ipl-logo

How Did Natural Laws Influence Early America

1322 Words6 Pages

The Influence of Natural Law Philosophy on Early America
In 1690, English philosopher and political theorist John Locke published Second Treatise of Government. Within Second Treatise of Government, Locke proposed principles such as natural rights, and the rights and regulations of kings and the government. Almost a century later, this same document sparked America’s founders to rebel against the British Empire. Locke’s natural rights philosophy influenced early American society and its founders- specifically within the ideas of life, liberty, equality, and revolution. In order to understand its influence however, one must contemplate what Locke defined as natural rights.
According to Second Treatise of Government, Locke defines “life, health, …show more content…

One of the most famous lines in all of America’s documents sums up John Locke’s theory of natural laws. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” [5] This statement means that God gives us rights, such as life, liberty, and happiness. These rights cannot be taken away and are equally given by God to all men. It is easy for one to notice that this idea proposed in the Declaration is almost identical to Locke’s proposed natural rights philosophy from Second Treatise of Government. However this is not the only part of the Declaration which reflects the idea of natural rights. Jefferson, the composer of the Declaration, speaks into the ideas of life and happiness as a natural right quite often. Specifically, Jefferson discusses how the king “has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people”, therefore Congress, “in support of this Declaration, with a pledge of firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.” [6] With these passages, The Americans were actively having their lives and happiness taken away by Britain. Their lives were not respected, nor where they protected as John Locke said men should be. Even after the Boston Massacre where several innocent colonists were killed, British Parliament protected the soldiers, “by a mock Trial, from punishments for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States.” [7] Americans did not have healthy lives, and they also did not have liberty. Liberty is “the condition of being free of restraints, especially the ability to act without control or interference by another or by circumstance.” [8] As written

Show More
Related
1211 Words | 5 Pages

When you are born you are given natural rights. John Locke once said that we have the right to life, liberty, and property. Well, King George III and the british parliament did everything in their power to take these freedoms from the colonist. The colonist put up with this at first, but as they starting listening to patriot authors and using their own reason, they realized they were being cheated of their natural rights and freedoms. Two of these patriot authors, being Thomas Jefferson and John Dickinson, wrote in Continental Congress; “In our own native land, in defence of the freedom that is our birthright, and which we ever enjoyed till the late violation of it- for the protection of our property, acquired solely by the honest industry of our forefathers and ourselves, against violence actually offered, we have taken up arms” (Document 2).

Read More
1404 Words | 6 Pages

Locke’s foundation for all his assertions on liberty is “that creatures of the same species and rank, promiscuously born to all the same advantages of nature, and the use of the same faculties, should be also equal” (Locke 8). With this comes “natural liberty” which Locke defines as “to be free from any superior power on earth,…to have only the law of nature for his rule” (Locke 17). The state of nature is something that all men are born into, but must leave to gain both stability and law because in the state of nature, as Locke write above, nature is the only force that rules man. Once one leaves the state of nature a shift is seen; now, “the liberty of man, in society, is to be under no other legislative power, but, that established, by consent” (Locke 17). Locke equates the “law of Nature” as being related to the “law of God” and it is here where Locke’s argument can be seen as divinely ordained, in the same way Louis XIV’s rule was vested in God’s power (Locke 7).

Read More
1225 Words | 5 Pages

When the thirteen colonies fought to gain their independence from Great Britain, he used John Locke’s ideas to justify the war. (Pg. 641) Not only did Thomas Jefferson use Locke’s idea to justify the American Revolution, he also included it in the Declaration of Independence, which was written in July of 1776. The only difference is that Thomas Jefferson, instead of property, he used “pursuit of happiness”. John Locke did not only believe in a men’s natural rights, he also believed that it was the government’s duty to protect these rights, and that it’s power comes from the people.

Read More
587 Words | 3 Pages

The writers of the Declaration of Independence demonstrate that all men are equally created and are provided with [God-given] rights that cannot be taken away, and those include, the rights to, “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness”. In the preamble, the Declaration of Independence indicates, “… men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights… Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness,” (“The Declaration of Independence”). John Lock, the philosopher who strongly influenced that segment of the Declaration of Independence argues, how life is, in fact, an inalienable right because God owns us, in other words, we do not own ourselves (James). In society, the unalienable rights can be seen as how we have the right to do anything we want in our lives, but there are rules that are established so that we can remain safe and therefore, they should be followed. The unalienable rights present in the Declaration of Independence are just one of many examples that express democratic ideas important to American

Read More
965 Words | 4 Pages

Locke believed that everyone was born with the three natural rights life, liberty, and property. Life stands for people wanting to fight to survive, Liberty is for the people and what they wanted, Property is for the people wanting to do anything that appeals to them in order to survive and allows them to own their own things like land, food, supplies etc. i agree with this

Read More
835 Words | 4 Pages

One of the biggest influences that John Locke had on President Jefferson was, what John Locke dubbed, “Natural Rights,” and what Jefferson called, “Unalienable Rights.” Meaning practically the same thing, these rights were very similar, and it is obvious that Jefferson’s version derives from Locke’s ‘Natural Rights.’ John Locke’s version stated that all peoples shall possess the following rights: Life, Liberty, and Property. In this case, life means, that people people will fight to live and want to survive. Liberty refers to being free, and being able to make one’s own decision.

Read More
562 Words | 3 Pages

The Bill of Rights was partially inspired by the musings of John Locke. When constructing these rights, the Framers understood that "bills of rights challenged kings to remember the Lockean truth that the people had fundamental rights granted by nature, rights that the government could not abrogate" (Fox and Pope 107). Various amendments in the Bill of Rights use Lockean language and support his ideals, such as Amendment V with Locke's ever-famous "life, liberty, or property" (Fox

Read More
540 Words | 3 Pages

He believes that everyone is entitled to natural God-given rights such as life, liberty, and property. This famous phrase influences the Declaration of Independence, as it reads, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." McDonald explains the "appeal to Heaven", in which he states, "Locke made it clear that this check meant resisting tyranny by any force--an appeal to heaven being a state of war--and, if necessary included dissolving the government. " This is the idea that the American patriots, during the Revolutionary War, used when overthrowing the tyrannical British government. Also, this idea earned recognition in the Declaration of Independence where it states, "...

Read More
1245 Words | 5 Pages

(Declaration of Independence). Locke believed that people had a right to an independent government to serve them which he based on his natural rights. He said “whenever the Legislators endeavor to take away, and destroy the Property of the People, or to reduce them to Slavery under Arbitrary Power, they put themselves into a state of War with the People, who are thereupon absolved from any farther Obedience”. (Declaration of Independence) The americans were saying that the oppression by the British gave them permission to rebel.

Read More
755 Words | 4 Pages

Without them he would not soon have been recognized by Voltaire as, along with Newton. ”(2) These to great minds showed the great influence not only made on American, but also the world. John Locke’s idea of Natural Law is one the major ideas behind the founding fathers driving efforts to start the Revolutionary War. The idea that man has a choice in what he choices to do with his life without the influence of government or in there case a monarch.

Read More
1735 Words | 7 Pages

He states “to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” In this statement, Jefferson contends that governments do not establish their authority from gods or kings, but instead by the willful submission of the people being governed, whereby they agree to give up some freedom in exchange for the protection of the balance of their natural rights. Jefferson’s ideas of natural rights are clearly influenced from “Chapter VII: Of Political or Civil Society” in John Locke’s publication Two Treatises of Government. In this chapter, Locke alludes to natural rights as life, liberty, and estate. The concept of life, liberty, and estate (or property) can most likely be taken to mean that individuals should have the right to live, the right to think however they want, and the right to labor.

Read More
697 Words | 3 Pages

In his Second Treatise of Government, Locke revealed his interests in new science, developing theories of education and knowledge (SMW, 34). One of the main points in his Treatise is that of the law of nature, where all men are in natural state of perfect freedom (SMW, 34). Locke argues, “Men being…by nature all free, equal, and independent,

Read More
1256 Words | 6 Pages

After all of this is some colonists still doubted that they were victims of an attack on their liberty it was tooken away by the Boston Massacre in 1770. For the colonists the threat on their liberty was beginning to seem corrupt. This corruption was quickly spreading to the colonies. “The colonists’ remedy for that corruption was American Independence. ”(Chpt.2 Pg.46)

Read More
1899 Words | 8 Pages

N.p., 06 Sept. 2004. Web. Powell, Jim. " John Locke: Natural Rights to Life, Liberty, and Property | Jim Powell."

Read More
1294 Words | 6 Pages

The American revolutionaries had a high degree of familiarity with the enlightened ideas that spread to England, which in turn prompted the revolutionaries to see great value in maintaining and protecting their very rights and freedoms that were promoted in the Enlightenment. Perhaps one of the most obvious influences come from John Locke, and his writings can easily be used to aid arguments on behave of liberty, property, and order. John Adams, a founding father and second President of the United States, used the ideas of Locke to shape his “doctrine of justified resistance” in his revolutionary efforts. Meanwhile, Thomas Jefferson had a strong reaction against the “many unwarrantable encroachments and usurpations, attempted to be made by the legislature of one part of the empire, upon those rights which God and the laws have given equally and independently to all.” In the initial draft of the Declaration of Independence (June 1776), Jefferson echoes and rephrases the familiar sacred trinity of “life, liberty, and property” from Locke’s Two Treatises of Government: “We hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable; that all men are created equal and independent, that from equal creation they derive rights inherent and inalienable, among which are the preservation of life, and liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

Read More

More about How Did Natural Laws Influence Early America

Related Topics

Open Document