Regardless of the state of corporations as "people" or not, there is an equally serious problem with punishing corporations. At my office, I have had frequent conversations with people about the need to uphold laws against corporations. There has always been a strong stand against it, because there is no meaningful way to punish a corporation.
I place this here, because I know of no where else to put it.
AT&T eavesdrops on the entire country in violation of telecom laws. Wachovia launders an amazing amount of money. I argued that the full penalty under the law should be put against them, and the response was, "that would just punish the stockholders". It is valid, and then again it is not. In the past, punishing the stockholders would probably be a viable path to take. Now though, so many people are owners of stock through pensions or mutual funds where they have no ability to even vote at stock holder meetings. Even more to the point, the owners are so diverse that having them provide oversight would be nearly impossible. The board of directors should be doing oversight, but that doesn't work.
I propose a possible solution. It is the only one that I have ever found that would possibly work.
In any criminal case where a company is found guilty of a crime, on top of the fine against the company itself, a fine will be levied against the people at the company responsible for making sure these things don't happen. The fine against the responsible people will be set as a length of years by the judge or jury. During that time, 5% of any compensation from the company including deferred compensation, retirement compensation, severance packages, stock options, golden parachutes, salary and bonuses will be taken as a fine paid to the location prosecuting the crime. The people in this group will include the top 5% of people at the company in total compensation as a base group, plus anyone with a title of Vice President or higher, anyone that has a person report to them that is of Vice President or higher, and the board of directors. The top 5% in compensation should overlap with the other group, but that just makes sure that the company doesn't try something tricky.
In any criminal case where a company pays a fine without admitting guilt, on top of the fine against the company, a 2% fine will be levied to the same group as above for the length of time that they would have been fined if they had been guilty of the crime. This is to handle cases where the regulator is overwhelmed.
These fines will stack, as a company is prosecuted for other crimes. Any employee hired will have the fine put on them. Any severance package during this time will have the fine placed on it.
It is election season, but I hope someone has made it here and will comment on this.