> Both seem counter to the notion of a republic and the accountability needed for private property.
Imagine that you own and run Acme Critical Publishing, which publishes exposés of crimes and ethical lapses of the sitting President. In speeches, he starts rambling about your company as an example of Horrible Very Bad People, and the next thing you know some supported of his casually looked up your home address online and now there are burning lower-case-t's on your lawn... I'd say the republic and accountability are both suffering in that scenario.
It's one of those "tools that can be used for for good or evil" things, and simply prohibiting the tool isn't necessarily the best way to maximize the good while minimizing the evil.
In your story, there are two failures; firstly, the President's failure to exhibit due care in the content of his speeches (an increased responsibility due to his lofty station), secondly, the lack of a police response to disperse ominous gatherings before they become violent.
Neither of these failures have anything to do with the anonymity of company directors. The President could know you personally, and still leak your address. Similarly, there could be a mob vandalising your property even if you didn't run Acme Critical Publishing, because that kind of thing happens in riots sometimes.
In some countries there is almost no anonymity on the public record, but this doesn't seem to negatively affect the level of violence in their societies compared to otherwise comparable locations. Therefore I would opine that 'enjoying safety' and 'enjoying privacy' are two very different and mostly orthogonal issues.
> firstly, the President's failure to exhibit due care in the content of his speeches (an increased responsibility due to his lofty station)
There is no such legal requirement, right? What's holding the president accountable?
> the lack of a police response to disperse ominous gatherings before they become violent.
It's really not possible for the police to do this. Regardless, GP's comment was about one or a small number of people showing up to cause trouble. In reality, the police can pretty much do nothing to prevent this. If they could, there really wouldn't be any robberies or murder.
> It's really not possible for the police to do this.
You try burning t's on the front lawns of politicians and see how quickly the police do exactly that. You seem to think it's a perfect crime and you could never be caught or held accountable. That's an insane view, but you're welcome to test it for yourself and see what happens. I think you might be surprised.
A lone person (or even a small group) could show up and cause trouble on anyone's property at any time. Why don't most people do it? Probably because police exist and there would be consequences. Should everyone have their addresses hidden from all people at all times? Why should a company have that protection and not you?
What makes them so special?
I think it's far better to understand that transparency is important to our democracy and our freedom and that means accepting a certain amount of risk sometimes. The fact that someone, somewhere, might one day find out where you live is a risk almost all of us face right now. There's no reason for a privileged class of people who want to influence our lives and government while also hiding themselves from the public and accountability.
> disperse ominous gatherings [...] a mob [...] riots
Hold up, I didn't say anything about a riot, let alone a physical gathering. Just the contents of a speech where your hypothetical publishing company has become fingered as a target. It could very well be a video on a campaign-blog.
> the level of violence in their societies
The analogy isn't about violence, it's about kinds of damage to you (and to the republic) when the privacy is pierced, and violence just happens to be the most illustratively-obvious form of that.
So, imagine if Trump exposed the contact info of people behind one of those groups showing anti-trump ads. His minions could use it as a signal to attack them.
Ok, so we only allow the government the privilege of knowing who owns what… then we worry about the government abusing this information for political gain?
Why is public knowledge of who owns what home required for accountability in a republic? A functioning government should have no problem enforcing whatever laws and codes exist regardless of whether the owner is directly known or shielded through some LLC.
Because our system of property, inherited from English common law, has a concept of a beneficial purchaser for value without notice. If someone gives you money for property and they are not on notice that there are conflicting claims, their claim is valid.
Such a system requires a way to establish constructive notice. A taker for value should have known that the land he was buying belonged to another if its ownership was properly recorded at the time of the purported sale.
Mileage may vary in different jurisdictions. Recording office May vary according to property type under state law; e.g., DMV might record motor vehicle titles while the county recorder in the county of the property probably records real estate.
So we should rely on the government being the only party with access to what you would make privileged information? A key aspect of public accountability is tautologically dependent on public information. We are supposed to keep our own elected officials as well as those granted the right to private property in check or else fraud and corruption would reign supreme.
We have been operating under these conditions since the advent of the democratic republic and to our good fortune.
No, it doesn't; but it turns out that you end up with a much poorer society without it. The king did not come up with incorporation merely to amuse the incorporators; it was to tax them and take loans from them, and that's because there was enormous economic activity they could undertake once there was a liability shield.
A monarchy is generally not governed by law. A monarch typically has ultimate authority to govern as they wish. Sometimes, their power is limited, and sometimes they delegate the responsibility of governance, but a monarch is precisely the opposite of a republic governed by law.
Or even non-public figure not wanting randos knowing where their house is.
I'm not a public figure and I don't want where I sleep posted all over the internet. I don't have the budget for security if some Twitter fool decides to give me a death threat because of a comment.
Back in the day, I looked up a minor celebrity in my hometown and just... knocked on his door one afternoon and had a nice chat. Can't wait to explain this to my grandchildren.
If someone really wants to know where you live, they will find you. If the information in your bio is actually yours, there’s already plenty to work with. :)
> A lock is not to keep out bad guys who want to get in
This is definitely not true. Locks are to keep randos from invading your space — drunk, drugged, and/or mentally unhealthy people end up in the oddest places sometimes. My buddy had a guy high on meth open and climb through a laundry room window and start wandering through his house. I’ve twice had drunk people knock on my door loudly and try to let themselves in (different cities) and swear that they were at the right address. These were all in decent/nice areas (some not so nice areas a mile or so away, but still…).
Same with privacy corps…
You don’t want some rando who is irrationally angry at your business or at you to be able to find you easily.
You don’t have to be as famous as Barbra Streisand in order to be a person of interest to mentally unhealthy randos.
I’ll do everything I can to keep sickos the hell away from me. Too many stalkers or people DMing inappropriate shit. But I never forget that in the end I’m never truly safe from someone trying to do serious harm.
USA is uniquely dysfunctional in only being able to (mostly) identify people by referring to an address. You could very well have public ownership records without revealing addresses.
Non-public or public figure who doesn't want their name associated with certain business activities that they partake in.