Article I. On the Power of Jurisdiction in General

Question 1. What is the power of jurisdiction?

Resp. The power of jurisdiction or of governance which by divine institution is in the Church is one thing of the external forum, another of the internal forum, or of conscience, whether sacramental or extra-sacramental (Can. 196).

Jurisdiction of the internal forum is not necessarily sacramental; namely it can be exercised in the extra-sacramental internal forum, unless the sacramental is required.

Question 2. What power of jurisdiction is ordinary, and what delegated?

Resp. Ordinary is that which by the law itself is attached to an office; delegated, that which has been committed to a person. But ordinary can be either proper or vicarious. - Cf. Can. 197. Ordinary is as it were official, delegated personal.

Question 3. Who are to be understood under the name of Ordinary?

Resp. § 1. In law under the name of Ordinary are understood, unless someone is expressly excepted, besides the Roman Pontiff, for each one's own territory, the residential Bishop, Abbot or Prelate nullius, and their Vicar General, Administrator, Vicar and Prefect Apostolic, and likewise those who, when the aforesaid are lacking, meanwhile succeed in governance from the prescription of law or from approved constitutions; but for their own subjects, major Superiors in exempt clerical religions.

§ 2. But under the name of Ordinary of the place or of places come all those listed, except religious Superiors (Can. 198).

This is very much to be noted in the canons of the Code, lest an error be made, and what is just not be given to him to whom it is owed.

Question 4. What is the law concerning delegation of ordinary power of jurisdiction, and concerning subdelegation of delegated power?

Resp. § 1. He who has ordinary power of jurisdiction can delegate it to another in whole or in part, unless something else is expressly provided by law.

§ 2. Even power of jurisdiction delegated by the Apostolic See can be subdelegated either for an act, or even habitually, unless the industry of the person was chosen or subdelegation was prohibited.

§ 3. Power delegated for a universality of affairs by him who below the Roman Pontiff has ordinary power can be subdelegated in individual cases.

§ 4. In other cases delegated power of jurisdiction can be subdelegated only by a concession expressly made; but delegated judges can subdelegate some non-jurisdictional article even without express commission.

§ 5. No subdelegated power can again be subdelegated, unless this has been expressly conceded (Can. 199).

Care must certainly be taken lest the clause at the end of the first paragraph, "unless," etc., be passed over.

Question 5. What power of jurisdiction is to be interpreted broadly, and what strictly?

Resp. § 1. Ordinary power of jurisdiction and power delegated for a universality of affairs are to be interpreted broadly; any other strictly; yet to him to whom power has been delegated, those things also are understood to have been conceded without which the same power could not be exercised.

§ 2. Upon him who asserts that he is delegated rests the burden of proving the delegation (Can. 200).

Because he ought not be admitted to a work proper to another unless it is established that the right has been conceded to him.

Question 6. Over whom can the power of jurisdiction be exercised?

Resp. § 1. The power of jurisdiction can be exercised directly over subjects alone (Can. 201).

Question 7. Whether one having judicial power, whether ordinary or delegated, can exercise it for his own advantage or outside the territory?

Resp. Negatively, with the prescriptions of Can. 401, § 1, 881 § 2, and 1637 remaining safe. Cf. Can. 201, § 2. Now indeed Can. 881, § 2, says "those who have ordinary power of absolving can absolve subjects everywhere on earth."

Question 8. Whether one having voluntary or non-judicial power of jurisdiction can exercise it for his own advantage, or while existing outside the territory, or upon a subject absent from the territory?

Resp. Affirmatively, unless something else is established from the nature of things or from law. - Cf. S. C. Indulg., 1 Feb. 1905, to II. - Can. 201, § 3.

Question 9. Whether an act of the power of jurisdiction given for one forum is valid for the other?

Resp. § 1. An act of the power of jurisdiction, whether ordinary or delegated, conferred for the external forum, is valid also for the internal forum, but not conversely.

§ 2. Power conferred for the internal forum can also be exercised in the extra-sacramental internal forum, unless the sacramental is demanded.

§ 3. If the forum for which the power has been given has not been expressed, the power is understood to have been conceded for both forums, unless from the very nature of the matter something else is established (Can. 202).

Question 10. When does delegated power cease?

Resp. § 1. Delegated power is extinguished when the mandate has been completed; when the time has elapsed or the number of cases for which it was conceded has been exhausted; when the final cause of the delegation ceases; by revocation of the delegating one directly intimated to the delegate, or by renunciation of the delegate directly intimated to the delegating one and accepted by the same; but not when the right of the delegating one has been resolved, except in the two cases of which in can. 61.

§ 2. But when power has been conceded for the internal forum, an act placed through inadvertence, after the time has elapsed or the number of cases has been exhausted, is valid.

§ 3. When several have been delegated collegially, if one fails, the delegation of the others also expires, unless something else is established from the tenor of the delegation (Can. 207).

Question 11. Whether ordinary power is extinguished when the right of the Superior conceding the office to which it is attached has been resolved? When does it cease? When is it silent?

Resp. According to the norm of can. 183, § 2, ordinary power is not extinguished when the right of the one conceding the office to which it is attached has been resolved; but it ceases when the office has been lost; it is silent when a legitimate appeal has been interposed, unless perhaps the appeal is only in devolutive effect, with the prescription of can. 2264, 2284 remaining firm (Can. 208).

According to canon 183, an ecclesiastical office in the case of the resolved right of the superior is not lost, unless the law provides otherwise, or unless in the concession there is contained the clause: at our good pleasure, or another equivalent.

Question 12. Whether the Church supplies jurisdiction in common error or in positive and probable doubt?

Resp. In common error or in positive and probable doubt, whether of law or of fact, the Church supplies jurisdiction for both the external and internal forum (Can. 209).

Common error in this cause is understood as "not error of fact and in second act, but common error of law and in first act," i.e., as Bucceroni says, "in such a state or condition of things, that error of the public or of the community naturally can and ought to follow if the matter follows its natural course." This interpretation seems able to be admitted altogether securely; otherwise often we would not be able to say when, in what individual confession, absolutions in determined cases began to be valid. - Bucceroni, Cas. 612, 129. 5; I. M. n. 769.

Question 13. Whether the power of order attached to an office by a superior or committed to a person can be committed to others?

Resp. The power of order, by a legitimate ecclesiastical Superior whether attached to an office or committed to a person, cannot be committed to others, unless this has expressly been conceded by law or indult (Can. 210).

Thus, for example, the interim Superior of some vacant mission can be given the faculty of administering the sacrament of Confirmation, but that cannot be committed to others, unless the power of subdelegating has been expressly conceded.