| ▲ | John7878781 6 hours ago |
| This sounds completely absurd. What's stopping me from starting up a bunch of LLCs or Trusts to rig the vote? |
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| ▲ | nh23423fefe 6 hours ago | parent | next [-] |
| Read the opinion. > I appreciate that Plaintiff may disagree with Delaware’s policy of authorizing certain municipalities to allow voting on behalf of entity property owners. Visions of faceless large corporations or even HAL, 55 controlling a small town are frightening and the stuff of science fiction. However, Plaintiff has not demonstrated that this policy violates the principle of one person/entity/one vote. |
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| ▲ | pessimizer 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | The answer to the question asked is not here. Accusing somebody of seeing "visions" is not an answer, it is an evasion. | |
| ▲ | josefritzishere 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | It fundamentally violates one person/entity/one vote. Corporations are not sentient. If you let them vote, a person gets to vote twice. There's no way around that conflict. I feel like this has to collapse on appeal or the nation is doomed. | | |
| ▲ | nh23423fefe 5 hours ago | parent [-] | | > a person gets to vote twice. how do they do that? | | |
| ▲ | Refreeze5224 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | The owner votes as themselves, and again as the corporate entity. | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz 5 hours ago | parent [-] | | No. Per the ruling: > Where a voter is entitled
to vote by virtue of being both a resident and as an owner of real
property, that voter shall be entitled to only one vote; where a voter
is entitled to vote by ownership of two or more parcels of real
property, that voter shall be entitled to only one vote. However, that seems to get messy with multi-owner LLCs where you might give 1% of each LLC to a bunch of your buddies and have them each vote as POA for theirs. | | |
| ▲ | SoftTalker 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | The POA is to vote as a proxy for the entity. The entity gets one vote. Not one vote per shareholder. | | |
| ▲ | setr an hour ago | parent [-] | | If you’re a shareholder in 5 companies, each owning 2 parcels of land, each with their own PoA, and you yourself hold land — then you have “influence” into 6 votes, though only direct ownership of 1 vote |
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| ▲ | pseudalopex 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | 1 person 1 vote does not mean in each city where they own property. | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | "One person, one vote" is clearly a per-race thing, or I'd violate it by voting for President and Senator at the same time. | | |
| ▲ | pseudalopex 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | This did not refute what I said. | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | You said: > The owner votes as themselves, and again as the corporate entity. Per the opinion, which I quoted above, this is not the case. (I do think it gets instantly messy with multi-owner corporations, though.) | | |
| ▲ | pseudalopex 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | Refreeze5224 said what you claimed I said. You quoted Fenwick's charter. Where a voter is entitled to vote [in Fenwick] by virtue of being both a resident [in Fenwick] and as an owner of real property [in Fenwick], that voter shall be entitled to only one vote [in Fenwick]; where a voter is entitled to vote [in Fenwick] by ownership of two or more parcels of real property [in Fenwick], that voter shall be entitled to only one vote [in Fenwick]. You dispute this meaning? Refreeze5224 did not say in Fenwick. | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | The context is clearly "in Fenwick". https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48295844 | | |
| ▲ | pseudalopex 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | The strongest plausible interpretation of josefritzishere and Refreeze5224 was the judge was wrong because voting in 2 places would violate 1 person 1 vote. Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize.[1] [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | But that's not true, either. My town has a village at its core; village residents vote in two places. Our school district doesn't perfectly match the town's borders, either, so some folks vote in two places there. One person gets one vote in a particular election. | | |
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| ▲ | kjkjadksj 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Whoever dictates the company vote then votes for themselves. |
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| ▲ | cwmma 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| It sounds like you it's only corporations that own property in the town that get to vote. So that's probably whats preventing you. |
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| ▲ | ceejayoz 6 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Wonder how long it is before there's a vote to allow the sale of inch-square lots. | | |
| ▲ | NDlurker 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Exactly. Same thing as offices set up to register out of state businesses. | |
| ▲ | 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | [deleted] | |
| ▲ | mindslight 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | IANAA. It would seemed to be recorded, not registered, land. Which means I wouldn't think approval would be required in the first place (the lot isn't going to be buildable though, of course] |
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| ▲ | SoftTalker 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | I own property in a nearby town but it's an investment; I don't live there. I'm unable to vote in their local elections. I have not heard of property ownership being a qualification to vote since the 1800s. | | |
| ▲ | Hugsbox 5 hours ago | parent [-] | | Which makes sense... why should anyone get a say in the local matters of a place they don't even live in? | | |
| ▲ | SoftTalker 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I own property there, I pay property taxes there (at the highest "non-owner-occupied" rate), in my case I'm actively operating a business not (just) a passive investor. Why should I have zero say in how those taxes are spent, or other local governance? I'm not a disinterested bystander. | | |
| ▲ | shimman 3 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I pay sales taxes in other cities I travel in, I too should get a say in how they run their government. Money, after all, is the top virtue in a democracy; if it wasn't why did the founders ensure that slavers had equal representation? | | |
| ▲ | Supermancho 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | > Money, after all, is the top virtue in a democracy "The Founders" of the US (however you want to form that category) were not the arbiters of what is virtuous about Democracy. Democracy is orthogonal to US law and intent. The PR for the US has always tried to message that they are a singular ethos. | |
| ▲ | SoftTalker 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | I would say the difference is that as a property owner I have a long-term local presence and vested interest there, I am (in theory) motivated to make thoughtful decisions about local governance, as opposed to a disinterested bystander passing through and paying local sales tax on a soft drink. | | |
| ▲ | ryandrake 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | You can't have a presence if you're not present. My parents own two properties, but they have to decide which one they are residents of, because they are not entitled to a say in how both local governments are run. If I am a long-term owner of Google stock, I still don't get a say in how Mountain View runs their city. A "vested financial interest" in an area should not be enough to give one a vote on local laws. |
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| ▲ | EnergyAmy 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | If you want a say, live there. |
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| ▲ | rayiner 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | That’s a fair point, but the ACLU didn’t challenge that aspect of the municipal charter. | |
| ▲ | charcircuit 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Because you have a vested interest in the success of that region by owning land (and a business) at that location. You have skin in the game compared to someone who is just renting and can easily flee to a different city if they vote poorly. | | |
| ▲ | cucumber3732842 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | >renting and can easily flee to a different city if they vote poorly. Nitpick: I think you're correct that the problem is people who do selfish shortsighted things and leave others holding the bag but I think you are blaming the wrong people. Pretty much everyone from Marx to MLK to Rand and Sowell identifies somme sort of class of "comfortable enough to meddle in things to further their self interest at everyone else's detriment" demographics as the root of a whole bunch of bad stuff. In most municipalities middle class who are too tied into the place (often through home ownership) to just get out that provide the bulk of the political will to do short sighted "feels good" stuff that solves some minor problem they have but screws the whole place on a 20-50yr timeline (by which time the individuals responsible will have retired and cashed out to Idaho or Florida or whatever). |
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| ▲ | SkyPuncher 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Owning property through a corporation is trivial. 3 of my nearby neighbors are owned via an LLC (rentals). * Start an LLC/C-corp for a trivial amount of money. * Purchase land, but instead of paying with it via a personal check, you need a touch of foresight so you can "capitalize" the corporation you just started. Write the check from the corporation, instead of your personal checkbook. | | |
| ▲ | cwmma 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | yeah so it sounds like if you did this IN THIS TOWN and didn't also live in the town you'd get a vote. I'm not sure if you'd get a vote if you owned the land directly but for all I know you might. | |
| ▲ | mindslight 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | IANAA, but having looked into it this does very little to actually reduce the liability exposure from small businesses. The minute you do anything yourself, you start to accrue personal liability. The only way to keep the corporate veil intact is to hire other people. So it only works if you're rich enough to hire a management company to do everything (screen tenants, maintenance/inspections, supervise contractors, etc) and you manage it as a purely financial investment. Just like the anonymity aspect doesn't work out in most states unless you're willing to shell out for an attorney to be the manager. In general these laws aren't made to help little people. |
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| ▲ | 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| [deleted] |
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| ▲ | dfxm12 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| A quick Google search suggests Fenwick Island has ~400 residents. The only thing stopping you would be someone else with more resources. |
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| ▲ | tekla 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| Should start a bunch of unions to rig the vote. |
