The common good is widely acknowledged as a fundamental principle of political life. Yet totalitarian regimes have committed countless atrocities in its name. To this day there is much misunderstanding of what the common good means. Is it a set of basic goods and services to be doled out by the State for the benefit of all? Fr. Brad Elliot gives us Charles De Koninck’s perspective on the common good as clarified by St. Thomas Aquinas.