Article First. On the Origin of Ownership in External Things

368. Principles. Concerning the origin of ownership, from those things which natural right teaches expressly, only those principles are to be taken which are required for rightly understanding these questions.¹

1. God granted the ownership of temporal goods for the preservation of life at the beginning to the human race in such a way that the goods were common to all and proper to one no more than to another.

a. Temporal goods were made by the author of nature for this end, that man may provide for himself from them concerning the things necessary for the preservation of life. Therefore man has a right of acquiring for himself from temporal goods the things which are necessary for the sustenance of life; but this right is true ownership in temporal goods.

b. Twice God granted dominion of earthly things to man: first indeed soon after creation: "Have dominion over the fishes of the sea and the birds of the heaven and all living things that move upon the earth";² then again after the fall and the flood: "Increase and multiply and fill the earth, and let your terror and dread be upon all the animals of the earth," etc.³ By these words God granted created things to the human race as a common good.

2. The division of things initially common, and private ownership of them, both movable and immovable, is not only licit, but in the present state of fallen nature also necessary.

Socialists affirm that temporal goods are to be held and preserved as a good common to all, so that the division of goods and private ownership of them is illicit and altogether unjust. But by a manifold argument it is shown that private ownership in the present order of things is altogether necessary, and therefore must be derived from the will of God.⁴ From these things it is clear that the distinction between rich and poor will never cease in human society at any time: "The poor you have always with you."⁵

3. From the law of nature itself, and indeed by occupation, the division among men of things initially common and private ownership were introduced.

By what right the first division of things was made, and in what way private ownership was first introduced, is not established among the learned. Some think that it was made by paternal authority; others by a pact of men, whether explicit or implicit; others by human law; others finally by force and violence by which the stronger oppressed the weak. In general it cannot be denied that this was done by the law of nature. With the natural faculty of acquiring ownership of things there must be joined a free fact which is the reason and title of ownership in some determinate thing; but this fact is the occupation of a negatively common thing. Hence the principle: a thing belonging to no one becomes the thing of the first occupier.

4. Ownership obtained by legitimate occupation is not absolute, but restricted by its own limits. Namely, man cannot have his goods as his own in such a way that in no respect are they any longer common, or that he can always and under every condition exclude all others from their use; for private ownership, which is a secondary right, cannot take away a primary right. Now the primary end on account of which corporeal goods were created is this: that there be at hand for men means for preserving those goods which nature itself wills to be common to all. Therefore, even after the division of goods has been made, man retains the right implanted by nature itself to those things which are required for protecting and preserving these goods.⁶

a. This right of acquiring those things which are necessary for preserving life is diverse according to the diverse condition of men. alpha. He who can labor has a (strict) right to labor, that is, of acquiring for himself the necessaries of life by labor (n. 69). beta. He who is unfit for labor has a (moral or legal) right of receiving the necessaries of life from the superfluous goods of the rich. gamma. He who is in extreme necessity has a (strict) right of taking those things which are necessary for preserving life. For each right, as far as can be done, ought to be preserved uninjured; but if private ownership impedes the preservation of life, the secondary right ceases and the primary right prevails. This right is not to be understood in such a way that the rich man is bound to confer upon the one in extreme need those things which he needs, but in such a way that he is bound not to impede him who, in extreme danger, provides for himself concerning the necessaries. To these rights on the other side correspond just so many duties, which are connected with ownership of temporal things.

b. Goods which nature wills to be common to all must be distinguished from goods which nature itself does not intend for all, but which individuals acquire for themselves according to their condition. Goods of the former kind are life, health, liberty, reputation; goods of the latter kind are a noble state, riches, great dignity, office, and things of this sort.⁷

¹ Cf. St. Thomas, II-II, q. 66, a. 2. Encyclical of Leo XIII, Rerum novarum, 16 May 1891. Walter, Das Eigentum nach der Lehre des hl. Thomas u. s. w. (Freiburg: Herder, 1895). F. Cathrein, Sozialismus^7 (Freiburg: Herder, 1903). F. Cathrein, Moralphilosophie^4 (Freiburg: Herder, 1902), II, p. 247 ff. H. Pesch, Liberalismus, Socialismus u. chr. Gesellschaftsordnung (Freiburg: Herder, 1901), p. 196 ff. Schaub, Die Eigentumslehre nach Thomas von Aquin und dem modernen Sozialismus (Freiburg: Herder, 1898). Th. Mayer, Institutiones iuris naturalis (Friburgi: Herder, 1900), II, n. 162 ss. A. Vermeersch, Quaestiones de iustitia^2 (Brugis: Beyaert, 1904), n. 194-245. Pottier, De iure et iustitia (Leodii: Ancion, 1900), p. 18-47. Diederlack, Die soziale Frage^6 (Innsbruck: Rauch, 1904), p. 131 ff.

² Gen. 1:28.

³ Gen. 9:1-2.

⁴ Diederlack briefly gathers the arguments, Die soziale Frage^6, n. 91 ff.; Cathrein, Das Privateigentum (Freiburg: Herder).

⁵ Matt. 26:11.

⁶ Cf. St. Thomas, II-II, q. 66, a. 2; H. Pesch, l. c., Pflichten und Schranken des Eigentums, p. 390 ff.

⁷ Cf. Lugo, disp. 16, n. 153 ss.