Just persuasion in Baroque electoral ethics

This paper surveys two controversies about electoral ethics among canonists and moral theologians from the Baroque period. The first controversy concerned the desirability of pre-vote electoral deliberations. The second controversy concerned the moral permissibility of electoral persuading. The dominant view was that the means of persuasion permitted to voters who objectively promote the common good are not permitted to voters who objectively seek to harm the common good. In the paper I assess the extent to which 'just canvassing' was held to be in some ways morally analogous to fighting in a just war.