The Defence of the Corporate Veil - Parent Companies Beware!
Much interest has recently been shown in the potential consequences of
the judgment given in Stocznia Gdanska SA -v- Latvian Shipping Co and
others, which was substantially upheld by the Court of Appeal on 21
June 2002. Although the case related to Shipbuilding Contracts, the
result has reinforced the traditional view that the Courts will not
countenance any further erosion of the fundamental principle of
English Company Law that a company is to be regarded as a legal entity
with a separate legal personality, distinct from that of its members.
However, the case has highlighted potential alternative sources of
liability for parent companies establishing wholly owned
single-purpose subsidiaries - in many industry sectors, including
shipping, property and big-ticket asset finance.
The basic principles
The principle of separate corporate personality has been established
for over a century. In the leading case of Salomon -v- Salomon & Co.
(1897), the House of Lords held that, regardless of the extent of a
particular shareholder's interest in the company, and notwithstanding
that such shareholder had sole control of the company's affairs as its
governing director, the company's acts were not his acts; nor were its
liabilities his liabilities. Thus, the fact that one shareholder
controls all, or virtually all, the shares in a company is not a
sufficient reason for ignoring the legal personality of the company;
on the contrary, the "veil of incorporation" will not be lifted so as
to attribute the rights or liabilities of a company to its
shareholders.
The basic principle established in Salomon in relation to single
companies was extended to groups of companies by a comparatively
recent decision of the Court of Appeal in Adams -v- Cape Industries
PLC (1990). In that case, the Court of Appeal held that, as a matter
of law, it was not entitled to lift the corporate veil against a
defendant company, which was a member of a corporate group, merely
because the corporate structure had been used so as to ensure that the
legal liability in respect of particular future activities of the
group would fall on another member of the group rather than on the
defendant company. In effect, the Court of Appeal rejected the
argument that the corporate veil should be pierced just because a
group of companies operated as a single economic entity.
Related principles and considerations
A corollary of the basic Salomon principle is that a company cannot be
characterised as an agent of its shareholders unless there is clear
evidence to show that the company was in fact acting as an agent in a
particular transaction or series of transactions.
In the end of the eleventh and middle of the thirteenth century there were nine wars between muslims and christians that are now called the crusades.All nine wars were meant to take over the holy land (what is now israel) from the muslims.The most successful of those battles was the first and second.The worst of the crusades was the fourth crusade.The Crusades didn’t have a positive effect on trying to take over the holy land.Document 1 states that ”the Crusades failed their chief goal: the conquest of the Holy Land.This is important because the crusades didn’t achieve their main goal and they weren’t recognized as much as the first crusades.Document 1 states that the left a bitter legacy in their quest to take the holy land..This is important
The eminent historian Jonathan Riley-Smith defines ‘crusade’ as “holy war fought against those perceived to be the external or internal foes of Christendom for the recovery of Christian property”. This would suggest that the Crusades were primarily an endeavour intended to promote Christian expansionism through the acquisition of both territory and religious converts. However the Crusades can also be interpreted as a means for independent Christian rulers to demonstrate their piety, amass wealth through loot and enhance their prestige; all of which would be beneficial to the rule of their own territories. In addition to this, the Crusades were intended as a defensive measure in
Two individual employees wanted to complete their assignment for their company. But, did their strategy go about accuracy? Karel Svoboda works for Rogue Bank. Svoboda is a credit officer who needed Alena Robles, independent accountant, assists to evaluate and approved his employer’s extensions of credit to clients. In order to complete the task, Svoboda needed to access the nonpublic information about the clients’ personal information related to the company such as their profits and performances. Instead of appropriately following the company policy, Svoboda and Robles created a plan to utilize this data to exchange securities. According to their plan, Robles exchanged the securities of more than twenty unique organizations and benefitted by
Spanish armies had a taste for conquest. ”It has been argued that after 750 years of fighting against the "infidel," the Spanish were psychologically committed to "conquest" but needed new territories. Christopher Columbus, who set sail in 1492, who may have witnessed the Fall of Granada, may have thought that in the East (which he thought he would reach by sailing West which of course he would have done if he had not stopped on the way) he would find the legendary Prester John, and persuade him to attack the Muslim world from the East while European Christians did so from the West.[9] Instead leading the Spanish to the Americas, Columbus set in motion the Spanish conquest of what they called the New World. There, fresh from defeating the Muslims as crusaders for Christ, with "sword in one hand and Bible in the other" they "arrived like thunderbolts among the unsuspecting native population." What followed has been described as cultural genocide, "the Spanish robbed the Indians of their language, their culture and their dignity."[10] 1492 changed the history of the world.”750 years of war would leave a desire for conquest in your mouth so it is easy to see why the Spanish would want to conquer more. Spanish conquest of the new world can be seen as good and bad, depending on who you are it can be because what they did was basically genocide, it could also be classified as good because they
At first glance, it seems implausible the word democracy isn't written in the United States Constitution, or in the Preamble of the Constitution, or even in the Declaration of Independence. One would assume a concept so paramount to modern American culture would surely be derived from one of its oldest and most endeared documents. Alas, it is not. The Constitution only specifically mentions two entities, the government and “We the People”. Defining government is an easy enough task, but who are “We the People”? Originally consisting of only white male property owners, eventually adding in other races, income classes, women, and astonishingly, corporations, the definition of “We the People” has evolved numerous times. Corporation is another key term the architects of our government failed to define for us, perhaps that is why it found its way into the phrase “We the People”. A grave dilemma lies in this fallible defining of terms. Granting corporations person-hood legislatively shifts the power of democracy from human interests to corporate interests. This corrosion of human interest can clearly be noted when examining the battle over corporate power highlighted in the court cases of Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, and United States v. Sourapas and Crest Beverage Company.
Lincoln learned the other important component of speech, not what to say, but how to say it, from his favorite books as a young man: The Bible, Aesop's Fables, Pilgrim's Progress, and Shakespeare's plays. These books and stories taught Lincoln the power of a metaphor. He fell in love with the idea of the meaning behind the stories or plays and the implied moral of each Bible verse. Metaphors can be found frequently throughout all his speeches. Although some may be dead metaphors, or metaphors so common that they fail strike us in any way, Lincoln had the unique talent of rephrasing it just so that it became a live metaphor with more strength behind it than imaginable.
...could even be argued that it also provoked such Atlantic powers as Spain and Portugal to seek trade routes to India and China. Efforts that helped open most of the world to European trade dominance and colonization and to shift the center of commercial activity from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic. Nonetheless the Crusades failed in ending the split between the Church, but ultimately succeeded in strengthening the Roman Catholic Church and accelerating trade which brought new economic and cultural wealth.
The growing increase in the rights of individual and the spreading influence of Islam posed a major threat to the finances and existence of the Church and monarch. Hence, the Church and State conspired to use the Crusades as a way to appeal to the religious conscience of the individual to keep control over them. That objective was far from noble, but the result was a growing economy that brought all (Church, state and the individual) greater prosperity. The Crusades brought a demand for additional goods and services beyond just farm products- equipping, feeding, housing and moving the soldiers called to the crusades created economic opportunities for others.
Corporate crime is extremely difficult to detect for many reasons. One major reason is that many people do not realise a crime is being committed as corporate crime is often seen as a victimless crime. At face value this may seem to be the case but if you look deeper you will see that this is not true. Every year the FBI estimates that 19,000 Americans are murdered every year compared with the 56,000 Americans who die every year from occupational disease such as black lung and asbestosis (Russell Mokhiber 2000). Deaths Caused by corporate crime are also very indirect so it can be very difficult to trace the problem to the corporation.
Although entirely unintentional, the Crusades helped advance Europe. The Muslims had made great advances in math, science and medicine while the Christians were burning accused witches. This knowledge was transferred to the Crusaders. Also the Holy Orders like the Templars amassed great wealth and later used it to influence Nations and to almost achieve complete sovereignty. Another effect would be explorative expeditions specifically for trade. With the trade increasing and the link between East and West being made, many European countries wished to find India. They also wished to find the mythical kingdom of Prester John who was believed to be a mighty Christian king and defender of the faith. This increased desire to find these lands lead to the exploration of Africa’s coastline and eventually India being found which lead to Columbus sailing west. So in a long chain of events, it could be said that the Crusades were responsible for the discovery of America. The Crusades also lent a sense of Christian identity to the europeans and a sense of unity between Countries. The Catholic Church rose in power and began to dominate more politically. This Church led political field gave the Holy Roman Empire more power than before and an increase in the corruption of the Church. This also gave way to tension between monarchs and Church officials
Before diving into different theological justifications of the Crusades, understanding what a crusade is, what preceded the Crusades, and the history of the Crusades are vitally important. First, what is a crusade? According to Paul Robinson in his writing Three Myths about the Crusades: What They Mean for Christian Witness “only the official military expeditions launched from Europe to the Holy Land and sanctioned by the pope count as Crusades” (28). Compounding off of that, it’s accepted that a crusade is one of a series of medieval military expeditions set forth to regain land lost to Muslim control. Accepting this definition, one lays the foundation for discovering thought-provoking information about the Crusades and all that they were
The Crusades reach different aspects of history from war, politics and economics to religions and cultural diversity. A crusade is defined as a remedial enterprise undertaken with zeal and enthusiasm by Merriam-Webster.com. Based upon the research on crusades and holy wars, it stated that in 1095, Pope Urban II sent out knights of West Europe to help the Christians that were dominated by Muslims in Near East. The Crusades is told to be understood better as a series of holy wars triggered by religious powers fighting for upper hand of ruling. Thomas F. Madden, in his published literary work The Concise History of the Crusades, explains the crusades were essentially “a war against Muslims for the defense of the Christian people,” even though
According to Phillips Donald, president Lincoln on Leadership Lincoln wanted to “build strong alliances”, what he wanted was to know who he could trust
The first recorded use of the word “computer” was in 1613 in a book called “The yong mans gleanings” by English writer Richard Braithwait I haue read the truest computer of Times, and the best Arithmetician that euer breathed, and he...