Because corporations are persons with constitutional rights under US law, if there is a slippery slope this is not where it starts.
Animal rights are one of two important philosophical movements from the second half of the 20th century. Copy-left is the other (and the easier one).
Such an entity would have the same "legal personhood" rights, and its leadership / officers would do pretty much the same thing as the "guardians" discussed in the article. And it avoids all the goofy questions of whether the river itself can be guilty of strict-liability offenses or liable for flooding damage or whatever.
Instead I have some training in philosophy. It gives me some experience with slippery slope arguments, the philosophical rationales for animal rights, and some other equally useful (or useless) ideas.
But insofar as I understand the common law, persons are strictly liable for matters of strict liability and “being guilty” would require a criminal act (e.g. criminal negligence).
But again, hire a lawyer if it matters etc.
The problematic part here is, how do you determine what a river "wants". Maybe it wants to be polluted the way some humans want to smoke. Ok, maybe not, but still, it seems like this is the wrong tool for the job. Why not just use some sort of environmental easement, or pass some law making it a protected river.
It’s a slippery slope to a national park system. It’s also a slippery slope to a public-private partnership to maintain natural sites.
Both are great.
It’s also a slippery slope to a system where natural entities receives court appointed “guardians”, who sue and defend based in the interests of their client, whatever that means.
That would be a mess.
There really needs to be some sort of board, selected by parties with interests in the well-being of the river.
Or just a regular old national park.
Companies, charities, and governments are all legal persons.
I could form an LLC and that would be a person.
There’s nothing about legal personhood that implies a right to continues existence.
It might make sense for certain natural entities to posses legal personhood.
It would probably make for sense for there to be some kind of public interest real-estate trust.