III. On Military Service

I. Justice of the law. The law of forced conscription is just. For by those to whom it especially belongs to judge about this matter, especially considering conscription as commonly admitted, it is judged very useful, or rather necessary, for protecting the republic. Nor is injustice present in the fact that families which do not have suitable young men are not held to some compensation, because the burden of military service is not familial but individual; nevertheless it would be equitable for the aforesaid families to contribute in another way. Furthermore, those whom ecclesiastical law exempts are to be exempted from the law of conscription.¹

¹ Cf. Damen, De vrijdom der Geestelijken van den krijgsdienst als Kerkelijke en Staatkundige Instelling.

II. Obligation of the law. According to some, the law of military service is merely penal; according to others, it is mixed or obliges to the act of serving. Moreover:

1. First, the natural law dictates that the republic must be protected against unjust aggressors in good time and in a due manner, even with danger of life.

2. The law of military service seems mixed, or to oblige to the act. For the legislator, as we argued in n. 1054, is judged to make laws in that manner which is especially suited to the matter of the law. But to the matter of military law, since it is moral and even determinative of the natural law itself, it is especially suited that the very act of serving be prescribed; as was said about tax laws (n. cited). Nor does common estimation hold that military law is merely penal.

3. The law of military service does not oblige from commutative justice, but from legal justice or another virtue, yet one distinct from commutative justice; this is proved by the same reason by which it was proved in n. 1054 with respect to tax laws.

Corollary. Those sin who neglect registration in order to conscription; likewise those who obtain exemption by illegitimate means; and these indeed sin even apart from the sin which the means themselves contain, such as a lie, corruption of physicians, mutilation of oneself; likewise those who do not obey the precept of mobilization, or desert military service. And this holds even if someone, after the precept has been issued, is staying in another region; for, as common estimation has it, he remains a subject until he has been naturalized in another region, as it is called. Yet deserters are not held to return if a grave penalty threatens them.

Question 1. Whether those act unjustly with respect to those who are substituted in their place, and therefore are held to restore to them: 1° those who render themselves unfit for military service; 2° those who deceive physicians or magistrates, so that they are declared unfit; 3° those who desert military service.

Response. It is disputed; but it seems it must be denied, since those who act thus are not the cause, but only the occasion of the damage. The cause of the damage is the law itself, which orders that a fixed number be called, so that, when one is lacking, another is called.

Objection. Those who draw lots tacitly enter among themselves an aleatory contract, by force of which they are held to leave all things to the lot, and therefore to abstain from deceiving officials.

Response. A contract of this sort is asserted gratuitously; indeed, it would be entered even by those unaware of it.

Question 2. What must be said about those who corrupt magistrates or physicians?

Response 1. Those corrupting certainly act unjustly toward the republic, namely by cooperating toward an unjust act of magistrates or physicians, who with respect to the republic are held from justice to fulfill their office faithfully. Yet the damage which the republic suffers cannot be estimated, nor practically does restitution seem to be imposed on the penitent.

Response 2. It is sharply disputed whether they also act unjustly with respect to those who are called in their place, i.e. in the place of those corrupting. Moreover, sufficiently probably it is denied, because also in this case those corrupting are not the cause, but the occasion of the damage coming upon a third party; nor is it clear that the officials are held by a tacit contract with respect to the third party, namely, to turn the damage away from him.