatest single discovery of modem times, whether you judge it by its social, by its ethical, by its industrial, or, in the long run--after we understand it and know how to use it,--by its political, effects." 1
Need Of A National Incorporation Law, Horace Lafayette Wilgus
Need Of A National Incorporation Law, Horace Lafayette Wilgus
Articles
When the report of the Committee on Uniformity of legislation was submitted to the last American Bar Association, and consideration of the legal problems growing out of modem commercial combinations, was urged as a matter proper for discussion and action by that association, it was gravely argued by distinguished lawyers present that there was no legal problem to be solved. The Committee on Commercial Law, however, thought otherwise and said:- "The American people look to the American Bar for leadership on this question. Some one must lead. If not the lawyer, then it will be the demagogue."
Limits To State Control Of Private Business, Thomas M. Cooley
Limits To State Control Of Private Business, Thomas M. Cooley
Articles
The present purpose is to inquire whether, in the matter of the regulation of property rights and of business, legislation has not of late been occupying doubtful, possibly unconstitutional grounds. The discussion in the main must be limited to fundamental.-principles, aided by such light as legal and constitutional history may throw upon them, since the express provisions of the constitutions can give little assistance. They always contain the general guaranty of due process of law to life, liberty, and property, but in other particulars they for the most part leave protection to principles which have come from the common law. …