The Tension between Individual and Political Ethics: Morality,Public Policy,and Abortion in the United States

“General” or “legal” justice roughly corresponds to contemporary meanings of “social” justice. It should also be noted that realm of law is generally not recognized as valid in the Enlightenment tradition of liberal individualism.

Curran Charles Toward an American Catholic Moral Theology. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1987, p. 198. This is Curran's interpretation of paragraph seven of the document.

Newman Jeremiah Foundations of Justice. Dublin: Cork University Press, 1954, pp. 72–75. This is a much different view than that of modern liberal individualism, in which the state has no concern with the moral life of its citizens, nor directly with the realization of the common good. Indeed, the purpose of the state in the typical liberal view is primarily to enforce contracts and restrain people from harming each other, in such a way that free and unrestrained competition is assured. And it is the “invisible hand” of those market forces that will realize the common good, and the ability to pay of those who are successful in the market that will assure participation of those who are worthy in the common good.

Dolan Joseph “Natural Law and Legislation.” Laval theologigue et philosophique 17 (1961), p. 53.

Dolan Joseph “Natural Law and Modern Jurisprudence.” Laval theologigue et philosophique 15 (1959), p. 253.

Dolan Joseph Italics added.

Aquinas Thomas St. Treatise on Law (Summa Theologica, Questions 90–97), with an Introduction by Stanley Perry. Chicago: Henry Regnery Company, 1969, I–II 93.3 ad 3.

It is ironic that two great saints would permit something that our own secularized and somewhat licentious society does not.

Human law is framed for a number of human beings, the majority of whom are not perfect in virtue. Wherefore human laws do not forbid all vices,… but only the more grievious [ones], from which it is possible for the majority to abstain; and chiefly those that are to the hurt of others, without the prohibition of which human society could not be maintained. Human law, Aquinas continues, does not lay upon the multitude of imperfect men the burdens of those who are already virtuous, namely, that they should abstain from all evil. Otherwise these imperfect ones, being unable to bear such precepts, would break out into yet greater evils. (Aquinas, Treatise on Law, I–II 96.2 and ad 2.

Dolan , “Natural Law and Legislation,” p. 256.

Dolan “Natural Law and Legislation,” p. 260. Italics added.

Kaveny Cathleen M. “Abortion and the Law: A Thomistic Perspective.” Thomist 55 (1991), p. 380.

Aquinas , Treatise on Law, I–II 95.1.

Aquinas , Treatise on Law, I–II 97.2.

Aquinas , Treatise on Law, I–II 96.4.

Gula Richard Reason Informed by Faith: Foundations of Catholic Morality. New York: Paulist Press, 1989, pp. 259–61.

Aquinas, Treatise on Law, I–II 95.3 obj. 1.

Kaveny pp. 361–2.

See, for instance, Grisez Germain Abortion: the Myths, the Realities. New York: Corpus Books, 1970, p. 340. Richard McCormick, How Brave a New World? Dilemmas in Bioethics. Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 1985, pp. 160–1. Benedict Ashly and Kevin O'Rourke, Healthcare Ethics, 3rd edition. St. Louis: The Catholic Health Association of the United States, 1989, pp. 184–8.

McCormick Richard How Brave a New World: Dilemmas in Bioethics. Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 1981, p. 200.

McCormick Richard How Brave a New World: Dilemmas in Bioethics. Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 1981, p. 200.

Carlin David “Abortion, Gay Rights, and the Social Contract.” America 168 (February 27, 1993), p. 10.