This Harvard Business Review article [1] interviews a reputable professor on the topic. America adopted English law corporations, replacing the Crown with the states. Early corporations were limited compared to today's because early enterprise was fairly limited--the American Revolution occurred on the cusp of the Industrial Revolution.

You are correct in stating that it took political capital to form a corporation in Revolutionary times. But that didn't mean they existed at the pleasure of the state. Furthermore, the close nexus between corporate chartering and political proximity showed its seams in the 19th century. That's why states moved the chartering process to independent bureaucracies.

[1] https://hbr.org/2010/04/what-the-founding-fathers-real.html