Article III. Supplements to the Doctrine

I. COROLLARIES.

91. Concerning the obligation of conscience. The obligation of conscience by which someone is bound to vote does not arise formally from the right of suffrage, but from the general obligation of legal justice by which someone is bound both to his civil fatherland and to the Church.¹

¹ Sometimes a religious rationale commands that you abstain from casting a suffrage. Thus in Italy.

Hence one who is merely absent from the elections never becomes guilty of violated commutative justice, even if he foresaw injuries to be committed by those elected.

In casting a suffrage, however, the right which Society possesses—that it be ruled by worthy magistrates—must be observed from commutative justice. And to mark a ballot for an unworthy man is to commit against that community an injury harmful per se, which, according to the efficacy and the damage which followed, will give rise to an obligation of restitution from general principles.² Moreover, to be an efficacious cause of an election of this kind, by which an unworthy man is preferred to a worthy one, is intrinsically evil.

² We deliberately add these things in order to warn that the rules concerning fault, concerning true influence upon the damage, and concerning the other conditions which are required for an obligation of restitution to arise, and concerning excusing causes, are prudently to be transferred to this matter. There is a sufficiently great variety of cases here. But to pursue these in discourse is foreign to our purpose. Authors who are occupied with the practical discipline are to be consulted.

Furthermore, in the same suffrage there inheres a rationale of cooperation in all the injuries which unworthy magistrates are foreseen to be about to commit, by reason of the office obtained, against the rights either of the State, of the Church, or of private persons.

This cooperation can be formal, as if you are moved to cast a suffrage for the purpose of obtaining an unjust decree. Otherwise it will be material.

Come, then, in order to define more precisely the kind of material cooperation: first, this cannot be regarded as the cooperation of one commanding. For through it the office of administering the commonwealth well is merely entrusted of itself. Nor is it per se the cooperation of one consenting (taking the word as it is employed in the moral treatise on cooperation), since the suffrage concerns not some law to be enacted but a person to be designated. Rather, it is the cooperation of one participating mediately, sufficiently similar to that of a seller who delivers weapons to someone whom he knows will abuse them. Therefore, this cooperation can be excused for a proportionate cause. Concerning this cooperation, cf. Most Illustrious D. Waffelaert, Nouvelle Revue Théologique [New Theological Review], vol. 14, p. 490.

92. Certain statements are proved.

a) St. Thomas, I–II, q. 105, art. 1, deservedly commends a certain participation of the people in the commonwealth, so that the peace of the people may be preserved and every government may be made more acceptable to the people. Nor, in the reply to objection 2, does he less wisely object to a purely monarchical government the danger of tyranny.

b) Several Belgian statesmen also spoke rightly concerning the nature of the right of suffrage in the chamber of deputies. It is useful to recite some things here:

“A legislative election is not a mandate; it is a choice ... the choice of the man whom one judges most capable of fulfilling well the functions of legislator and, if need be, those of governor.... This man is not bound to the elector by a contract which subordinates him to the latter: the elector designates him, but it is the law which appoints him and invests him with the sovereign function in the interest of all his fellow citizens, whatever their political opinion or the region which they inhabit.” Thus D. de Smet de Naeyer, 4 May 1892, Annales [Proceedings], p. 1148.

“The object of the election consists in calling to public affairs the most capable and most accredited men, with a view to constituting the best possible government.” Thus D. de Brocqueville, 12 September 1899, Annales [Proceedings], p. 2552.

“The right to vote is not exercised in the interest of the elector, but in that of society, which can, by that very fact, subordinate its exercise to the conditions which it judges opportune.

“And these conditions are necessarily variable and contingent: they depend upon circumstances, they depend upon environments, they do not, they cannot have an absolute character.

“Such indeed is the true notion of the electoral right. It is a function, a duty rather than a right.” D. Beernaert, 28 February 1893, Annales [Proceedings], p. 799.

The earlier statements pleased all Catholics. As to that last statement concerning an office, since the speaker seemed to press it too far, it was properly corrected by D. Woeste, in the place cited above, who showed that acceptance is required in order that there could be question of an office properly so called and that there might be, as it were, a contract.

93. From what a correct judgment concerning some ordering of the right of suffrage is to be made. From the things said, these points are certainly established. In order that someone may weigh with certain judgment the various proposed methods of ordering suffrage, he must weigh many circumstances, and first of all those by which it becomes manifest what ordering gives greater hope of good administration. But once provision has been made for the common good, that ordering is to be preferred which will distribute more equally among the citizens that political authority which is contained in suffrage.

Whether, however, this is accomplished by that system which we shall call by its French name proportional representation, or by the constitution of equal districts to each of which one deputy is allotted (the single-member system), is a question which, according to our intention, we pass over in silence.

But what is to be said of those who contend that, without proportional representation, the truth of the representative government which we employ does not stand; or of those who, on the contrary, assail the same arrangement as contrary to Catholic principles concerning the right of truth and as infected with the plague of political skepticism?³

³ D. de Brocqueville raised this objection in the Belgian Parliament, Annales Parlementaires [Parliamentary Proceedings], 1899, p. 2551.

We judge both parties to be in error.

The former, indeed, because, as was shown, the right of suffrage does not look toward deputies conducting themselves in the manner in which the entire people, or at least the whole body of electors, would conduct themselves if laws were enacted in assemblies. Furthermore, if it is not repugnant to a genuine representative government that very many citizens be destitute of every suffrage—as long prevailed in Belgium—how would it be repugnant that not all possess an equal right, but that they possess varying authority?

Someone will say: “Parliament must present an exact image of the electors.”

If you understand that must as an absolute necessity, we simply deny it. For first it is necessary that the constitution and manner of acting of Parliament conduce to the common good. But if you signify only a secondary fittingness, we shall concede it; yet you must then admit with us that it by no means pertains to the essence of the government.

As regards the latter, we certainly are not those who deny that there are certain principal truths which ought not to be disputed in a well-ordered society. And even when, as in present-day societies, the very great number of dissenters does not permit the rights of the true religion to be positively acknowledged, nevertheless we by no means doubt that at least those moral truths upon which human society rests must, as far as possible, be retained. Hence suffrages would rightly and deservedly be taken away from those who all but openly contrive the destruction of the present order.

All these things, I say, we freely concede; nor shall we deny that it can happen that the system of proportional representation is argued for in a manner which savors of heresy and political skepticism. But:

a) This is not the necessary rationale for defending that system. For if persons are designated in the elections, while no definition of matters is made, questions concerning the right of truth and the usurpation of error do not of themselves pertain here. For it can well happen, and sometimes does occur, that the opposing parties are both Catholic and patronize worthy candidates.⁴

⁴ Nevertheless, the method of suffrage recently adopted in Belgium, which took away from individual electors almost every choice of persons, brings it about that the contest is, as it were, necessarily concerning the “opinions” themselves, as they say today.

b) In a region where, no selection of opinions having been made, the right of suffrage belongs no less to socialists than to Catholics, by which they can prevail entirely in the commonwealth, this manner of ordering elections is perhaps more easily purged there than elsewhere of every appearance of skepticism.

For there all things are reduced to the mere distribution of legal rights already conceded; and the question is circumscribed by these limits: what, under the circumstances, seems more expedient.⁵

⁵ Thus, approximately, D. Vanden Heuvel, Annales Parlementaires de Belgique [Parliamentary Proceedings of Belgium], 1899, p. 2666.

II. SCHOLIA.

94. Concerning universal suffrage. We wish to say briefly how it is to be regarded.

1. Universal suffrage can reasonably be commended if the suffrage is to be cast concerning matters about which, according to the cultivation attained in society, all citizens can judge maturely; or at least if the less instructed in the commonwealth are judged ready to assent to the more expert who are worthy of trust. If these conditions obtain, that system does not lack its own advantages, since it is pleasing to the people to possess some authority, and under this government those who rule are more compelled to care for the good of the people and to comply with their honorable desires.

These two things are especially objected against the same system:

a) That in elections account is taken almost solely of number, with consideration neglected of the special interests toward which the various citizens apply themselves. Thus argue not a few who defend what in French is called the representation of interests. Cf. Cathrein, Philosophia Moralis, no. 624.

b) That the minority is easily oppressed by the majority even when the former scarcely yields to the latter in number.

As correctives of these defects the following are praised:

a) Plural suffrage, by which more suffrages are attributed to those who seem to excel in knowledge or probity. Others object, however, that this greater power, which is said to be attributed to the foremost, already belongs to them by reason of the authority which those who excel in wealth, learning, and virtue connaturally possess over electors. Yet it cannot be denied that not rarely those rather prevail who are foremost in audacity and know by certain arts how to capture the favor of the common people.

b) The right conceded to the minority to designate some deputies. But the adversaries of this system reply that by those concessions made to minorities the government of the commonwealth is weakened and deprived of that strength which is necessary for procuring the common good.

We abstain from these controversies. Nevertheless, it cannot be denied that it accords more with nature, which made men of various ability and station, that he who prevails in skill, or to whose greater interest, on account of his fortune, it is that the commonwealth be well administered, should also be superior in the power of suffrages. Above all, however, the prerogative by which two or three suffrages are attributed to a father of a family is to be retained.

For not only do fathers of families seem per se to be preferred by far, in zeal for the common good, to younger men or to those who lead a celibate life; but, even if you aim merely at equality, the suffrage of a father of a family, as the virtual suffrage of the family—that is, of several persons—ought to have greater weight than the suffrage of an individual man.

95. You will ask why, when recourse is had to suffrages, that which has pleased the greater part is ordinarily made to prevail.

A twofold cause can be assigned:

1. Since it is not established who is superior in ability and counsel, and all who possess the casting of a suffrage are judged expert, that which more persons have judged should be preferred is presumed to be better and truer.

2. Since perfect agreement cannot be had, the greater part approaches more closely than the lesser to this agreement; so that, insofar as it can be brought about, the matter is administered in this manner according to the judgment of all.⁶

⁶ See how D. A. Fouillée attempts to solve the same question, La philosophie du suffrage universel [The Philosophy of Universal Suffrage], Revue des Deux Mondes [Review of the Two Worlds], vol. 65, pp. 111–113.

96. You will ask why the people, while electing magistrates, is to be regarded, more than other bestowers, as dispensing, as it were, its own thing.

For we gave this rationale above, no. 74, why the people in committing offices is not held by an obligation of distributive justice.

Reply. Because, in a democratic government, the whole people is regarded in some manner as the first subject in which public power inheres. This power is then attributed to others to be exercised by the consent and, as it were, in the name of the people, since the people cannot administer the commonwealth by itself.⁷

⁷ In this sense it is said in our fundamental law (art. 25), “All powers emanate from the nation.” By these words is signified what has in fact been done among us, or how the political government has been constituted among us, but by no means what must necessarily be done. Furthermore, the same rationale of the common good which demands that society be ruled by a few also demands that, within the limits of the power handed over, they possess an authority by no means subject to the judgment of the people. Therefore, the people cannot recall to itself the power which it conceded to the king and his legitimate successors, but is held by a formal or virtual compact which possesses full firmness.

Or, if you prefer, a certain first distribution is made by which all elective honors are attributed to the people in the manner which the common good permits. That manner is that they be exercised by persons who are acceptable to the people, provided that they are worthy.