We have uncovered [not-so-] SECRET DOCUMENTS exposing a [non-] CONSPIRACY at the HIGHEST LEVELS of . . . something or other. It turns out that Pope Pius XI might not have come up with the “act of social justice,” his breakthrough in moral philosophy all by himself! We have traced a description of the essential elements of the act of social justice to five years before Msgr. Luigi Aloysius Taparelli published his multi-volume Saggio Teoretico di Dritto Naturale Appoggiato sul Fatto (“A Theoretical Treatise on Natural Right Based on Fact”) in which he first used the term “social justice” in a clearly defined way, although he did not describe a particular defined act of social justice!!!!!!!!
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| Fr. William Ferree, S.M., Ph.D. |
In what CESJ co-founder Father William J. Ferree, S.M., Ph.D., described as a profound breakthrough in moral philosophy, Pius XI discerned the existence of a defined “act of social justice.” As Ferree explained at length in his doctoral thesis, The Act of Social Justice (1942, © 1943) and somewhat more readably in his pamphlet, Introduction to Social Justice (1948), social justice is the particular virtue directed to reform of the common good — not, it cannot be sufficiently emphasized, any individual good. As Pius XI stated in Quadragesimo Anno after detailing some specific individual measures which could be taken to improve the lot of ordinary people,
What We have thus far stated regarding an equitable distribution of property and regarding just wages concerns individual persons and only indirectly touches social order, to the restoration of which according to the principles of sound philosophy and to its perfection according to the sublime precepts of the law of the Gospel, Our Predecessor, Leo XIII, devoted all his thought and care.
Still, in order that what he so happily initiated may be solidly established, that what remains to be done may be accomplished, and that even more copious and richer benefits may accrue to the family of mankind, two things are especially necessary: reform of institutions and correction of morals. (Quadragesimo Anno, §§ 76-77.)
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| Pope Pius XI |
According to Ferree, Pius XI defined the common good as the vast network of institutions (social habits) within which human persons become more fully human by acquiring and developing virtue — “correction of morals.” The first principle of social justice, therefore, is the common good must be kept inviolate. (Ibid., § 57.)
This is because the common good is the environment within which human persons as political animals become virtuous. To subvert or circumvent the common good to achieve any individual good regardless how important the individual good may be in its own order is socially unjust and is therefore wrong. You may not “rob Peter to pay Paul.”
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| Msgr. Taparelli |
Possibly to oversimplify, the special task of social justice is not to replace or substitute for the individual virtues when they are inadequate or fail altogether. Rather, the job of social justice is to reform or restructure the social order so individual virtues, especially individual justice and charity, function within acceptable parameters (and this, too, cannot be emphasized enough) without redefining or nullifying their substantial nature.
But what is social justice? As defined on the CESJ website, social justice is,
. . . the virtue which guides us in creating those organized human interactions we call institutions. In turn, social institutions, when justly organized, provide us with access to what is good for the person, both individually and in our associations with others. Social justice also imposes on each of us a personal responsibility to collaborate with others, at whatever level of the “Common Good” in which we participate, to design and continually perfect our institutions as tools for personal and social development.
And now for the [not-so-] SECRET exposé!!!!!!!! We found a DOCUMENT from 1835 describing the act of social justice in graphic and gory detail!!!!!!! This was in Volume I, Chapter XII of Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America!!!!!!!! Anyway, because we’re a little tired of so many exclamation points, too:
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| Alexis de Tocqueville |
The citizen of the United States is taught from infancy to rely upon his own exertions in order to resist the evils and the difficulties of life; he looks upon the social authority with an eye of mistrust and anxiety, and he claims its assistance only when he is unable to do without it. This habit may be traced even in the schools, where the children in their games are wont to submit to rules which they have themselves established, and to punish misdemeanors which they have themselves defined. The same spirit pervades every act of social life. If a stoppage occurs in a thoroughfare and the circulation of vehicles is hindered, the neighbors immediately form themselves into a deliberative body; and this extemporaneous assembly gives rise to an executive power which remedies the inconvenience before anybody has thought of recurring to a pre-existing authority superior to the persons immediately concerned. If some public pleasure is concerned, an association is formed to give more splendor and regularity to the entertainment. Societies are formed to resist evils that are exclusively of a moral nature, as to diminish the vice of intemperance. In the United States associations are established to promote the public safety, commerce, industry, morality, and religion. There is no end which the human will despairs of attaining through the combined power of individuals united into a society.
Here are the whole theory and practice of social justice — individual virtue, subsidiarity, solidarity, and action as a member of an organized group — a century before the appearance of Quadragesimo Anno. As de Tocqueville argued, this habit of association develops civic competence and preserves political freedom. This (at least from the perspective of personalist liberal democracy) is the heart of de Tocqueville’s analysis of the American system.
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