Rerum Novarum

Pope Leo XIII, 1891

More commonly known as The Workers Charter

From the Latin meaning of revolutionary changes Issued by Leo XIII on 1891 Considered the first of the Churchs modern social canon, as it represented a newfound understanding of

the need for the Church to offer its critical reflection on

the social issues of today

WHAT IS IT ABOUT?
Opens with a description of the grievances of the working class. It emphasizes the duties and obligations that bind owners of capital and workers to each other. Articulates the inherent dignity of both labor and laborer. Refutes the FALSE theories of socialists. Defends the right of ownership.

Let it be taken for granted that workman and employer should, as a rule, make free agreements, and in particular should agree freely as to wages; nevertheless, there is a dictate of natural justice more imperious and ancient than any bargain between man and man, that remuneration should be sufficient to maintain the wage-earner in

reasonable and frugal comfort. If through necessity or fear of a worse

evil the workman accept harder conditions because an employer or contractor will afford him no better, he is made the victim of force and injustice.

WHAT DOES IT TELL US?

It simply tells us that the state should prioritize labor over capital and that the dignity of the laborers should be of concern. The State has the right and the duty to intervene on behalf of justice and individual and social well-being; and employers and workers should organize into both mixed and separate associations for mutual protection and for self protection. All this is set forth with sufficient detail to reach the principal problems and relations of industrial and social life.