How Did John Locke Influence The Two Practice Of Government

Fifty years after the writing of the Declaration of Independence, on May 8th, 1825, Thomas Jefferson wrote a letter to Henry Lee. Jefferson wrote to Lee telling him what he remembered and what inspired him and the Committee of Five to write the Declaration. Jefferson wrote he was not looking for new ideas, or principles that no one had thought of but to state the “common sense” of the subject of American independence. He went on to say that nothing was really “copied from any particular and previous writing,” but rather it was the American belief at the time. Even though Thomas Jefferson says nothing was really copied, the Declaration was definitely influenced by other thoughts, ideals, and principles that were written around that time.
When Thomas Jefferson states the Laws of Nature in the first paragraph of the Declaration it is in reference to John Locke’s Two Treatises of Government. John Locke wrote the Two Treatises of Government in 1689. Locke wrote about laws of nature in his Two Treatises of Government. His laws of Nature were outside of government; no official body of government has written them down and made them laws. The laws of nature governed society before government was founded. Locke’s laws of nature could be split into three parts. First, that all men were

This could be seen in the Great Awakening, colonists signed and upheld covenants with their respective churches, and sometimes each other. The covenants were contracts with God to maintain any religious obligations. The covenants the colonists had with each other was a way to agree to live peacefully together in a settlement. The colonists gave consent to govern each other and God just as Jefferson said people had the right to do. As Jefferson put it “Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the