The United States Constitution is a document that
provides the framework for the federal government and is ultimately the supreme
law for the companies and citizens of the United States of America to abide by.
This document “establishes the structure of the federal government, delegates
powers to the federal government, and guarantees certain fundamental rights“
(Cheeseman, Henry R., interview for Deutsche welle, 2001.). These fundamental
rights, laws and freedoms are granted, to all Americans. Despite the
ratification of the Constitution in 1788, the laws still pertain to today’s
ever-changing economy and culture. The Constitution has been referred to as a
“living” document that evolves in unison with our country, following all the
innovations and developments in all of the related fields and areas. The
Constitution of the United States sets forth the nations fundamental laws for
business regulation.hapter
1 “From love field to the world*s most successful airline“
TThere are many examples of
the ways that United States Constitution and the United States legal system
affect the Royal Caribbean company.
Royal Caribbean Cruise Line was founded in 1968. by Andres Wilhemsen
&Company. We are Miami, Florida based cruise company, with 21 ships and
over 20 000 employees. In our 40 years of history, business regulations have
changed for many times, also, we sail
all over the world and need to interpret every single regulation and law which
can apply to us.
First, one of our offices is located in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and we
had the building seized and demolished due to a highway being built. Our legal
department was instructed by the local government to accept financial
compensation and „move on“, but our lawyers argued that Amendment 5 states,
"…nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of
law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just
compensation.". So, the government is responsible to find a new, equally
lucrative location for our business, build a new structure, and to provide
compensation funds to all the workers on the payroll whom were temporarily
unable to work. After a few meetings, local government accepted our arguments
and our determination to go to the supreme court and found us a new, similar
location, based on our argument that in our line of business, (travel and tourism) location is
80% of success.
Second, due to the nature of our business we have been subjected to
thorough searches of our passengers and staff, and it was everything but not
good for business. All the attempts to explain to the officials the importance
of providing the non-stressful environment to our passengers as one of the
basic conditions for successful business gave no results. So, our legal
department argued in court that Amendment 4
states, "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses,
papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be
violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by
Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and
the persons or things to be seized.“
On the other hand, we do understand the necessity of firm control of
incoming and outgoing people and properties, in relation to our national
security and always threatening possibility of terrorist attack, so we offered
a compromise. We allowed thorough control of all the ships, passenger and staff
luggage but away from their sight, in safe environment of our sub-deck storage.
We also established full immunity for the company or/ if any illegal person
and/or object is to be found. This way, we both secured our clients and staff
from any unpleasant surprise on their journey and gave enough space for all the
relevant government agencies, federal and state, to perform their patriotic and
legal duty of protecting the United States of America. We understand the
limitation Constitution imposes with this Amendment to the members of the
„Protect and serve“ community.
It seems, if a business is successfully making a large sum of money
under the table by illegal actions and if the federal or state agency cannot
prove the company is involved in illegal activity to yield a "reasonable
search", they cannot search through their offices or properties to confirm
a hypothesis. Thus the scandalous business can continue to thrive. But, we also
recognize the necessity to cooperate and coordinate with all the agencies in
order to build and secure the safe environment for all the citizens, and that
includes ourselves. Therefor, we offered all possible adjustments of our
procedures in order to abide the law but also to keep our business on the same
level as it is.
According to our legal department, (conversation I had with the head of
Royal Caribbean Legal department, 2009.) there are two sides involved –
business and government regulators, whether they are federal or state. Despite
their antipathy, the two sides, business and government regulators, have, in
fact, benefited from each other. Government regulations ensuring the
enforceability of contracts and property rights are such basics that business
in the United States could not function properly without them. Likewise,
without the economic growth created by private business, the U.S. government
could not sustain itself. Although the current system of federal and state
regulations may sometimes be self-contradictory, and, in addition, confusing to
the business community, it is a relatively loose one, leaving the United States
as one of the nations whose business welfare depends most on the decisions of
private entrepreneurs.
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