THE CATHOLIC ORIGIN OF DEMOCRACY

New Zealand Tablet, 17 July 1919, Page 37

THE CATHOLIC ORIGIN OF DEMOCRACY

(By Archbishop Redwood.)

' It is a favorable theme and a vain boast’-with many, in spite of history, which is dead against it, that “Modern Democracy is the child of the Reformation." The fact is that? even in Protestant England, as well as in America, the true historical source of democracy lies in the institution and doctrine of , the Catholic Church. To prove this would only require us to consider representative ; political thinkers ■ from Hooker, Buchanan, and Milton to Locke and Ageron Sydney, and to show how dependent they are on Catholic canonists, legists, and schoolmen. But it is even more interesting to note that widespread ideals such as were embodied in the Scottish Covenanters, the English Levellers, and the American Puritans were directly derived from pre-Reformation democracy. In the 17th century there came a reaction ; against the • Protestant theory and practice of despotism by divine right, jure divino, and there was a return— unfortunately only partially successfulto the medieval ideas of natural rights, popular sovereignty, liberties of municipal and corporate bodies. And we are witnessing in the 20th century a further readaptation of those political ideas which the Reformation’discarded. The only important factor in ormatioh political adjustment which the modern world has definitely ..refused,to. reintroduce, namely, papal international arbitration and guidance, nations are now attempting to recreate by a rather dubious League of Nations. “ '' , The assertion that democracy is the child of Catholicism sounds to prejudiced ears far-fetched and paradoxical. But just clear away the gathered'clouds of prejudice created by anti-Catholic historians, and you will see at once that it is profoundly true. In the Middle Ages what corporate entity, any .way like a modern State, was there but the Catholic Church ? Even the holy Roman Empire was a shadowy ideal. What representative assembly was there Only the ecclesiastical ; courts and chapters. What really political thinking was done? Only the discussions concerning Church government. Where do we find, the forerunners and models of our democratic assemblies ? In those mixed councils and conventions , of ecclesiastics and laymen which determined religious discipline and social policy.. They were a matter of course in Spain from the middle of the seventh century, and assumed a special import-' ance in France towards the close of the eleventh century. The most famous of such assemblies was the Council of Clermont (1095), attended by archbishops, bishops, abbots, religious, and laymen of I different countries. What councils established Pacts of Peace and enacted the Truce of God? Those great popular' assizes which laymen and even women attended. - Adequate acknowledgment has never been given to the Church for the social and political influence l of. such, corporate action. These great diocesan meetings accustomed the people to joint action by mutual pact'*and deliberate agreement in defence of liberty and "justice but even the small resulting parish organisations, kept up by voluntary tribute, evolved into the system of local liberties which, upheld the King against feudal chieftains, and thus founded what we know as the modern State. Before it came to designate a municipality, the word “commune" meant the diocesan or even parochial associations of peace; nay, in the 12th century, pax was often synonymous with, covimunia. \Lt is to the Church that we owe the .'commune and consequently the House of Commons. v g In another important ~ way, too, the .Church organisation served the cause of democracyit introduced the idea of representation. As early as the 6th century we find disputes of chapters/appearing in councils, and it; was in Spain that the Church stood out most conspicuously as the pioneer of representative democracy.

What was the origin of the Cortes ? Why. the Councils of Toledo containing both nobles aiid clergy. And every student of -. history knows how."powerful'' the Cortes was during the last century and a-quarter of the -Visigothic rule, and how it survived even the shock of f Moorish invasion. In the Christian Kingdoms of the north the purely ecclesiastical, functions gradually .passed/ to special clerical assemblies.. And thus in 11th centuryrLeon, Castile, and Aragon, "emerged." the' first representative parliaments (based on the principle of • States and . orders) to replace the primary assemblies of antiquity, Nay, more, already in the 12th century, we find towiirepresentatives in the assemblies of. Spain, Sicily/.and Gascony—whereas the English boroughs were- first .represented in the Parliament of 1265. So democracy'is by no means sa ;v peculiar product of I the Anglomind, except, perhaps, the idea of parliamentary absolutism. : The procuradores of a Spanish.city,- received, credentials and letters of instructions (poderes), and for subjects outside these they were bound to refer again to their constituents; that is, they ; were merely delegates. ■' '■'. - 'v ■ ■ •■.; ••: -_\ss :■■-' %

Democratic government, therefore, owes its inception to the Catholic Church ; but it owes much of its

perfection, to the Friars; The Friars (this will be news to the average Protestant) exercised enormous influence on the public opinion of Europe, and threw .their weight on the side of liberty. They were strong supports of Simon de Mont-fort. But they also carried the representative system to a development not attained'" even yet in the secular State. Ever since the 13th century the Dominican Order possessed an elaborate system of representative government which has left its mark -oh' English constitutional history. (See Barker, The Do - minican Order and Constitution, 1913.) It is.,in the Dominican Constitution of 1228 that we discover the

first explicit assertion and enactment of constitutional principles, some of which waited six centuries before being adopted (or . imitated) by ’ secular States. Here are a few-of them : (1) , All authority. is ultimately invested -in -representatives Selected by local communities. (2) There is V practically complete self-determination the Convent : elects its prior, the Province its provincial, the Order ; its general. - (3) There is a clear distinction., between constitutional and ; legislative enactments; any new constitutional measure must for validity be : reenacted by three successive chapters or else be passed in -a special constituent assembly ( capitulum generalissimum only held twice, in 1228 and 1236), (4) Federalism ,is combined with autonomy; the general, provincial, and conventual chapters and priors form a gradation of international, national, and local legislatives, and, executives. There is nothing incongruous in translating a religious rule in terms savoring of Westminster or Paris, when we are dealing with a century, when the friars were the great intellectual and moral force in Europe, and politics were not yet secularised and isolated. : Thus ? .William of Ockham, an Englishman, - a political writer and a friar, juxtaposes Order and State : “The King is superior to the whole kingdom, and yet in certain cases he is inferior to it, for in the case of necessity the kingdom gan depose and imprison him. This follows from natural law, just as force may be met with force. So also *in many religious Orders the head is superior to all the brethren, and yet in certain cases the general chapter is superior to the head and can dismiss him.' ’■ (Octo Quest'iones, ii., 7; Gold--hart, Monorchia, ii., 341.) | To give a striking instance of the priority of Oath- ' olic democracy, to modern, take Nicholas of Cusa, three and a-half centuries before America declared that Governments derive “their just powers from, the con- : sent. of the governed.'' " He says: “Every constitution! is rooted in national law and cannot be valid. if it con-1 tradicts it; . . . ; Since all are .free by nature, all government, whether by written law or a . prince, is based solely on the agreement and consent of ‘ the sub-*;

ject. For, if by nature men are equally powerful and free, true and ordered power in the hands of one can be established only by the election, and consent of the others, just as law^alsofis^ established -by consent. It is clear, therefore, that the binding validity of all constitutions is based on tacit or -express- agreement and consent." (Dioloc/us, . Goldhart, ii., .603). And this democratic teaching had the almost unanimous adhesion of the best canonists and theologians from 1515 to 1623. Such, then, are; the seed-thoughts and the embryo-, outlines of democracy which we owe to Catholic civilisation and culture. The great Catholic Church, for over eight centuries; slowly .trained Europe in the theory and practice of self-government, finally "eventuating in commune, Cortes, Parliament, and States. The discussion concerning the structure of the Church formed, for nearly three'centuries, the great polemic of the: West, and thus inaugurated and habituated in : men's -minds those categories of political thought whose inheritors we are to-day. And all the while 1 there flowed that stream of deep, patient thinkers who from Thomas Acquinas, Nicholas, d'Oresme, Antony of Florence, down to Almain;-Major, Bellarmine, and Suarez, upheld the ideal of popular rights and government by consent. From the annals of the Catholic : past ~ from her most renowned canonists, legists, arid" schoolmen, were drawn those principles .which" shattered for ever the Reformation tenet .of Divine right crossed the wide antic, founded the American Republic, and have powers" and consequences not yet exhausted. ".v : v .