Unorthodox?

Shall I note how odd ball it sounds for the legislature to make a mess of proper application of direct person-to-person application of the equal privileges and immunities clause merely through grants of various forms of incorporation?

The judge in the Portland Catholic archdiocese bankruptcy ruled today that the victims of child sex abuse by priests can recover their damages from all of the assets in the archbishop's name, including those affiliated with area parishes.
[ Jack Bog's Blog: Score another big one for the altar boys ]

I am not a person but an economic unit, without the equal privilege to get a fresh start for my private dealings with another private entity. My ability to potentially feed and house some kids, and provide for medical care must come in second in priority to a federal and state government that sought to immunize a private capitalist from the rigors of capitalism.

Individual liberty to simply live or to practice religion is dieing at the hands of the tyranny of the majority. (See John Stuart Mills: On Liberty.)

The notion of limited liability is far broader than just the statutory incorporation by reference of precisely the same concept from within a religious organization. If the characterization of the structure of the Catholic Church's separation of parishes from the archdiocese has no legal consequence then I would be all for it, provided that it is also accompanied by a matter-of-law piercing of the corporate veil so that I too can get a fresh start. The free exercise of religion and the free exercise of a myriad of other liberty interests, supposedly inalienable interests, are surely at risk in today's superficially-reasoned political attacks.

I claim no shame or responsibility for the federal government's choice to cut a deal to provide a banker with guaranteed returns that are free from risk. You should feel no shame or responsibility for sharing a religious belief with some folks that broke criminal law. The substitution of civil financial penalties are hardly suited to deal with such matters against a group rather than specifically upon individual perpetrators of a crime. I will not believe that I am a criminal for having sought to do public good by obtaining an education.

I see an arbitrary judicial disregard of the statutes that incorporated the religious organization's structure. The necessary consequence is that the statutes in the future must more particularly supply options for religious incorporation and thus convert them into state privileges that can be withdrawn or used to facilitate unrestrained entanglement.

I have not yet seen the judicial opinion but I know its' likely framework.

UPDATE:

Shall I dare superimpose another case where civil penalties exceeded that which the government itself could extract directly? Signature gathering comes with a risk of a 100,000 dollar fine, and five years of jail time. Yet the free speech costs of another, tripled, netted a 30 fold increase in financial penalty. And, it was openly targeted at the content of the speech of the defendant and his supporters.

Determine the maximum which the government authorities could obtain against the individuals that are subject to loss of liberty, then place that as an upper limit also for any private action that lists as a cause of action a claim based on a violation of criminal law.

The ease of obtaining a civil penalty, by a preponderance, with complete indemnification by shareholders, rather than risk losing in a criminal prosecution, in an economic relations case, loses nearly all merit in the context of First Amendment related issues.

It is like the multiplier affect of losing social security benefits as a consequence of being deported for having in the past been a member of the Communist party.

UPDATE: Dec 31, more thoughts

I thought the archdiocese's argument was that Oregon statutory law expressly referenced, and allowed, religious organizations to craft their own structure free from the interference of politicians. Surely this statutory recognition of a hand's-off policy could be rationally justified as an accommodation of the religious rights accorded to individual citizens (even if a particular religious organization might not individually claim the benefit of the First Amendment).

The rule of law, as you say, would perhaps allow for an OEA civil judgment (based on their speech costs, and 30 times higher that the state could have obtained directly in their own name) against Bill S. to be collected from any future donor to any organization to which Bill might participate in for purposes of exercising First Amendment rights.

I am not prepared to accept the premise that a judge, state or federal, can attach the donations of persons that express a belief in a particular religion.

There is a present analytical challenge going forward in that a set of local persons professing a faith in Catholicism band together to make new donations to buy the present church property and to hold the same until the conclusion of the present litigation in two, or perhaps ten years. Would they not have to hold such property, after purchase, separate and apart from the church itself and beyond the reach of judgment creditors, for later redelivery? Is this not the very notion of a trust that you considered illogical at the outset? The forced delivery of individual parish assets is in the nature of punishment, and it is not being delivered voluntarily by the archdiocese. I would demand more in terms of a nexus between each parish and the criminal conduct upon which specific individuals could conceivably be criminally prosecuted. Merely holding the same faith is not enough.

Should each member of an incorporated association that speaks out on political matters be jointly and severally responsible for any act attributable to the association? That is, must the parameters of a relationships and potential liability be fully and completely spelled out in statutes, and thereby be fully and completely based on the consent of the legislative and executive branch. If a battle in the context of a religion is not enough for a judge to take a pause what then could possibly give comfort to any member in society to loosely express any affiliation with any mere political belief. Suppose all members of the Green Party or Libertarian Party were held personally responsible for X?

Suppose an atheist publicly announces their atheist belief, is that enough to attach their personal property for any criminal act of anyone else professing a belief in atheism and the act is based on advancing atheism?