Spencer Heath Archive

Item 606

Recollected verbatim by Spencer MacCallum immediately after conversation with Heath.

No date

Chartering is called “giving powers” to a corporation. But that is a misnomer. No charter ever gave a corporation or its members any powers they did not have before. Charter­ing can only restrict powers; it cannot enlarge them unless it involves some public service involving a franchise, eminent domain, etc. Chartering, as patenting or any govern­ment action, can only grant privileges — by restricting the powers of others.