American manufacturer Ingersoll-Rand Co. forged the tools thatcarved the Panama Canal and shaped Mount Rushmore. When it shiftedits legal address to Bermuda in 2001 to reduce taxes, the maneuversparked bipartisan outrage in Congress.

“These corporations have turned their back on their country,”Nevada Democrat Harry Reid fumed from the Senate floor, adding thathis father, a hard-rock miner, had wielded an Ingersoll-Randjackhammer. “There is no reason the U.S. government should rewardtax runaways with lucrative government contracts.”

Over the next dozen years, Congress passed law after law toprohibit American companies that reincorporate overseas from doingbusiness with the federal government.