Whether It Is Fitting That the Law Should Debar Certain Persons from
the Office of Advocate?
Objection 1: It would seem unfitting for the law to debar certain
persons from the office of advocate. For no man should be debarred
from doing works of mercy. Now it belongs to the works of mercy to
defend a man's suit, as stated above (A. 1). Therefore no man should
be debarred from this office.
Obj. 2: Further, contrary causes have not, seemingly, the same
effect. Now to be busy with Divine things and to be busy about sin
are contrary to one another. Therefore it is unfitting that some
should be debarred from the office of advocate, on account of
religion, as monks and clerics, while others are debarred on account
of sin, as persons of ill-repute and heretics.
Obj. 3: Further, a man should love his neighbor as himself. Now it is
a duty of love for an advocate to plead a person's cause. Therefore
it is unfitting that certain persons should be debarred from pleading
the cause of others, while they are allowed to advocate their own
cause.
_On the contrary,_ According to Decret. III, qu. vii, can. _Infames,_
many persons are debarred from the office of advocate.
_I answer that,_ In two ways a person is debarred from performing a
certain act: first because it is impossible to him, secondly because
it is unbecoming to him: but, whereas the man to whom a certain act
is impossible, is absolutely debarred from performing it, he to whom
an act is unbecoming is not debarred altogether, since necessity may
do away with its unbecomingness. Accordingly some are debarred from
the office of advocate because it is impossible to them through lack
of sense--either interior, as in the case of madmen and minors--or
exterior, as in the case of the deaf and dumb. For an advocate needs
to have both interior skill so that he may be able to prove the
justice of the cause he defends, and also speech and hearing, that he
may speak and hear what is said to him. Consequently those who are
defective in these points, are altogether debarred from being
advocates either in their own or in another's cause. The becomingness
of exercising this office is removed in two ways. First, through a
man being engaged in higher things. Wherefore it is unfitting that
monks or priests should be advocates in any cause whatever, or that
clerics should plead in a secular court, because such persons are
engaged in Divine things. Secondly, on account of some personal
defect, either of body (for instance a blind man whose attendance in
a court of justice would be unbecoming) or of soul, for it ill
becomes one who has disdained to be just himself, to plead for the
justice of another. Wherefore it is unbecoming that persons of ill
repute, unbelievers, and those who have been convicted of grievous
crimes should be advocates. Nevertheless this unbecomingness is
outweighed by necessity: and for this reason such persons can plead
either their own cause or that of persons closely connected with
them. Moreover, clerics can be advocates in the cause of their own
church, and monks in the cause of their own monastery, if the abbot
direct them to do so.
Reply Obj. 1: Certain persons are sometimes debarred by
unbecomingness, and others by inability from performing works of
mercy: for not all the works of mercy are becoming to all persons:
thus it ill becomes a fool to give counsel, or the ignorant to teach.
Reply Obj. 2: Just as virtue is destroyed by "too much" and "too
little," so does a person become incompetent by "more" and "less."
For this reason some, like religious and clerics, are debarred from
pleading in causes, because they are above such an office; and others
because they are less than competent to exercise it, such as persons
of ill-repute and unbelievers.
Reply Obj. 3: The necessity of pleading the causes of others is not
so pressing as the necessity of pleading one's own cause, because
others are able to help themselves otherwise: hence the comparison
fails.
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