Legal Fiction Examples

Legal fiction is a factious fact that is deemed as true under the law for purposes of legal, administrative or other expenditures (Black’s 2002). One example of a legal fiction in the U.S legal system is when a corporation is considered a person so pre-written laws will still apply to them and not have to be altered. Legal fiction ensures that the corporation is subjected to the same rights and rules that are drafted only to apply to people. There are two sides to this fiction they are that if the corporation is a person they must follow the same laws and rules they also receive the same benefit as people do and they no one can tell them what they can and cannot do with their money as long as it is not terroristic or illegal. This is the reason
If a corporation is not viewed as a person, it becomes harder if not nearly impossible to sue them even if they openly admit to making a mistake but, are not willing to fix it. A good example of this is the BP oil spills; if BP was considered a corporation business lawyers would not have been able to sue them directly for the loss of business that fishermen and store owners endured due to no tourists wanting to visit the gulf coast. Since BP was a corporation and is considered an individual they were able to be sued and made to fix their mistakes and pay retributions to the people who were the most affected in the area. This is not always the outcome and many corporations still get what they want over what the people want but having a legal fiction involved it makes it easier for corporations and individuals to be on the same page. Although legal fictions tend to border whether they are indeed right or wrong in this example of a legal fiction the fiction does ultimately benefit the employees and consumers more than it will the corporation or more than it would if the corporation was only a viewed as a corporation and not as a