There have been many discussions on this board about who actually owns, and is thus responsible for, state-chartered corporations. I just had a realization that the true owners of a state-chartered corporation is the state itself, rather than the shareholders. It is the government which grants the charter, and can revoke it at will, which has the ultimate power, thus ownership, over a corporation. Furthermore, by seeking a state charter, the former owners, now shareholders, have voluntarily ceded their ownership to the state. Since all state property is illegitimate, it is open for homesteading by its users: its workers and clientele.
Interesting idea. I’ll play devil’s advocate: it can be argued that merely being state-chartered isn’t enough for that property to be considered illegitimate. For an analogy, just because the state forces you to register a gun (and thus has, or at least claims, ultimate power over the gun), doesn’t mean that the gun is unowned property.
Setting aside the nonsense that state property is open for homesteading (good luck!), simply registering a property with the state does not bring it under control of the state. It simply means that the state recognizes your ownership of this property under its statutes. For example if I register my house with the local municipality in exchange for a deed I still have full possession of the house, even if the deed is provided by the state.
The situation is different in that you cannot acquire a gun without great personal risk without registering it, but you can own a business without incorporating it. Business owners voluntarily incorporate, thus through this devil’s bargain turning over ownership of their assets to a government-defined entity, for the benefits they perceive they will accrue from this, such as limited liability. Gun registration does not create such an entity, anyway, it merely tracks your purchase so later the government’s thugs can find you.
Practically, it is not open for homesteading, but that does not mean it isn’t rightfully so.
The state recognizes your property rights (to some degree) without incorporation. You can own a business without setting up a state-spawned fictional entity to own all your assets and limit your liability.
The house analogy is flawed. Your ownership of the house will not be recognized without the deed. As with Wombatron’s gun example, you cannot own without registering, in this case. You can own assets sufficient to run a business without incorporation.
Or that you have to register your car. Or have a license to drive.
I think people start off with a blatantly poor position, and then they build an unstable house on that foundation.
First, I think very few will buy that all state property is open to homesteading. That preculdes any justice if the property was stolen.
Let’s assume it is true (strictly for the sake of argument, I think it is false), I also don’t buy that the owners can’t homestead back the property that was theirs but not theirs. Of course, there is an anti-ownership/anti-capitalist agenda here.
Lastly, cars and homes fall under this notion of chartered state property. As do marriages (state contractual privilege). Can I homestead someone’s wife? Is your car free game?
I’ve already smashed the anti-corporation argument here and on my blog. A corporation is no different than a partnership. Or a sole proprietorship. Or a tax-exempt foundation for the purposes of this argument.
Which was Murray Rothbard’s position for decades, and still is Walter Block’s position (one of his more virtuous positions).
This classical Rothbardian position that the state’s property claims are morally homesteadable is irreconcilable with the Hoppean conservative position that state property should be regaurded as if it were private.
Considering Hoppe’s position came after Rothbard’s, and that Rothbard supported Hoppe’s work, we can safely assume that the Hoppe position is the most up-to-date Rothbard position.
Anyway to imply that existing property can be homesteaded is to corrupt the term homesteading to meaninglessness. It is not homesteading but privatization.
That’s beside the point, which is that the homesteading position is the classical Rothbardian position. It is not logical to assume that whatever his later positions happent to be are going to be improvements. They could be a devolution. The Hoppe position is not a Rothbardian position, it is Hoppe’s position, as they are two separate people, and Rothbard didn’t come to a similar position until towards the end of his life. Of course, Hoppeans like yourself are always trying to claim Hoppe as the logical extension of Rothbard, when Hoppe represents the conservafication of Rothbardianism and blatasntly deviates from various points that were rather constant throughout Rothbard’s work.
It is not to corrupt the term homesteading to meaninglessness. If something has no current legitimate owner, in an ethical sense it is unowned and hence open to be homesteaded. This is perfectly consistant with Rothbard’s theory of homesteading throughout most of his life.
I think that what is important here is to apply Rothbard’s criteria of how to recitify theft from EoL:
Thus, state property whose true owner can’t be found, or doesn’t exist, is open to homesteading.
And, practically speaking, it is impossible to even accurately allocate original ownership relative to state property, since it has persisted intergenerationally and created a massive network of property redistribution.
Could either of you actually quote from Hoppe? Because as far as I know he is not against the idea of state property being open to homesteading… especially not the vast swathes of unimproved land that the State holds. He differs from Rothbard as regards who should gain title over entities like schools &c., though.
See that’s where people confuse homesteading with privatization. You cannot claim unimproved land as your property under the principles of homesteading. Homesteading grants you a property right in the property that you have produced, and therefore you can only claim ownership to improved land under homesteading. If you build a farm somewhere then you have the right to that farm.
The people who think that state property can be homesteaded miss this fact entirely. They believe that mere occupation is an act of homesteading. No, that is expropriation.
I don’t think that anyone is claiming otherwise. You can only homestead something if you improve it, and it is unowned.
It is homesteading if the property is unowned. Otherwise, how does one homestead abandoned property?
There is no such thing.
Excellent. So we’re back to the initial post, which was that JCFolsom proposed that corporations have willingly ceded their property rights to the state and thus there is no true owner.
Giving it some thought, I would disagree with that. Merely being forced to register doesn’t make one’s property the state’s.
There may be some small shred of hope for you yet.
I already said this once, but apparently, since nobody responded, I must repeat myself. Incorporating is not merely registering your property. It is ceding your property to a state legal entity such that they become corporate assets and thus limit your liability. Your liability is limited to the holdings of the corporation because it is the corporation that is actually liable as the owner.