Rerum Novarum
Leo XIII’s encyclical of 15 May 1891 on the condition of the working classes, the founding text of modern Catholic social teaching. It rejects the Socialist remedy of common ownership and defends private property as a natural right, but condemns the “yoke little better than slavery” laid on the workers by unchecked competition. It sets out the duties of employers and workmen, calls on the State to protect the poor, limit hours and secure a wage sufficient for “reasonable and frugal comfort”, and defends the workers’ right to form associations.
- Edition
- The official English translation, issued as On the Condition of Labor: Encyclical Letter of Our Holy Father by Divine Providence Pope Leo the Thirteenth (New York: Benziger Brothers, 1891). Proofread against the page images of that pamphlet and against the same translation as printed in Henry George’s The Condition of Labor (New York, 1891). The encyclical’s own references are given as notes.
- Source
- Internet Archive
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Contents
- 1 Socialism and Private Property 19 min 25
Leo XIII opens with the conflict between capital and labour: industry and science have changed, wealth is concentrated, the guilds are gone, and a few rich men have laid on the poor “a yoke little better than slavery”. The Socialist remedy of common ownership he rejects as unjust and harmful to the worker himself. Private property is a natural right, grounded in human reason and foresight and in the labour a man puts into the land, and it belongs above all to the father as head of the family, a society older than the State. Its inviolability is the first principle of any remedy.
- 2 The Church 24 min 34
No solution is possible without religion and the Church. Inequality and toil are part of human nature after the Fall, and class is not by nature hostile to class: capital and labour need each other. Religion teaches workers to keep contracts and avoid violence, and employers to respect the worker’s dignity, give him time for religion and pay just wages. The rich must use their superfluous wealth for the poor, as a duty of charity rather than justice; the poor learn that poverty is no disgrace. The Church has always relieved poverty, and its charity cannot be replaced by State relief.
- 3 The State 24 min 25
The State must promote the common good and protect all classes, especially the poor, whose labour makes the nation rich, but without absorbing the individual or the family. It must protect property against agitators, prevent the causes of strikes, guarantee Sunday rest, and limit hours of work, with special care for miners, women and children. A wage agreed freely is not thereby just: it must be enough to support a frugal, well-behaved worker in reasonable comfort. The law should encourage workers to become owners, which would bridge the gulf between rich and poor, and should not crush property by excessive taxation.
- 4 Associations 21 min 20
Employers and workers can do much through mutual-aid societies and above all workmen’s associations, modern successors of the guilds. Men have a natural right to form such societies, which the State may regulate but not prohibit; Leo protests against the suppression of religious orders and the hindering of Catholic societies. Christian workers should form their own associations rather than join those led by men hostile to religion. Associations must put religion first, run their affairs honestly, settle disputes internally and provide for members in need. The letter closes by calling all classes, and above all the clergy, to act at once, and on Christian charity.