ARTICLE III: On Census

1146. • DEFINITION. Census (rente) is a right of perceiving an annual pension from a thing or person.

It differs essentially from loan for consumption in this, that in the contract of census, even a temporary one, the price or capital is alienated in perpetuity, while in the contract of loan for consumption restitution of the principal after a determined time is established as to be made. And census can be constituted both by onerous title and by gratuitous title (III, 839). Cf. Ferraris, v. Census.

He who acquires the right of perceiving a pension is called the censualist, censitor, buyer, creditor. But he who assumes the obligation of paying it is called the censuary, seller, debtor. The pension to be paid is called canon, revenue, or rent, because it itself returns or is returned each year.

DIVISION. 1. By reason of the price by which it is bought, census is reservative or consignative.

Reservative census is bought by the handing over of an immovable thing: for example, I cede my field to you under the condition that you pay annually to me five bushels of wheat, or fifty francs. - Consignative census, or simply so called, is bought by money: for example, I hand over to you one thousand francs so that you may pay me fifty francs each year.

2. By reason of the thing in which it is founded, census is real or personal.

Real census, or ground-rent, is that which is constituted in some fruitful thing, so that the obligation of paying passes to any possessor whatever of this thing; and when the thing perishes, the census perishes. - Personal census is that which is founded, directly and immediately, in the labor or industry of some person, who obligates himself and his successors to paying without order to some thing from which the pension must be paid (III, 847; H. Ap., X, 201). Cf. n. 839.

3. By reason of the thing which is owed, census is pecuniary or fructuary, according as it must be paid in counted money or in fruits.

4. By reason of the time during which the pension must be paid, census is temporary, or life-long, or perpetual.

a) It is temporary if it is constituted for a determined time, for example for twenty years; b) life-long, if for the life of the censuary or censualist, or even of another person; c) perpetual, if without any term of time, so that it must pass to the heirs both of the censuary and of the censualist.

4. By reason of the mode joined, census is redeemable or irredeemable, according as the obligation of paying can be extinguished, the price being restored, or not.

But it can be redeemable at the will of the censuary, or of the censualist, or of each, according as the faculty of demanding that the contract be resolved through restitution of the capital, without deduction of pensions which meanwhile came, belongs to one or the other, or to each. Redeemable simply is understood as at the will of the censuary. To one considering it, it is clear that restitution of the principal here is obtained, not by force of census, but by force of the joined pact, namely of selling back.

1147. PRINCIPLES. I. Census is licit, provided the due conditions are preserved. It is established: 1. from the Bulls of the Supreme Pontiffs, who approved census under certain conditions, and from the unanimous consent at least of theologians of today; 2. from reason, for census is nothing other than a contract of sale or exchange, in which the pension to be paid is the merchandise, whose price is the capital, thing or money, which is handed over. Wherefore, the rules of sale also have force in the present matter (III, 839-849; H. Ap., X, 196 ff.).

1148. II. From Natural Law, the condition required in the first place is equality between the census and the price. But that price is determined either by law or by common estimation; which estimation, in these times, is found described in public sheets. Therefore without doubt it is licit to buy and sell, at the current price, annual censuses founded in the Government.

From CIVIL Law:⁰² 1. Perpetual census is essentially redeemable on the part of the censuary. Yet it is licit to agree that it cannot be redeemed before a certain time, which cannot be prolonged beyond the limits constituted by law. The faculty of seeking back the principal and extinguishing the census is not conceded to the censualist except in the defined cases, namely if the censuary has omitted to pay the census for two years, or if he has not constituted the due securities, or has been compelled to cede goods. 2. Life-long census, since it is for an uncertain time, is necessarily aleatory; but it must be constituted according to the probability of length of life, with account had of age, health, and complexion of the person to whom the annual pension must be paid.⁰³

From CANON Law: 1. Personal consignative census is forbidden through the Bull of St. Pius V Cum onus, on account of danger of usury. The Bull nevertheless, according to St. Alphonsus (III, 849), has not been received in many places. 2. In the case of enfranchisement of land, namely when the land is freed from the burden of furnishing census to the Church or to a pious place, "a new investment cannot be made in banks, public or savings chests, nor in notes of public debt; because it is not held as a canonical and stable investment; but it must be made in stable, safe, and fruitful goods... Yet, in these times, it is customary for the Sacred Congregation of the COUNCIL to concede that investment be made also in nominative bonds of public debt, when it cannot be done otherwise." Cf. A. S. S., I, p. 537, 569.