Wednesday, January 29, 2003 :::
Back when I was an undergraduate writing a paper, I would occasionally come across the realization that what I had written was so incoherent that I was going to be starting over from scratch, but probably not even that particularly soon. Kate Malcolm has responded to a post I wrote like that, and asks a question. I really have nothing to add, but that clearly didn't stop me before, so here goes:
I'm not entirely sure what the phrase "state action" is supposed to mean; even when delivering the State of the Union address, I don't think President Bush invoking faith in God is terribly troubling, even if giving that address is a Constitutionally mandated act performed by him because he is the President. There seems to be something different about putting together the personnel of government, though; I guess I'm willing to say that the appointment is a state action, and the nomination is a big enough part of that that it must, too, be a state action. I think voting in Congress is a state action, at least on bills (perhaps less so on "sense of the body" type resolutions).
I have a lot of confusion about corporate (i.e. on behalf of a group) actions in general. If the mission of an entity is tied up in evil acts, certainly it should be held liable for them, but if an individual takes an action on his own it doesn't make sense that every organization of which he's a member should be liable for that. The nomination and vote seem to me integral parts of the action of the state; the details of the presentation of the state of the union do not, though I can't quite say why.
If I asked what the law has to say about group liability, would it distract you enough to prevent me having to answer questions to which I haven't an answer I can satisfactorily defend?
::: posted by dWj at 6:11 PM
