Here’s an account of how Pope Pius IX (Giovanni Maria Mastai-Ferretti [1792-1878; pope: 1846-1878]) made absolutely sure that the “doctrine” of papal infallibility would be approved by Vatican I (1870). In the text, “majority” = “conservatives,” those who campaigned for infallibility; “minority” = “liberals,” those who fought against it:
Much publicity had attended the summoning of bishops and theologians to Rome for the preliminary work of organization, but it remained for [Lord Acton] to reveal the less publicized facts that, as far as possible, only those well-disposed to infallibility had been invited, and that not until protests by leading German Catholics was the University of Munich, the most celebrated (and liberal) Catholic academy, represented at all. The Roman penchant for mystery first concealed from the theologians the real purpose for which they had been convened, and then bound them by the seal of secrecy of the Holy Office (the Inquisition). By these, and many similar devices, it was made certain that the regulations drawn up for the conduct of the council would redound to the Pope’s favor. Thus, it was decided that decrees would be issued in the name of the Pope instead of the council, a procedure not invoked even by the Council of Trent. Nor were the bishops to have the right to originate motions; this function was reserved to two commissions from which the minority, as the liberal opposition became known, was carefully excluded, so that, on the most important, the Commission of Faith, the 200 liberal bishops had not a single representative. These rules of procedure were so much to the liking of the papal party that it was also decided to prohibit discussion or amendment of them at the council itself, which provoked Acton to remark that the Pope left the council with nothing but “the function of approving.”
In addition, the minority was grossly under-represented numerically at the council. Wherever it happened to be strong – Germany, the Austrian Empire, France, and America – the number of bishops relative to the Catholic population was infinitesimal compared with the proportion in Italy and Spain, the main infallibilist countries. Typically in Acton’s vein are the [journalistic passages] describing the preponderance of Latins at the council: the 700,000 inhabitants of the Roman States were represented by 62 bishops constituting half or 2/3 of every commission, while 1,700,000 Polish Catholics were represented by the Bishop of Breslau, who was not chosen for a single commission; 4 (out of 62) Neapolitan and Sicilian bishops could, and did, out-vote the archbishops of Cologne, Cambray, and Paris, representing a total of 4,700,000 Catholics. In ecclesiastical statistics, it appeared that 20 learned Germans counted for less than 1 untutored Italian. “The predilection for the infallibilist theory,” [Acton] deduced, “is in precise proportion to the ignorance of its advocates.”
With the organization of the council weighted, in advance, against the minority, the additional impediments placed in the way of free discussion and consultation seemed supererogatory: debates, conducted in Latin, condemning 9/10 of the prelates to silence and most of the others to confusion, wretched acoustics in the lavishly fitted and spectacularly high assembly hall, the refusal to permit bishops to examine the stenographic reports of even their own speeches, the prohibition of meetings of 20 or more bishops outside of the council, the strict censorship of literature (which meant that minority documents had to be printed in Naples or Vienna and smuggled in illegally), and the time-honored custom of the Roman postal office of opening letters suspected of heresy or error. And, if all these precautions should, by chance, fail, it was made a mortal sin to communicate anything that took place in the council, “so that any bishop who should, for instance, show a theologian, whose advice he sought, a passage from the Schema under discussion, or repeat an expression used in one of the speeches, incurred lasting damnation!”
When the opposition persisted, in spite of these difficulties, other expedients, described by [Acton], were attempted. Debate was cut short, minority speakers were interrupted, a few violent scenes were staged, and rules of order were liberally interpreted to favor the infallibilists. Toward the end of the council, all pretence of sober and free discussion was abandoned, and the final text of the constitution was rushed through without any debate at all. Outside of the assembly hall, other more or less subtle mechanisms operated to undermine the spirit and destroy the force of the minority. There were the enticements of the well-stocked papal preserves – the titles, benedictions, and dispensations which the Pope could issue or withhold, at will. There were 15 vacant cardinals’ hats dangled over many more vacillating heads. The exercise of papal influence ranged from the most obvious appeal to clerical vanity, as in the case of a uniquely decorated stole bestowed upon one gratified bishop, to the genuine sentiments of affection felt for the Pope and the desire to compensate him for the disrespect of the world. Pius, himself, had thrown off the sham of neutrality early in the proceedings of the council, affirming his personal conviction of his infallibility, issuing papal briefs commending the efforts of the majority bishops, and openly chastising, and even censuring, members of the minority. An aged Chaldean patriarch, having delivered a speech against infallibility, was roundly abused by the Pope and forced to resign his office, while another cardinal, the Archbishop of Bologne, guilty of the same offence, was confined to the isolation of his room and ordered to prepare a formal retraction. In most cases, there was no need to exercise such overt pressure. Many Italian bishops, and others from distant lands, were not allowed to forget that it was the papal court that supplied them with food, lodging, and traveling expenses.
If everything else failed, there was one final threat, the idea that resistance to the Pope was blasphemy against the Holy Ghost, and that the members of the minority…were guilty of heresy even before the official promulgation of the dogma. Those who were worried because they could see nothing in the tradition of the church to support the dogma of infallibility were supposed to have been soothed by Pius’ bland assurance, “The tradition is myself,” and by his frank admissions of divine inspiration. The assembly hall with the miserable acoustics was not so ill-chosen after all, it was later discovered, for the rays of the sun were seen to fall exactly on the place occupied by the papal throne from which Pius would announce his infallibility. That the throne was not accidentally put in that position was suspected by those familiar with the Pope’s attachment to the mystical symbol of the sun. On his own order, a portrait had been painted of him, in which, in [Acton's] description, “he stands in glorified attitude on a throne proclaiming his favorite dogma of the Immaculate Conception, while the Divine Trinity and the Holy Virgin look down from Heaven well pleased upon him and, from the cross, borne in the arms of an angel, flashes a bright ray on his countenance.”
*****
For five more weeks, the deliberations of the council dragged on, with the minority capable only of some delaying actions. On July 13 [1870], the preliminary voting occurred. The 764 bishops in attendance in January had dwindled to 680 or 690 and, of those, 88 voted non-placet, 62 placet juxta modum, and 80 or 90 abstained, although they were present in Rome. The opposition resolved to leave Rome in a body rather than yield to the dogma immediately and, in the public session of the 18th, when the dogma was solemnly promulgated, only 2 bishops remained to pronounce the words non-placet and, then, to make their submission.
…For the first time in the history of the church, the Pope was accredited with supreme personal and immediate authority reaching to every individual communicant over the heads of all mediating officials, an authority extending not only to matters of faith and morality, but also to church governance and discipline. It was explicitly forbidden to appeal from a papal judgment to an ecumenical council, so that the last stronghold of the bishops was destroyed, together with the whole structure of jurisdictional autonomy. Not satisfied with having scored a triumph over the bishops, the council, in the words of [Cardinal] Manning’s famous boast, had also “triumphed over history.” The decree proclaimed, as a divinely revealed dogma, the infallibility of the Pope when he spoke ex cathedra, and solemnly pronounced anathema upon anyone who denied this infallibility.
From: Lord Acton: A Study in Conscience and Politics by Gertrude Himmelfarb (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1952), pp. 101-104, 106-107.
John Acton (1834-1902), made Lord Acton in 1869, was a politician, scholar, and author – and a Roman Catholic who opposed the “doctrine” of papal infallibility. He is best known for his statement: “power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”
