SOURCES OF LAW. — The expression is to be understood in a twofold sense: sources of production (fontes existendi) are distinguished from sources of cognition (fontes cognoscendi). The former are those which contribute to the formation of the legal system, the latter are the means and documents from which the content of legal norms is ascertained.
Sources of production are also commonly distinguished into material sources (organs which establish norms) and formal sources (means through which a norm acquires the character of a legal norm).
I. ITALIAN LAW
For Italian law, a source of production of law is the State, either inasmuch as it directly establishes the legal norm, or inasmuch as it confers upon other subordinate entities the faculty to issue, within the limits of their respective competence, legal norms, or inasmuch as it recognizes the validity of a custom.From a formal point of view, there are four sources of production of Italian law: laws, regulations, norms in labor matters, and usages (art. 1 of the preliminary provisions to the Civil Code).
A law is a norm issued by the organs designated for that purpose by the Constitution; it is formal when approved by the Chambers and promulgated by the President of the Republic (art. 70 and 73 of the Constitution), or material when issued by the government or other authorities having the faculty to issue legal norms (art. 76 and 77 of the Constitution).
A regulation is a norm issued by the organs of the executive power (art. 87 of the Constitution) or by other authorities within the limits of their normative autonomy. It is, by its nature, subordinate to the law. A typical form of regulation is that issued to facilitate the correct application of the law, or executive regulation. Alongside this, there is the so-called independent regulation, which governs matters subject to the discretionary powers of the executive. Lower authorities may also issue regulatory norms within, of course, the limits of their own competence.
The complex matter of labor relations, which, according to art. 1 of the preliminary provisions, was governed by corporative norms, is now regulated, pursuant to art. 43 of the legislative decree of 23 November 1944, no. 369, by the norms of collective agreements, the judgments of the labor magistracy, and corporative ordinances. This remains in force until the norms for the application of art. 19 of the Constitution, which recognizes the binding force of collective labor agreements concluded by recognized unions, are issued.
Usages or customs are rules of conduct uniformly and constantly observed by the members of a community, in the belief that they are obeying a legal imperative (v. CONSUETUDINE). Custom may be distinguished into praeter legem, secundum legem, and contra legem; the last is not admitted by Italian law; the first can only take effect when there is a complete absence of law governing the matter; in matters for which there are laws or regulations, usages have effect only when expressly referred to (art. 8 of the preliminary provisions).
To ensure knowledge of already formed and declared enforceable legal norms, a system of publicity is established, which, for laws, is effected by their insertion in the Official Collection of Laws and Decrees and their publication in the Official Gazette of the Italian Republic.
It is evident that, once published, laws and regulations, as documents that make known the will of the legislator, are sources of cognition of the law. Alongside these individual sources, in almost all modern States there exist codes, organic laws having normative value by virtue of a specific delegation conferred upon the executive power, which collect the norms regulating a broad branch of legal activity. At present, the codes in force in Italy, in order of promulgation, are the Penal Code and the Code of Criminal Procedure (1930), the Civil Code and the Code of Civil Procedure, and the special Code for Navigation (1942). Alongside the codes, mention must also be made of the so-called consolidated texts, which are compilations of laws regulating a single matter or related matters, usually compiled at official initiative to facilitate their knowledge and application.
II. CANON LAW
With regard to canon law, it is necessary to distinguish the sources of divine law from those of human law. Natural divine law (v.) and positive divine law (v.) have as their source of production God, the former as Creator, the latter as Legislator. Sources of cognition of positive divine law are Revelation, namely the Bible (Old and New Testament), and Tradition (the transmission of divine precepts) occurring outside Holy Scripture. Strictly speaking, divine law, whether natural or positive, constitutes a source of canon law insofar as it pertains to matters that are the object of canon law (v. DIRITTO DIVINO; D'IRITO CANONICO). It must also be noted that the precepts of divine law which are not enforced by the Church, that is, which are not reproduced in positive norms, do not form part of canon law.Material sources of production of canon law are the organs invested with jurisdiction of the external forum. These are the Supreme Pontiff (can. 218) and the Ecumenical Council (can. 218 § 1), which alone can issue universal laws, that is, laws valid for the entire Church, subject, of course, to the limits of divine law precepts. Such power may also be delegated, and in fact is, even with a certain stability, especially to those organs of the Roman Curia which assist the Supreme Pontiff in the government of the universal Church (there are also cases in which, for example, the Pontifical Commission for the Authentic Interpretation of the CIC [v.], an organ of the Roman Curia, is invested with ordinary—though vicarious—legislative power which pertains by right to the Supreme Pontiff).
Alongside the sources of production of universal laws, there are those of particular laws, which are still the Supreme Pontiff and the Ecumenical Council, and, within the limits of their respective power, other organs having jurisdiction over the entire Church (v. GIURISDIZIONE). Moreover, particular councils are sources of production of laws which, if approved by the Sacred Congregation of the Council (can. 291), have validity in the territories of the Ordinaries who participated or should have participated in the councils themselves; finally, sources of production of particular laws are the Ordinaries, whether with territorial or personal jurisdiction, and certain organs designated by the constitutions of exempt clerical religious institutes (can. 501).
For the formal sources of production of canon law, V. CONSUETUDINE; LEGGE ECCLESIASTICA.
The sources of cognition of canon law are to be distinctly considered in the following historical periods: from the origins to Gratian (11th century), from Gratian to the Council of Trent (1563), from the Council of Trent to the CIC (1917); V. CODEX IURIS CANONICI; COLLEZIONI CANONICHE; CORPUS IURIS CANONICI.
Sources of knowledge of current canon law, besides the Code of Canon Law (CIC), which, moreover, does not ordinarily apply to the Eastern Church (can. 1), are: previous universal laws expressly or implicitly reserved by it; special laws of a transitory or exceptional nature; territorial laws issued to fulfill obligations assumed by the Holy See in concordats (can. 3); particular laws contrary to the CIC expressly maintained in force, and those not contrary to it (perhaps excluding penal norms); customs contrary to the CIC expressly maintained in force, and those immemorial or centenary customs contrary to it which, in the judgment of Ordinaries, cannot be abrogated; customs *praeter legem* which, again in the judgment of Ordinaries, are to be left in force; finally, subsequent laws issued by the Holy See or with its consent, which may even derogate from the provisions of the CIC.
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One can form a first certain judgment on the substantial morality of an act by considering what functions as its object. It is precisely one of the essential tasks of moral science to determine and classify human acts from the standpoint of their objective moral value. The most general categories of this classification are: good, bad, indifferent, or better acts; intrinsically or extrinsically good or bad; gravely or lightly bad (mortal or venial sin).
II. THE END
The end is also a term of the will, but in a different way from the object: the object is what one wills, whereas the end is that for the sake of which one wills. Even when object and end concretely coincide, they represent two distinct real aspects toward which the will directs itself. The object is what is willed or effected by the will, but with a view to a further end. The object is that toward which the will tends, but the end is what the will intends. Hence the will finds satisfaction not in the object but in the end, which represents the motive (reason) of the volitional tendency (intention). Now the end, being the formal object of the will, imparts to it its own moral quality. In short, the moral quality of a man’s actions is judged not only by their objective content but above all by the moral quality of his intentions, the motives for which he acts, and the ends he seeks to attain. A man may pursue, in a single act, several ends independent of one another, or complementary and subordinate ends, one as the principal end and another as secondary. In such cases the act is considered virtually multiple and takes its moral coloring from the predominant end.III. THE CIRCUMSTANCES
Every concrete human act necessarily proceeds from an agent situated in particular conditions of time and place; these and other circumstances grouped in the well-known verse *Quis, quid, ubi, quibus auxiliis, cur, quomodo, quando* can confer different moral values on the act. They can alter the theological species of the act, or add new moral species, or intensify, aggravate, or diminish those already possessed by virtue of the object and the end. For example, from the circumstance *quis* (the acting subject) it may depend that an act, good in object and end, is concretely contrary, gravely or lightly, to the moral order, as in the case of a spouse who enters religious life despite the dissent of the other spouse.It must be kept in mind that for an act to be called good, it must not present any moral deformity either in its object, its end, or its circumstances; yet if any one of these three elements is morally vitiated, the act may be called bad. *“Bonum ex integra causa, malum ex quocumque defectu.”* And since it is never lawful to perform an act that is concretely bad, it follows from the principle just stated that it is never lawful to perform a good end by means of an act intrinsically bad in its object. In the circumstances, the end does not justify the means; nor is it lawful to perform acts that are good in object and end but bad in circumstances.
BAL.: *Summa Theologiae*, 1-2, qq. 8, 18; J. E. Van Roey, *Non sunt facienda mala ut eveniant bona*, in *La vie diocésaine*, 2 (1908), pp. 114–20; E. Ranwez, *C’est l’intention qui fait l’action*, in *Collections Numericenses*, 22 (1928), pp. 135–40; G. Gagnan, *Fin justifie les moyens*, in *DTHC*, II, cols. 8–17; D. Simonin, *La notion d’intention dans l’œuvre de St Thomas d’Aquin*, in *Revue des sciences philosophiques et théologiques*, 19 (1930), pp. 445–53. Gaetano Corti