Prima Secundae
Lecture 246: The Mutability of Human Law and Custom

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forward thus it seems that is not lawful right or allowed to the one who is subject of the law that he act outside the words of law that's what the thing that's been court today for augustine says in the book on the true religion in temporary laws right or temporal laws although men judge about those things when they what institute them nevertheless when they're instituted and firm it is not lawful to what judge about them or to judge according to them well my friend there was speaking about uh john quincy adams there when they were admitting missouri into the what yeah it's going on balance the senate right because then the slave states and the question was could the federal government um prohibit slavery in missouri right and although um he was opposed to slavery right now he didn't think that according to the constitution they could prohibit it so they had a real problem there and then they decided to divide maine from massachusetts and that evened up the states again and then they had this uh you know a line there yeah yeah which would say states above here could get slavery but ones above could not have slavery at all right even though they had own slaves or sold slaves yeah yeah i guess washington dc was it was a mess in those early days it was just a muddy place you know and the rats and the pigs were moving around and they were moving around and there's all these shacks of the slaves you know they were there and no no no you got rats and pigs in congress and the slaves were in the city yeah yeah and he was this this arthur i was reading he was uh he was quoting you know the french ambassador you might say you know what did i do to be confined to this city you know i could live in this city because he could really be a lousy place i think it was hbo there was a mini series that was available it was very very well done very well acted very modern now in some not so good ways but they showed washington as it was being built and just a total mess that it was oh it was terrible and uh four blacks that were sort of sliding away building parts of it was uh no comfortable things for people coming down you know like the representative people you know they didn't have much to know but it's definitely a second objection right yeah moreover it pertains to him alone right to interpret the laws to whom it belongs to what constitute the laws right but men subject to the law it doesn't belong to them to what constitute the laws right therefore it doesn't belong to them to interpret the intention of the legislator but always they ought to act according to the words of the law however everyone who is wise knows how to explain his meaning in words but those who what establish the laws are regarded as being what yeah for it says for by wisdom in proverbs 8 through me kings rule and the givers of laws discern just things you know because aristotle gives example you know the silly laws you know that the greeks had sometimes as a sign you know the force of custom you know but these irrational laws persist you know despite reason it's kind of a sign he gives there the force of custom you know you have to watch out therefore it's what yeah intention of the lawgiver except through the words of the law right so where the hell do they find the portion right there in the constitution you know it wasn't there from the emanations from the penumbra yes very much yeah spirit of the vatican too against this is what hillary says in the fourth book about the what trinity yeah the understanding of things said right from what causes right should be what yeah because things are not to be subject to what speech but to the thing the speech ought to be subject to thomas often quotes that now he's talking to the trinity yeah so there's a question there where thomas was saying you know should you say that the son is always being born from the father or the son is always born of the father well of course one objection says you know isn't the the present tense right isn't that most appropriate to eternity right so then you want to say that son is always being born of the father right yeah but thomas says when you're talking about something coming to be right if you do that in the present it's not yet complete and so if you want to symbolize the perfection of the father right yeah you should you should use the past right yeah yeah and so um you could it'd be better to say that the son is always born of the father right but not that the son is always being born because he's not quite born right it's not there yet yeah he's always being generated right and there's something imperfect there right so you know christ says before abraham was i am you know that was more appropriate for him to use the present right he says that's the most appropriate to turn it to you but sometimes you have to use another case because the defect of our language right it's adapted to talking about things like we're you're being born you know it's not quite there not quite out i answer it should be said that has been said above every law is ordered to the common what safety of men right and to that extent it obtains both the force and the what definition of law right according as it falls short of this right it does not have the notion of what binding whence jurisprudence wherever he is justinium okay so it's probably uh it's one of us here right now justinium okay and that know what law or equity does what benignity suffer that those things which are what safely right or healthfully or easily for the usefulness of men are deduced that they do not what by a more more uh duriorum or uh stubborn interpretation against the common what usefulness commodium would lead to what severity right now that's kind of what the supreme court's trying to say today right that they you know it's a big things uh not work you know if we don't uphold this yeah yeah i guess the irs i guess pays those things out those those things and they did it on their own you know it's not in the law that happens many times it's something you Right, to observe something for the common, what, salvation is useful, ut in pluribus, right, which nevertheless in some cases is more, what, yeah. When Aristotle is talking about the way we see in ethics, you know, he speaks of it in one place as roughly, right, and Thomas says, that is applying universal and simple things to singular and complex things. Because, therefore, the lawgiver cannot, what, look upon all singular cases, huh? He proposes a law according to those things which happen in pluribus, huh? Keeping its intention, right, keeping its intention, common usefulness. Once, if there come forward, huh, there emerge cases in which the observation of such a law is harmful to the common, what, salvation, it should not be, what, observed, huh? So there are times when you should drive on the left side of the street? Yeah, when the right side is, yeah, there are electric wires there or something, right? And now you have to, now you have to go around that, right, huh? It would be harmful to go through the electric wire, huh? Or the right, half the street is flat, huh? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just as in a, what, a city is being, what, besieged, there is statute of law that the goats, that the gates of the city should remain closed, right, huh? Because this is useful to the common salvation with the pluribus, right? But if it happens, in case, that the enemy, right, huh, pursues some civilians through whom the city is conserved, it would be harmful to the city unless the, what, a, and therefore in such a case, the door should be opened, huh, against the words of the, what, law, that there might be observed the common usefulness which the legislature, in fact, intends, yeah. But nevertheless, this should be considered, that if the observation of the law, according to the words, does not have a sudden danger to which is necessary at once to, what, act, does not pertain to just anyone to interpret what should be useful to the city and what useless, right? But this only pertains to the, what, princes, who, in account of cases of this sort, have authority for dispensing in the laws, huh? So Shakespeare does that one of the plays, right, huh? Of course, my friend, my friend had read about six or eight plays at Shakespeare by the age of ten, huh, John Quincy Adams, right? Oh, yeah. He didn't have all that junk, right? Oh, yeah. Because his father insisted his sons learn Greek, you know, the best language there is, he says. He was so well-read, you know, even in the world's literature, you know, that he could get along very well as a diplomata. He was very fluent in languages, too. One of the few men, Americans at the time, he would speak French, Dutch, German, Russian. Wow. Went to his father when his father was an ambassador. Yeah, he went to France. So, yeah. And then he went to Russia as secretary to the ambassador to Russia. I guess when he and his wife, you know, came to Germany now, he spoke fluent French and German, so I started right away into that. I'm going to expect these Americans not to be able to speak the languages, which, as they say, is true even of our ambassadors nowadays. They don't know the language of the country they're going to. See, I guess when Jefferson was given this opportunity to buy the Napoleon, right, huh? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And then he got kind of, when he had the authority to do so, right, John Quincy stepped in and justified it. But it's partly about, you know, the old trick, you know, saying that it's a tweety, you know, which is an authority to do, for instance. It is a lot of things that you didn't know, you know, about. You realize how ignorant you are of your own countries. Oh, yeah. Yeah, they don't, because at school they don't learn much of these things at all. Well, I guess after the second thing of Monroe there, the second thing, Monroe announced he's not going to try for a third term, right, huh? So everybody in his cabinet is trying to be an ex-president, right? So they're all, you know, fighting among themselves and so on. And I guess the secretary of defense there, he had some of his cronies there in the army, right, huh? And Monroe had cut back on the, you know, the paying of the army, so he was very indignant that some of his cronies were not being kept, right? So he came to the White House, you know, and he yelled at the president, and he took up his cane like he was going to whack him one. And so Monroe picked up the things in the fireplace, you know, and ordered him to serve him. That's the last time he got here in the White House, you know, the rest of the thing. But he realized how all these little stories, you know, that tell you what things are like in those days, huh? See, when he became, when he was elected president himself, John Quincy, and he was the sixth president, huh? And that would be in 24, I guess, 1824. Nobody could ever get enough electoral votes in those days to be president, right? So I guess according to the Constitution, it goes into the House of Representatives, right? Well, anyway, Jackson, of course, at that time was running for a thing and so on. And he had the most popular votes, but he didn't have the majority, right? Well, then Clay was running too. He was hoping that he'd be appointed Secretary of State, right? Because that was a stiffly stone of the presidency in those days. And so he switched his votes anyway to John Quincy, right? Well, then everybody was yelling, you know, this is a deal, you know, that Quincy had done this, which he hadn't done with Clay, right? When Clay was made Secretary of State, right? So he was hamstrung, this whole thing. He couldn't accomplish anything because Jackson and the people had the majorities in the House or Senate, and they hammered him, you know, they stopped everything. He had been, you know, for six years in the Senate, you know, and then later on he was in the House after he retired from the presidency. So he was in the Senate for six years, and then he was president for four years, and then he was, you know, for a long number of years there. He died in the House, you know, if you remember, for a long years. But if there'd be a sudden danger, right, huh? One undergoing such a, what? Not such a thing. Yeah. Then necessity, what? Has it dispensed annexation? Because necessity is not subject to the law, huh? That's the thing about Andy Jackson, right? He was our general there, you know, in Florida, right? And he still belonged to Spain, right? But the Indians there and runaway slaves were coming over into Georgia, you know, stealing and killing people and running back again and doing violent things. So he went in there and cleaned up the place, right? And the question was, was he doing, was this law for or not, right? And then he finally kind of forced the Spain to cede, you know, Florida to them. They were afraid of the Napoleon of the woods, meaning Jackson, right? So Jackson should be popular, right? So he got to be president. And this necessity is. And this necessity is. as annexed to a dispensation, right? Because necessity is not subject to the law. There goes the necessity again, right? Yeah. Okay. Now, to the first objection. To the first, therefore, it should be said that the one who in the case of necessity acts apart from the words of the law does not judge the law itself, right? But he judges about a singular case which he sees that the words of the law ought not to be, what, observed, huh? To the second, it should be said that the one who follows the intention of the lawgiver does not interpret the law simply, but in a case in which it is manifest and to evidence of, what, harm that the legislator intended something other, right, huh? If, however, it would be doubtful, he ought either to act according to the words of the law or consult the spirit, huh? To the third, it should be said that the wisdom of no man is so great that he can, what, think out all these singular cases, right? And therefore, he is not able sufficiently through his own words to express those things which are suitable to the end intended. And if the legislator were able to consider all cases, it would not be necessary that, what, all. Yeah, but the law ought to be what carried according to those things which happen. What, to the law you will say. It's a little guy that's Thomas, isn't he, huh? So you're reading Thomas carefully, frequently, and with reverence? You know, Kajetan says about Thomas there, he so reverenced the, what, fathers of the church, he seemed to have inherited the mind of, what, all of them, right? So Thomas then, you know, did the other things, too, huh? He read carefully, frequently, and with reverence, the church fathers. And therefore, you might say, he's rewarded by inheriting the mind of all them, right? You see that in Aristotle when he reads the early Greeks, too, huh? Even though he's quite superior to them, you know, with logic and everything, right? He's the father of logic. He has this great, you know, reverence and respect for the early men, huh? They call it sometimes a golden age of Greek philosophy, you know, the age from Thales to Aristotle. It's kind of fun to read David Hume, you know, he talks about Aristotle, you know. His reputation's all coming, you know, it's all evaporated, you know. Yeah. Hume's always coming out these things, you know, you get to involve this life of Johnson, you know, because you hear things about Hume. And they're talking about death, you know. And it doesn't bother you, Mr. Hume, you know, that you're not going to be anymore after you die. Well, no more than it embosses me that I was not departing. All kinds of things, you know. Johnson has no sympathy with these, you know, these statements, you know. To Hume is. I guess Hume is a pretty long history, though, in England, huh? That's kind of appropriate they should descend to the level of history, huh? When I go and read this history of John Quincy, I was kind of relaxing, you know. You go from this tough stuff, you know, it's universal stuff. You realize the singular is kind of proportioned, because of your senses and so on. But you realize history is not. The best description of history, you know, is one damn thing after another. I think Rousseau said it was just, it's a bag of tricks. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whoever writes it, it's a bag of tricks. I think there's been one damn thing after another. It's amazing, I mean, how many... I worry about my little grandchildren, you know. Remember my Uncle Al, you know, I said, I'm not too worried about myself. He said, don't worry about my children, you know. The future is going to hold for them, you know. It's a good thing. There's a little old lady in South Dakota, Marie Schwartz, and she was kind of crazy. Yeah. Kind of like a bag lady. Yeah, yeah. She's come into church, and she's praying, and she's really thick, and she's really crazy. And one day I was praying in church, and she came up, and she said, you know what? I said, what, Marie? She said, God is still in charge. Thank you for reminding me. Thanks for reminding me, Marie. I appreciate it. Okay, now on the mutation of laws. Then we're not to consider about the change of laws and about this four things are asked First with a human law is changeable Second with it should always be changed when something better occurs Third whether it is abolished by what custom and with a custom obtained the power of law right now I remember one time this guy was being interviewed, you know, a physician at Assumption in Political Science, right, huh, and so And they're talking, you can listen to them, and so on. They're talking about, they're talking to the students about Policy, what is the policy, you know, with the state troopers, right? In other words, there's a speed limit, right, huh, let's say the speed limit is 60, let's say, out there Will they stop if you go 65 or do they wait until you're going 70? What is the policy? You know, it's custom right, right, you know, to You know, service certain, you know, going beyond the speed limit, you know, if you go yeah, this might be your bound to Stare them into activity, right, huh? National conferences by the UN on women, on children They're all attempts to establish a body of custom, which will be transformed into international law Yeah Ideally, according to the alleged promulgators, binding on all, you know, all the nations And that's one of the reasons why they're such insidious kind of things Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, yeah, they're trying to get a woman picture on the $10 bill now, you know It's who's the other thing, right? Well, the discussion is who it's going to be, you know, because all kinds of ridiculous stuff Share, share Something suggested that this guy would turn himself into a woman, you know, kind of, you know, and he tried to do so No, put him on the $3 bill Put him on the $3 bill Yeah Someone else was proposing a $25 bill You know, $425 would make $100, right? We need a $25 bill I hate to see Alexander Hamilton get knocked off the $10 bill He's a handsome guy, you know And, you know, Lincoln's kind of ugly, you know, and all the other guys are kind of ugly on some of the bills, you know You hear that famous remark of the Lincoln-Douglas debates, where Douglas said you're two-faced, you know And Lincoln turned the eye and says, no, I asked you, I didn't say, if I had another face, would I wear this one? It is preferably ugly, you know Yeah, yeah And about this four things are asked What can we ask them? You know, up to three and not four But the use of the human law should be changed through the disposition of the, what? Rulers, what that means exactly To the first, then, one goes forward this It seems that human law in no way ought to be changed That's kind of a strange argument, huh? For human law is derived from the, what? Natural law, right, huh? As has been said above It's the day for knocking things over I went to church to pray a little before I came in here, you know I set this thing down next to my pew For some reason I didn't sit down properly And this thing is heavy, you know And bang, you know Because there are two guys in there praying, you know So I said, what kind of a person is coming to the chapel now, you know It's like a bomb off, a terrorist in church Yeah, yeah, yeah I went to Mass this morning And the kind of alarms, you know For some reason they were set off, you know With the light And it's a bright light, you know It's flashing So they can stop that before they start Mass, you know Because it's just, you know It's kind of blinding you, you know It's just They'll be able to stop it, you know Okay, for human law is derived from the natural law This has been said above But the natural law remains, what? Immobile Therefore human law ought to, what? Remain Immobile Yeah Moreover, as the philosopher says in the fifth book of the Ethics A measure ought most of all to be, what? Permanent, huh? So my example is you shouldn't use a rubber binder as your measure, right? It keeps on changing, right? If you stretch it, you know, it's not So you need something that's a wooden or a metal But the human law is the measure of human acts Therefore it ought to remain, what? Oh, yeah What's the name of that thing in Paris there? The Yeah, yeah It's kept there very sacred, yeah The whole country's gonna, the whole world's gonna be Discombobulated if that If that loses its supermanence, right? Moreover, it's of the notion of law that it be just and right But that which is once right is always right Therefore that which is once a law ought always to be the law Are you all convinced by this, huh? Yeah, Warren Murray tells me about traveling in Germany there, you know And the landlady lays down the laws, you know, when you come there, you know And this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, you know It's really the difference between Writing a room there in Germany and writing a room in Paris or someplace A law, a temporal law, although it is just, right? Augustine says in the book on free judgment Should be, what? Is able to be changed, right? Two times Juste, right? Justly, right? Augustine doesn't buy into these three objections But that's three against one, anyway It's just the authority of Augustine, right? But because you're a great reverence for Augustine You better think twice Or thrice Okay When the Pope said Whoever disagrees with Thomas is always suspect I answer, it should be said, as has been said above That human law is a certain, what? Dictate of reason, right? I mean, that word dictator, is that related to the word dictator? By which human acts are directed, right? And according to this There is a, what? Two-fold cause That human law be justly, what? Changed One on the side of reason itself And the other on the side of, what? Men Whose acts are, what? Ruled by law Now on the side of reason Because, what? Reason That it proceeds gradually Step by step From the imperfect To arrive at the, what? Perfect, eh? Paulatum I see that word a lot of Thomas, eh? Whence we see in the looking sciences, eh? That those who first philosophied, right? Treated some things Very perfect Which afterwards Through Those who came afterwards Were, what? More perfected, eh? So also It is in things to be done For the first Who intended to find something useful To the, what? Community of men Not being able To consider all things From themselves Or of themselves Or by themselves They instituted some things That were imperfect Failing in many, what? Ways, huh? Which afterwards They, what? Changed Instituting some things Which Only in Smaller cases Fewer things In fact De- Or fail short Of the common use Of the common use Of the common use So that's one way of reason, right? Because reason takes time, right, to see what's correct. It's things that are imperfect at first, right? True of the Father laying down the law in the house. You say, Rosie, you didn't hang up the keys. You violated house rule J3. We have a law of this. You come in the house, you put the keys in the little key box there so that you go. As long as I forget too, Curtis. Kind of joke about that. It's surprising that many people can't find the keys, huh? You get more common, right? Yeah. Now on the part of men, whose acts are ruled by law, right? Law can rightly be changed in account of the changing condition of human conditions, the conditions of men, by which according to the diverse conditions, diverse things are what? Dispedient, yeah. Just as Augustine lays down the example in the first book on free, what? Judgment. Where the quote came, the said counter came, the same word. That if the people or populace is well moderated and grave, huh? Intelligent and the common utility. Rightly a law is laid down by which for such a people it is listed to create for itself a what? Yeah. Through which the Republic administered. But now if, Paul Lacton, huh? The same people, becomes what? Depraved, huh? Having a what? So corrupted to sell their votes and entrust the government to scoundrels and criminals. They're talking about, like this phrase, low information voters. And they have a lot of low information voters, right? Around, you know? And they should really have the vote, right? You know? Now, I was reading this thing, the life of John Princey Adams, you know, some states still had this property requirement, right? You had to have property for a certain amount to be able to vote, huh? But then in the western states who were admitted, you know, beyond the original, they were letting people who had anybody, any male, right? Full suffrage, you know, without any property, right? They wouldn't put up with this aristocratic thing, huh? Of course, John Princey, he was back in the time we grew up where there was a property thing, and it wasn't until the 1820s, at least, you know, that they started to, you know, in Connecticut, things like that, to go away with those laws, right? But they were getting into a more rough electorate, huh? But now you've got, what they call it today, though, I call it today, I hear this phrase, low information voters. Yeah, and if you can get friends on the mirror, it's a good quote. Yeah, yeah. One of the friends of my brother-in-law there, you know, was helping out in a governorship race here in the state of Massachusetts, many years ago now. I remember him telling me, he's all good all over the states, you know, he says, it's amazing the ignorance, you know, the people, you know, and when they support a candidate who actually stands for the absence of what they want, they don't even realize it, you know. And it's just, it's obvious to him going around the states, you know, that the people just don't know what's what, you know. They don't even know what's in accordance with what they want. They don't know what's right for, you know, the state. Yeah. You realize how ignorant people are and so on. Yeah. Because the swing voters, those who are unimportant, don't decide until the very day of the election are so key these days. Yeah. The way they're portrayed in the media is kind of humorous. They're portrayed as almost Solomonic, you know, sort of on the one hand or on the other. Who should I vote for? It's the elections of tomorrow. I haven't decided. But the way they're portrayed, they're very wise and kind of prudent. But, of course, they're portrayed that way by the New York Times and others that try to push them in their direction. The right one takes away from such a people, I guess, the power of giving honors and what? Return judgment to the what? Yeah. Judgment of the few good, yeah. That's what John Quincy Adams thought, you know. And he was not gonna, you know, go out and campaign for the presidency, huh? Okay, now, what about these wonderful objections, huh? To the first, therefore, it should be said that the natural law is a partaking of the eternal law and therefore it remains, what? Yeah. And it has its immobility and perfection of the, what, divine reason? Yeah. Instituting, what? Nature, yeah. But human reason is changeable and imperfect and therefore his law, or its law, is changeable, huh? And moreover, the natural law contains certain universal precepts, which are always humane, huh? But the law laid down by men contains precepts that are particular according to, what, diverse cases that emerge, huh? When can kids buy liquor, you know? Some states have, some states at 18, some at 21, you know. I think in this state they're trying to bring the age for really getting an abortion down to 16 now, and so on. It's just, they're very defective in the law sometimes. Very defective. It's so complex that our legislatures don't have the time of the inclination to read for the law because they have thousands of pages of documentation. I remember, yeah. When Cardinal Wright came back, you know, to, when he was established in Rome, you know, he came back and gave some talk. Just the way he spoke about abortion, you know, what's going to do to this country, you know. He anticipated all the evil was going to do. It was kind of dramatic the way he said it. Yeah, it's really long, and nobody's going to have time to read that. Bishop out in Wisconsin said, it's not as long as the Affordable Care Act. I'm glad to see that the Pope thinks that the science and technology are the answer to our prayers. The Pope says exactly the opposite. Remember, it's part of the greatest, the world's greatest to libertify. That's right. To second it should be said that a measure ought to be, what, permanent quantum es possibile, right, as much as is possible. But in changeable things, it cannot be altogether what? And therefore the human law cannot be entirely right. To the third it should be said, what is right in bodily things is said absolutely, and therefore always as far as of itself remains right. But the rectitude or rightness of the law is said in order to the common utility, to which is not always what? Suitable, one and the same thing, right? Sadness that above. And therefore such a rectitude is what? Changed. Radical. Radical. Radical. Radical. Radical. Radical. Radical. Radical. Radical.