Title I: On Injustice Opposed to Legal Justice

Usefulness. - In this title chiefly the error must be set aside which, having followed the "individualism" of the nineteenth century, almost dispenses citizens from offices toward the republic; and a right estimation concerning the obligation of taxes must be acquired by us.

In our work we have abstained from the name of social justice, lest we increase the confusion under which not a few labor, who practically equate legal justice with a particular virtue. For while for some social justice is the same as legal justice, others, by that word, better call together the complex of virtues which come into use in society.

Nature and Accusation of Sins. Every sin contains a material violation of legal justice. For every sin is forbidden by law at least divine. Yet that malice regularly is not to be declared, both because, when the sin has been indicated, it is already sufficiently understood, and because for the most part it will not be formal. For this requires an action done from contempt of the common good, which therefore is opposed to legal justice by a formal reason and, as such, is to be indicated. Since that virtue lacks a special matter, a material violation is not specified by it. Acts specially harmful to the common good, for example betrayal of the fatherland, will have to be indicated as such, as gravely opposed to piety and charity.

On Taxes to Be Paid. 1. In difficult circumstances of the republic, it belongs to a good citizen that he bring aid to his city even by monies liberally offered. How much more will he pay just taxes, according to his proportionate part, to the ruling treasury! Wherefore this rule must always be inculcated, that taxes be contributed according to the sufficiently general usage of upright persons; and today not a few republics labor under such manifest need that a reasonable contribution does not seem able to be denied without sin against piety. Yet, considering the quantity which could be subtracted, and considering the pecuniary penalties by which frauds are punished, grave sin will rarely be certain; but we do not deny that one can sin gravely.

2. But from the common opinion, there is no obligation of conscience positively to declare things subject to tax. Wherefore commutative justice is not violated by those who, in making instruments of sales, indicate a price below the true one, or do not manifest all movable goods which pertain to the inheritance. And where this practice has sufficiently prevailed, not even truth is offended by that lesser declaration. Yet he who uses false certificates of physicians, etc., to increase the debts of an inheritance, will be guilty of a lie. Moreover, observe that a notary has not been constituted to protect the rights of the treasury, so that, with justice uninjured, he can be a participant in fraud. But if an oath is requested, religion itself per se will oblige that you respond sincerely according to the just mind of the one asking.

Wherefore where an oath is requested merely to protect the rights of heirs, not at all to protect the rights of the public treasury, it can be sworn that nothing has been concealed by him who was conscious of no thing iniquitously concealed, so that the rights of the heirs have remained intact.

But if a sworn declaration is requested for the utility of the treasury, that obligation, today sufficiently odious, nevertheless cannot tend to this, that from it religious men be compelled to bear an unequal burden of taxes. Wherefore according to the reasonable mind of the one asking, and therefore without perjury, he will have responded who, under oath, declares accurate indications which have been made according to received usages.

3. Moreover, before the proportionate part to be paid by each has been defined by the officials set over this, no right seems to have been acquired for the treasury.

4. When that definition has been made, the question concerning the obligation of justice of paying just taxes is probably controverted. Certainly power is not lacking to the civil prince to oblige citizens to pay the just part of taxes. But already before our age, to many the mind of the legislator seemed to be no other than that of fining detected defrauders. Today the intention of obliging conscience becomes less probable. Therefore, unless the general persuasion of the region is different, and this must be trusted, we shall deny a strict obligation of justice. Yet those will violate justice who use unjust means.

Nor can those be excused who wish to exercise fraud as an art: both because, from the intention of using force against officials, they bear a mind contrary to justice; and because they expose themselves to dangers of ruin and penalties, and thus offend charity toward themselves and their family.

5. But those who, by corrupting officials set over taxes, have obtained immunity for themselves, are formal accomplices of those officials who violate the duties of their office, so that they are guilty of injury against the republic. Just taxes are supposed.

6. But insofar as by withdrawing their goods from the treasury they are an indirect cause why others are burdened more, they commit no injustice toward those persons: neither commutative nor distributive. Not commutative, because the greater burden of others, if any results from this, follows no unjust action toward others. Not distributive, since they do not themselves have the positive care of equal partition.

It is useful to add this. If they could be more secure concerning the reasonable use of public monies, upright and Catholic men would contribute monies more willingly and would act more scrupulously in this matter.

Today, the ease with which theologians excuse tax frauds from sin is not rarely presented as scandalous. But of what kind is that scandal: of the little ones, or Pharisaic? Let them observe first that by Catholic theologians those arts are condemned as strict injustice by which those who conduct purchases and agreements for the city assign to themselves part of the public monies; and every dilapidation of the common patrimony; indeed, already the very sloth by which public offices are conducted without true solicitude for the common utility; so that, if heed were paid to moral theology, the treasury would gain many more monies than it loses on account of the benignity of theologians. If besides you weigh the unjust place into which, in more than one state, Catholics are thrust down, so that they are in great part excluded from public offices, and that full liberty of conscience of living according to the precepts of the Catholic religion is denied to them, which is offered so liberally and rashly to the haters and disturbers of social peace; if you consider in your mind the laws which Catholics must tolerate, by which, for example, public monies, and therefore monies contributed by Catholics themselves, are destined for the scholastic propagation of irreligion: with what face will men who are witnesses, and perhaps authors, of such abuses accuse theologians of excessive indulgence, and demand that for laws often unjust, obligations of conscience be urged which they themselves generally repudiate?

— Yet to the State which exercises the business of transporting letters, goods, persons, a just price from commutative justice is owed by those who, for example by taking an ordinary place, tacitly enter with it into a contract of carriage. A just price, I say, not that which it seeks beyond this on account of monopoly, as it is accustomed to do in selling tobacco, etc.; that is to be paid as a tax.

Nor will he be accused of injustice who, contrary to "postal" laws, enclosed in customary letters certain things forbidden or specially to be taxed, nor he who, after paying the price of an inferior class, should make a journey in a coach of a superior class. For provided that the lowest price of carriage or journey is paid, those accidental frauds are judged to be urged only by penalties. Except if someone has used an unjust means. Cf. Prummer, II, 85.

On Military Service. The obligation of military service has the true nature of a tax. The laws by which it is imposed are commonly held as penal, the more so because they seem to recede sufficiently from the equality of justice. Where those are designated by lot who must earn stipends, those who by fraud evade service do not violate commutative justice, even if by accident, from the disposition of law, another must be substituted. For they are prohibited by no right of this person from taking thought for themselves. He who by agreement has obligated himself to occupy the place of another in the camps, if he has fled, per se is held for the whole damage which from this is suffered by those with whom he has agreed. Yet unforeseen conditions of intolerable cruelties or of very grave spiritual danger can furnish a just cause for deserting military service; and then, with the contract rescinded, only the price in proportion to the time which remains would have to be refunded. Indeed he is freed from this obligation if the other, for whom he is substituted, nevertheless remains exempt, since then he has truly furnished the promised immunity. Similarly, from commutative justice he is held to earn stipends who has bound himself to the State by free enlistment.

But in time of war, those who desert the military station are punished by a graver penalty; nor, in a just war, do they seem to us able to be excused from grave impiety toward the fatherland.

But the very grave penalties by which they would be punished if they returned will easily dispense them from the obligation which they would otherwise have of returning to the camp.

— 1. The material violation of legal justice which is contained in every sin need not be accused distinctly; the formal violation would have to be: this is committed by him who acted from an intention contrary to the common good. But acts specially harmful to the common good, such as betrayal of the fatherland, are to be noted as such, as gravely opposed to piety and charity.

2. On Taxes. By not paying taxes in that way in which they are customarily paid by good citizens, a sin against piety toward the fatherland is easily committed, besides the notion of scandal; yet the sin will rarely be grave, on account of the slight effect of an individual defraudation.

But the legislator, both civil and ecclesiastical, can urge the obligation of conscience by his precept; indeed, he can exact just taxes from commutative justice. Yet a positive obligation of declaring things liable to tax is generally not admitted; nor is a right judged to have been acquired for the treasury before it has been defined what each must pay. Indeed, when that determination has been made, the obligation of justice is not yet demonstrated. But justice itself forbids that you corrupt public officials; nor do those seem able to be excused from grave sin who wish to exercise fraud as an art.

3. To the State which exercises a business, for example of transporting letters, goods, persons, the just price, not that which besides it exacts in the manner of a tax, must be paid, commutative justice itself wills. Yet accidental frauds of using a coach of a superior class, etc., seem to be punished only by penalties.

4. A law which binds citizens to military service is held as penal. Yet those who, in a just war, desert the military station which had been committed to them gravely offend piety toward the fatherland.

Private persons who, by withdrawing themselves or their goods from the treasury, have been the cause per accidens why others are more burdened, do nothing which is injurious to these.