The Virtue of Social Justice and International Life

THE VIRTUE OF SOCIAL JUSTICE AND INTERNATIONAL LIFE By FRANcis E. McMAHON "THEdistribution of goods among men and the division even of men into peoples and nations must not alter the common society of the human race." 1 Bossuet spoke as a philosopher and as a theologian, deeply conscious of the essential oneness of human nature and of its common call to a supernatural destiny. He said this in a time characterized by a rapidly developing nationalism, and he was no doubt aware of the existence of great societies of peoples having little or no contact with the civilization of which he was a part. Yet these factors of division did not obscure for him the truth of the unity of mankind. We of this century, and especially of the present decade, require little or no persuasion to accept this truth. With the press carrying regularly articJes about world-wide economic programs and possible world-wide applications of the " Four Freedoms," there is rather a tendency to deny cultural disparities , and a temptation to engage in the practice of daydreaming about the quick realization of Utopia for all mankind after the present war. At the same time we are in a less advantageous position in certain respects than the thinkers of Bossuet's time. We have for the most part abandoned the unity of philosophical vision they possessed, however imperfectly , as we have discarded to a great extent their deep faith in Christian teaching. The conviction as to the unity of mankind is today forced upon us more by material circumstances than by metaphysical or religious principles. I do not mean that the latter, however, have not played a part. Cardinal Verdier was struck by the small attention given to the bonds uniting men across national frontiers in the social 1 Bossuet, Politique Tiree de l'EcTiture Sainte, lib. I, art. 5. 55 56 FRANCIS E. MCMAHON sphere. It is surely strange that philosophers, for example, have rarely talked about social justice in relation to the" common society of the human race." It is a fact that in the past social justice has been almost exclusively considered in relation to the particular political or social unit. It has been assumed or stated that the individual had duties in social justice to his particular society, but that duties in charity alone existed in relation to the whole human race. Nations, as moral persons, were supposed, it is true, to be subjected to both classes of duties, but the nature of the justice in question was generally left unspecified. Commonly it seemed to mean commutative justice alone. Has not the time arrived to review this position? Why should social justice be restricted to the particular state? What reasons militate against the proposition that peoples as well as nations have obligations in social justice to all mankind? What positive proofs can be offered in support of this proposition? The following constitutes the beginning of some reflections upon these and cognate questions. I do not profess to know the answers to all the questions connected with this problem. But I believe it to be a very legitimate problem, and the type of problem with which philosophers at the present time should be concerned. There is no need of discussing in extenso the nature of social justice in these pages.2 It is the moral virtue which ordains men's actions to the common good. It is distinguished thereby from commutative justice, which regulates actions between private individuals; and from distributive justice, which regulates actions between the social whole and the private citizen or group. Social justice resides both in the ruler and the ruled: in the ruler radically as in its source; in the ruled formally, as in those acting for the common good in accordance with law. The common good of course is specifically distinct from the sum of the individual goods or the good of the greatest majority of the citizens. It is the good of the whole D Vd. Philip Hyland, 0. P., "The Field of Social Justice," THE THOMIST, Vol. I, pp. 295-330. VIRTUE OF SOCIAL JUSTICE AND INTERNATIONAL LIFE 57 social body in proper balance with the good...