Question

 

What are the political controls of agencies by the president and Congress?

Discuss and question the criminal “intent” of a corporation.

What debt collection practices do third-party collectors pursue?

Answer 1

What are the political controls of agencies by the president and Congress?

CONGRESS
Federal agencies are dependent upon Congress and the president for their budgets and operating authority. An agency that loses the support of these bodies or oversteps the bounds of political acceptability may be subjected to radical restructuring. Congress also determines the budget and appropriates money for the various administrative agencies. A legislature may also enact a SUNSET PROVISION, which provides for automatic termination of an agency after a stated time unless the legislature is convinced that the need for the agency continues. Sometimes, a sunset provision is written into the statute that creates a particular agency, but a general sunset law may terminate any agency that cannot periodically demonstrate its effectiveness.
PRESIDENT
The president uses a variety of powers and techniques to oversee and influence the operations of administrative agencies. The president can generally appoint all "officers of the United States," with the advice and consent of the Senate. Under the authority of this provision, presidents often appoint agency heads who share their political agenda. The president's power to remove an agency head depends on whether the agency is an independent agency or a cabinet department. Independent agencies tend to be multimember boards and commissions, like the Securities and Exchange Commission and NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD (NLRB), which are run by officials who are appointed for a fixed period that does not correspond to the president's term of office. The president also reviews agency budgets, through the OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET (OMB).

Discuss and question the criminal “intent” of a corporation.

Initially, corporations were not held criminally liable for corporate activities as acorporation was considered to be a fictitious legal entity incapable of forming the requisite for the commission of a crime. After than the Supreme Court concluded that criminal liability could be imputed to the corporation based on the benefit it received as a result of the criminal acts of its agents.  
A corporation may be punished by fine or seizure of its property which can be levied by an execution order issued by the court. The fact that the penalty provided for the violation of a statute is a fine or imprisonment, or both in the discretion of the court, does not render it inapplicable to a corporation, and the same rule applies where the statute creating the offence provides for imprisonment if the fine imposed not paid. Sometimes, a statute providing that the penalty for a particular crime is imprisonment may be read in conjunction with a general statute allowing the imposition of a fine, and the fine may be imposed on the corporation in lieu of imprisonment.

What debt collection practices do third-party collectors pursue?

Under the FDCPA, a collector is permitted to make third party contact, but there are limitations on the manner of the contact and the frequency of the communication. A spouse and the debtor are one and the same when it comes to communication. Even if the spouse is not the account holder, the collector can speak to the spouse as if he or she is the debtor. However, when it comes to other family members, friends and neighbors, the rules change. A collector can call these third parties solely for the purpose of seeking location information of the debt. The collector is prohibited from disclosing where they are calling from or what they are calling about. A collector can only call that third party one time. A second communication is only allowed if the collector believes that the person they called was mistaken about the information and they may now have the correct information. The collector is not even allowed to disclose the name of the company he works for unless the third party requests that information from the collector. Still, the collector cannot disclose the reason for the call – to collect a debt. Finally, a consumer can force the collector to discontinue communications altogether. A simple letter to the collector advising it that either the debtor wishes for there to be no further communication, or the debtor refuses to pay the debt, actually requires the collector to discontinue its collection attempts through direct communication.