That's what I mean. If it were the case that coordination can't be done, it violates every normative expectation.
Keep in mind, I lump in people's behavior with normative restrictions of the First Amendment. If the Government can't do it, and the Government is us, we shouldn't be doing it. So businesses doing it because business doesn't hold for me either. Especially if it happens as a method of indirection to work around literal interpretation.
So if there is a restriction on shareholder coordination, I don't see how our legal system in this case can be taken seriously as anything but a tool utilized by those in positions of influence capable of more tightly coupling to other people of influence.
I agree with your conclusion but not really your reasoning. There are countless things the government can’t do, which individual people can do. I can respect an establishment of religion. I can spend money without a transparent and disinterested tender process. Etc etc. You seem to be taking a very literalistic, almost theological reading of “the government is the people” - yes, the people choose and appoint a government to represent them, but hopefully you understand that the government isn’t metaphysically the same thing as the people.
Saying “the government is the people” is much like saying “the shareholders are the managers of the company”: yes, that’s true in an oblique, ideal sense, but you’re going to run into trouble if you start trying to literally substitute the one for the other in random sentences.
Keep in mind, I lump in people's behavior with normative restrictions of the First Amendment. If the Government can't do it, and the Government is us, we shouldn't be doing it. So businesses doing it because business doesn't hold for me either. Especially if it happens as a method of indirection to work around literal interpretation.
So if there is a restriction on shareholder coordination, I don't see how our legal system in this case can be taken seriously as anything but a tool utilized by those in positions of influence capable of more tightly coupling to other people of influence.