Bill of Attainder or Just Rewards?

Today’s lead article in The New York Times was titled, “House Approves 90% Tax on Bonuses After Bailouts.” The tax was in response to the exorbitant bonuses given to executives at AIG while their company was imploding.

The big issue about the new legislation concerned its constitutional muster. Opponents declared it a bill of attainder, an act prohibited by the Constitution.

The strict definition of a bill of attainder is “an act of legislature declaring a person or group of persons guilty of some crime and punishing them without benefit of a trial.” I don’t think this strictly matches that. First of all, it’s not strictly aimed at AIG. It encompasses several other firms because it includes any executives earning more than $250,000 per year receiving a federal bailout.

Companies affected include Citigroup, Bank of America, AIG, Wells Fargo, JP Morgan Chase, General Motors, Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, PNC Financial, U.S. Bancorp and G.M.A.C. 

However, the article notes that constitutional experts believed the legislation was legal  because previous court rulings have approved retroactive taxes, especially if they cover a short period of time.

So let’s get this legislation through Congress, signed by the President, and enforced so we can move past this scandal and attack the problems that really matter: healthcare, education and energy.