ARTICLE IV: On Leasing and Hiring

1149. DEFINITION. Leasing is a contract by which someone gives his work or thing to another for use, for a certain wage. Hiring is the same contract on the part of the one accepting.

He who furnishes the use of the thing or his own work is called the lessor; but he who hands over the price, the lessee or hirer.

DIVISION. There is distinguished: 1. leasing of things, which is threefold, namely of buildings, of fields, and of animals; - 2. hiring of the work of a person, that is, of labor or service.

To this is referred, and is called hiring of work, the hiring of workers, artisans, carriers, guards, etc.; likewise the hiring of architects and of those who, after public denunciation, promised a work to be perfected, with determination of time, matter, form, and price.⁰⁴

1150. • PRINCIPLES. I. The obligations of the lessor are the same as those of the seller. Therefore the lessor is especially held concerning the following:

1. To preserve equity in the price of the lease and to hand over to the lessee a truly useful thing.

Therefore he must hand over the thing at the established time, and in such a state that it is apt for the end for which it was leased; likewise, to effect that the hirer can use or enjoy the thing through the whole time of the hiring, and therefore to sustain all expenses necessary for this, for example for roofs to be repaired, for taxes and public burdens, etc.

2. To render the hirer secure, both from vices of the thing and from juridic disturbance in the use of the thing during the time of lease.

We say from juridic disturbance, namely which could be inferred by a third party having right, but not that which would be made through violence. But if the use of the thing, on account of necessary repairs, is impeded for a notable time, for example beyond forty days, indemnity is owed to the hirer (III, 857).

1151. II. The lessee ought reasonably to use the thing leased and faithfully to pay the price. These things are clear of themselves.

1. He ought to use the thing leased as a good father of a family, that is, for the end alone of the lease.

Whence, if he consumes the thing for other uses, the lessor will be able to seek reparation of damage or rescission of the contract. Yet, a contrary pact being excluded or positive law not prohibiting,⁰⁵ he can sublease the thing to another who is equally suitable. To him it pertains to pay those modest and daily expenses which must be made for the preservation of the thing. - He must restore the thing in the state in which he received it, with the change arisen from age or greater force excepted. If it is not established by writing in what state the thing was at the time of the lease, it is presumed to have been in good state, unless the contrary is proved.

2. The lessee must pay the wage of the lease, or pension, and indeed at the established times.

But in the case of misfortune, for example of sterility on account of hail, it has been introduced from equity of right that something be remitted from the price of the lease of a field, and that the damage be undergone equally by lessor and lessee, unless an equitable compensation is given from the fruits perceived in other years.⁰⁶

Note. 1. The contract of lease is DISSOLVED: a) when the time of hiring has been completed. If the time was in no way determined, the lease will be able to cease at the discretion of one contracting party, provided the other is warned at an opportune time. b) By the destruction of the thing leased. c) By non-execution of the agreements. d) By mutual consent, with the right of a third party preserved, for example of a subhirer.

2. But a lease entered upon by an authentic act is not dissolved by the death of the contracting parties, but passes to heirs. If the lessor has donated or sold the thing leased, or wishes to occupy it himself, he cannot, from new Law, expel the lessee; but the constituted term must be awaited.⁰⁷ Otherwise in Roman Law.

Encyclical Rerum novarum (middle version); Vermeersch, de Just., n. 386; Lehmkuhl, I, 1344; Noldin, II, 609; Genicot, I, 645; Schindler, II, p. 663; Tanquerey, II, 786; Garriguet, Contr. du travail; H. Pesch, Lehrb. der Nationaloeconomie, III, p. 207-219; Godts, de Salario familiali; Schrijwers, Man. d'Econ. pol., P. IV; De Gryse, Biederlack, Pottier, and others.

1152. • DEFINITION. Hiring of work, or hiring of workers, is a contract in which a just price is paid for certain labor.

It is said 1. For certain labor. For the object of this contract is not the thing produced, but the labor to be furnished, therefore the operative force itself, the very strength of the worker: therefore something which cannot be separated from the worker, and which always remains clothed with human dignity.

Hence you will deduce: a) The contract of labor is not a mere purchase-sale, because for establishing equality between the work furnished and the just price, for taxing human labor, we cannot use the same norms as for common wares and things merely negotiatory.

b) The contract of labor is not a contract of partnership, as if the master contributes his capital, but the worker his work, to a work to be perfected commonly, the profit afterwards to be divided.

2. A just price is paid: namely such a price as truly responds both to the work furnished on the part of the worker and to the end which the worker necessarily intends in leasing his strength.

ORDER OF THINGS TO BE SAID. In establishing rules concerning JUST PRICE, authors go into diverse opinions. Therefore fitting distinctions must be premised, and afterwards principles established, whether with respect to hirers of workers or with respect to the workers themselves.

How many kinds of wage are given? There is given 1. Individual wage, namely that which suffices for feeding one man on that day, and furnishes him the necessities for suitable support, provided he is frugal and well-moraled.

Individual wage can be subdistinguished into the lowest, commonly sufficient for feeding one man; and the highest, which furnishes to a man not only necessities and conveniences, but also as it were restores the expenses which he had for learning the art, and forestalls future damages.

There is given 2. Family wage, namely that which suffices for feeding a family,⁰⁸ as it is ordinarily constituted.

It is subdistinguished into absolute and relative family wage.

a) Absolute is present if, in ordinary adjuncts, the same sufficient family wage is paid to the father of a family.

b) Relative is had if that wage which of itself commonly suffices is increased according to the number of children and the weight of necessities.

1153. PRINCIPLES. I. The hirer of workers is held from justice to allot to them the lowest individual wage. The reason is that only the lowest individual wage procures equality between labor and wage. For the labor of the worker is: 1. labor of a human person, whence a thing much nobler than merely negotiatory things; 2. labor necessary for a life suitable to a man, labor therefore which cannot be estimated below a wage sufficient for the necessities of life; 3. finally labor by which the strengths of the worker are consumed for the utility of the master, whence there arises a right to a wage which is apt for restoring the strengths of a well-moraled man.

From these things conclude: a) The same labor standing, whether considered in itself or in adjuncts, the same lowest individual wage is owed both to men and to women (cf. Rosler, Frauenfrage, p. 113). So that it may be just, it must suffice also to

the needs of the seventh day. Ordinarily, however, feminine labor is less, on account of weakness of body, necessary interruptions, etc.; whence it is diminished without injustice (Noldin, II, 612).

b) This wage is owed to workers antecedently to an express agreement, according to common estimation; it will be able to be exacted by any worker at all.

c) Indeed, without injustice the highest individual wage will be able to be exacted; for no more is exacted than is expended for the advantage of the master. If special dangers of the work are present, special expenses for acquiring skill in the work, that must be paid to the worker.

d) The system of those is to be rejected who think that any wage whatever is just into which the worker has consented; for often, conquered by necessity alone, the worker consents to a payment below the just one.

A great question is: Whether the hirer of workers is bound from justice to pay to the worker who is called to marriage an absolute family wage. The affirmative opinion pleases us much. The reason is that (as Leo XIII says in the cited Encyclical) it is a most holy law of nature that the father of a family protect, by food and by every cultivation, those whom he himself has procreated; and the same is derived thither from nature, that he should wish to acquire and prepare for his children those things by which they may be able, in the doubtful course of life, to defend themselves from miserable fortune.

Therefore the labor of the married worker, which is the truly ordinary means for fulfilling this office and as it were the one capital through which he is rendered apt for satisfying this duty imposed by nature itself, this labor, we say, obtains in common estimation a price which can be compensated only by the payment of an absolute family wage. Cf., besides the authors already cited, Manning, La quest. ouvr.; Collat. Brug., IV, 1901; Nicotra, Quest. du Salaire; Liberatore, Economie politique, p. 246; Marres, Perin, etc.

Nevertheless, the contrary opinion, which denies, we cannot reject. Thus it argues. Does the equality which commutative justice intends to establish truly require that more be owed to a married worker? The necessity of feeding and providing for oneself is intrinsic and absolute to labor; but the necessity of feeding a family is rather extrinsic and hypothetical to labor, if namely a man is joined in marriage. From this it follows that the price of labor, which indeed ought rather to be considered according to itself, does not vary in itself and does not confer other rights if the worker is married. This seems to be admitted the less because, if extrinsic and hypothetical elements had to be considered in the estimation of labor, even a relative family wage would have to be paid from justice, if the family became more numerous (cf. Genicot, I, 647; De Gryse, Contr. cond., p. 45).

Whence some say that the absolute family wage is owed from charity alone; but others have recourse to legal or social justice, in order to impose on masters the obligation of paying such a wage to married workers (cf., besides those just cited, Antoine, p. 611). But they add that the absolute family wage, although of itself and initially owed from legal justice only, obliges from strict justice always and in such a region when it has truly been brought into use. For then, as regards the estimation of the labor of workers, it becomes a vulgar price.

II. The hirer of workers sometimes does not act unjustly if he pays a wage lower than the aforesaid. The reason is that the general norm, according to which the price of labor is estimated, often admits change by reason of circumstances.

Therefore the wage would justly be diminished: 1. If the worker were not yet apt for ordinary labor, or had been accepted from mercy alone, unequal to ordinary labor. 2. If in such a region labor commonly produced fruits less than just; a fortiori, if labor, prolonged with hope of better fortune, actually turned only to the detriment of the master.

Note. Yet from this do not conclude that the master acts justly who, about to begin some industry, meanwhile would give small wages until he himself has paid the capital taken from others.

III. The hirer of workers assumes other obligations upon himself. And indeed: 1. before the completed time of hiring he cannot withdraw from the contract without a legitimate cause; 2. he must take care that in workshops the workers do not suffer grave dangers against good morals or against life and the health of the body; whence he should faithfully apply the precautions prescribed by law; 3. for the rest of the body and sanctification of the soul necessary time should be conceded. Cf. the cited Encyclical; Vermeersch, o. c., n. 460; Riviere, Vingt ans de vie sociale, p. 78; Harmel, Catechisme du Patron; Kurschner, Lex. d. deutsch. R., v. Arbeit; Gopfert, Arbeiter-aussperung (ap. Linz. Quart. Schr., 1908, p. 334).

IV. The worker, from justice, must fulfill the obligations of the contract.⁰¹ The same is valid for the lessor of works.

Therefore the worker is held: 1. to furnish labor faithfully according to the agreement, so that, if from lack of skill, or negligence, or his own fault he has not performed what he promised, he is held proportionately to remit the wage, or to restore what has already been accepted; 2. not to depart, without a just cause, from service before the time of hiring is finished (but see n. 1154); and if from such departure or in another way, for example by completing the work faultily, he has brought damage upon the master, to compensate it. Recall the things said n. 708, 1140, concerning servants, and n. 1036, Question 2, concerning drivers, etc.

Note. a) From the natural law. Workers act illicitly who give some sum of money to inspectors, to corrupt them, so that a faulty completion of the work or cheaper material may be approved by them. But they would not act illicitly if they gave money for turning aside their unjust vexation. See also n. 1135.

b) From natural equity. Equity demands that, in the case of an unusual misfortune, compensation be conceded to architects or others who have taken upon themselves a work to be completed. Yet this compensation is not owed if the redeemer of the work erred in computing the expenses (Aertnys, l. III, 506; Genicot, I, 650).

c) From Positive Law.⁰² No one can promise his work except for a determined time or for a determined work. An artisan, if he has not finished the work, is held concerning a greater or lesser fault, according as he furnished both material and labor, or labor alone.

(operistitium, sciopero, greve, huelga, Streick, strike).

On account of the importance of the question, it is useful here to note what must be held concerning operistitium.

1154. PRINCIPLE. Operistitium theoretically is licit, if the due conditions are present. The conditions are: 1. that it be opposed to justice neither in the matter nor in the mode; 2. that there be a just and grave cause; 3. that no other way be available for obtaining the end.

It is said 1. That it not be opposed to justice, neither in the matter nor in the mode. But a) IN THE MATTER a cessation of labor is unjust if there has preceded a valid contract concerning work to be furnished for a stated time and it has not been rendered void, as is plain from the things said n. 1056.

Now, the contract can be invalid either from defect of free consent, for example if the workers are morally compelled to lease their work below the just price; or from a dishonorable condition added, for example if they undertook work not necessary to be furnished on Sundays. The contract can also become void, namely in the case in which the master does not observe the conditions concerning which agreement was made. Then there is no obligation of contract, and therefore the workers have the right, with the other conditions observed, of ceasing from work by agreement. Yet charity demands that beforehand they warn the patron, to avoid his very great damage.

But if no contract preceded concerning work to be furnished for a determined time, or if the time has elapsed, the right belongs to the workers of ceasing from labor at their pleasure, and this even by agreement; but to induce others unwilling to this is often against charity both toward workmen and toward masters, unless a grave cause excuses.

b) IN THE MODE, the cessation of labor would be unjust if seditions were moved, if force or threats were applied either against the masters themselves for extorting the things sought, or against other workers, by prohibiting them from labor through fraud, threats, or strictly harmful means; likewise if the workers harmed other citizens by disturbing the city.

It is said 2. That there be a just and grave cause. a) Just; therefore operistitia made for extorting a wage beyond the highest price or any inequitable conditions are illicit. But if, while obtaining an equitable pay, they intend an increase of the same, yet not above the highest price, they do not sin against justice, unless they apply unjust means, for example lies. But agreeing among themselves in this way about not leasing their work at a lower price, they seem to harm charity⁰³ (cf. n. 1138, 2).

b) Grave; for since from operistitia very evil consequences commonly arise, a cause of great moment is required, such as will be, with the circumstances considered, a diminution of excessive labor, or a cessation of vexations.

It is said 3. That no other way be available; and this also on account of the innumerable evils which a cessation from labor by agreement carries with itself. From this last condition it is clear that there is required in addition a true probability of obtaining the good end intended, if not immediately, at least in the near future.

We have said: theoretically it is licit. But IN PRACTICE, operistitium very often is illicit, because it cannot always be established concerning the conditions mentioned above, and many inconveniences accede which Leo XIII best declares thus: "This kind of cessation affects with damage not only masters and the workmen themselves, but harms commerce and the utilities of the state; and since it is accustomed not to be far from violence and disturbances, very often it brings public tranquillity into danger."

Nevertheless they are not to be blamed who, only on account of grave fear struck into them by associates, cease from labor while bearing themselves passively. Cf. Lehmkuhl, I, 1349; Genicot, II, n. 22; Gopfert, II, 122; Biederlack, Innsbr. Quart. Schr., 1912 and Theolog. Fragen; Vermeersch, o. c., n. 470.