As we saw in yesterday’s posting, “Nature”
must have given to humanity something other than the State by means of which
human life was to be maintained in a manner that respects the demands of human
dignity. That means is the natural right
to be an owner, vested in every human being by nature itself: private property.
Despite numerous claims to the
contrary, more than one pope has strongly emphasized the importance of
widespread ownership of capital, “whether the property consist of land
or chattels.” (Rerum Novarum, §
5.) (N.B.: owned things, “property,” are
divided into “land” and “non-land.” A
“non-land” thing that is owned is called a “chattel.”) Consequently, as Leo XIII concluded when
commenting on the problems associated with the growing number of people who do
not own capital and advancing technology is displacing human labor in the
production process,
“We have seen that this great labor question cannot be
solved save by assuming as a principle that private ownership must be held
sacred and inviolable. The law, therefore, should favor ownership, and its
policy should be to induce as many as possible of the people to become owners.”
(Ibid., § 46.)
Commentators caught up in the slavery of past savings (which
is irrevocably linked to the labor theory of value — a discussion we will not
get into here) often interpret “people” in this passage to mean only
workers. They assume that only labor
gives title to capital. Extreme
adherents of this position echo the Nazi law on landed property and assert that
not only does labor alone give title, title is only effective so long as the
labor is useful, i.e., serves the needs
of the community or State.
In this view, ultimate title is vested in the community, i.e., the State. Confusingly, while there is no substantial
difference in their respective positions, and both claim that the State will
eventually “wither away,” Fabian socialists usually use the word “community”
that they insist is not “the State,” while Fascist socialists use “the State.”
In this extreme position, people who can no longer work or
whose work is considered “non-economic” are to be supported by others on the
basis of “gift” rather than “exchange.”
As Karl Marx summarized this position in his 1875 Critique of the Gotha Program, “From each according to his
abilities, to each according to his needs.”
This effectively abolishes private property as anything
meaningful, directly contradicting explicit papal teachings, e.g., “[E]very man has by nature the
right to possess property as his own. This is one of the chief points of
distinction between man and the animal creation.” (Rerum Novarum, § 6.)
Ironically, a number of people who believe they are
absolutely faithful to papal teachings take for granted an understanding of
property that the popes were desperately working to counter. This is the false belief that all rights, but
especially life, liberty, and property, are not inherent in (natural to)
humanity, that is, possessed absolutely by every single human being who lives,
has lived, or ever will live. In this
theory, rights are allegedly vested in the State, to be permitted only insofar
as the State sees fit.
Of course, even if we accept the traditional understanding
of natural rights as being held absolutely by every human being, we have to
realize at the same time that all rights, by their very nature, are limited in
their exercise. As a general rule, no one
may licitly exercise his or her rights, even the most absolutely held, in a way
that deliberately harms others or the common good.
The belief that rights are not inherent in each human being
but are vested in the State is, in the words of Pius XI, “a theory of human society peculiar to itself.” (Quadragesimo
Anno, § 120) It is “irreconcilable
with true Christianity” (ibid.) — or
anything else based on a sound understanding of the natural law. There is some evidence suggesting that Leo
XIII was responding to this new understanding of the natural law in a number of
his encyclicals, especially Rerum Novarum.
