Untitled Essay, Research Paper

Perhaps one of, if not the, most historically influential political thinkers of the

western world was John Locke. John Locke, the man who initiated what is now known as

British Empiricism, is also considered highly influential in establishing grounds,

theoretically at least, for the constitution of the United States of America. The basis

for understanding Locke is that he sees all people as having natural God given rights. As

God’s creations, this denotes a certain equality, at least in an abstract sense. This

religious back drop acts as a the foundation for all of Locke’s theories, including

his theories of individuality, private property, and the state. The reader will be shown

how and why people have a natural right to property and the impact this has on the

sovereign, as well as the extent of this impact.

Locke was a micro based ideologist. He believed that humans were

autonomous individuals who, although lived in a social setting, could not be articulated

as a herd or social animal. Locke believed person to stand for,

“… a thinking, intelligent being, that has reason and reflection, and can consider

itself as itself, the same thinking thing in different times and places, which it only

does by that consciousness which is inseparable from thinking.” This ability to

reflect, think, and reason intelligibly is one of the many gifts from God and is that gift

which separates us from the realm of the beast. The ability to reason and reflect,

although universal, acts as an explanation for individuality. All reason and reflection is

based on personal experience and reference. Personal experience must be completely

individual as no one can experience anything quite the same as another.

This leads to determining why Locke theorized that all humans, speaking

patriarchially with respect to the time “why all men,” have a natural right to

property. Every man is a creation of God’s, and as such is endowed with certain

individual abilities and characteristics as gifts from God. Not being able to know

God’s exact wishes for man, Locke believed that all men have an obligation to develop

and caress these gifts. In essence, each man was in charge of his own body and what was

done with his body. Of course, for Locke, each man would do the reasonable thing and

develop his natural skills and potentials to the best of his abilities, in the service of

God.

The belief in God given abilities and the obligations that follow are

not totally deterministic. Man, endowed with reason, could choose not to develop these

abilities. Having the ability to choose the development of his potential, each man is

responsible for that potential and consequently is responsible for his own body. The

development, or lack therein, is a consequence of individual motivation and is manifested

through labor.

In keeping with the theory of one’s body is one’s own, a

man’s property can be explained in terms of the quantifying forces of his labors.

Physical labor or exercisation of his mind, to produce fruits for this person’s

labor, is then his own property. Locke believed that one did not need the consent of a

sovereign, as far as property was concerned, because it is the melding of labor and nature

that makes anything owned. Yolton articulates this when he states, “(b)y mixing my

work, my energy with some object, (nature), I particulise that object, it’s

commonness becomes particular” Locke believed that as long as

there was plenty for others, consent was pointless, irrelevant and would merely be an

overzealous exercision of power. Pointless because as long as there was more for others in

the common store, one was not infringing on another’s natural rights. Irrelevant

because property production or the use of labor was completely individualistic and one

should not be able to control another’s labor as it is an infringement on their

natural rights.

There are however limits, as far as property and labor are concerned.

One limit is that of non destruction. God did not create anything for man to destroy. The

amount produced by any man should be kept in check by his level of destruction. For

example, there is a big difference between the cutting of one or a few trees and the

harvesting of an entire forest. Yolton explicates this by stating that, “… specific

rights comes in conjunction with this restriction. Since ‘Nothing was made by God for

Man to spoil or destroy,’ the property making function of man’s activities ought

to be curbed at the point of spoilage. If my acquisition spoils, I offend against the law

of nature, since I have, in the beginning, ‘no Right, further than’ my use. What

is useful and is used has value and the person who uses them a right to them. The same

rules are cited for land as for the produce of land.”

The making of currency as an unspoilable property and medium for

exchange seems to have by-passed this limit all together. Inequality becomes rampant and

as such an authority is needed to protect a man’s property and the social peace. With

the advent of money as unspoilable property, certain inequalities amoungst men would

develop. Those with less start to feel cheated and used. This is very dangerous for those

with more, because with these inequalities, comes the danger of theft, or injury to

property or body. It is for this reason that people enter into a social contract and

appoint a soveriegn. The sovereign has the ability to protect those whose property is in

danger, and will do so through the passing and enforcing of laws. In this way not only is

a man’s property protected, but a state of peace is maintained as well.

Locke not only believed in one individual’s right to property, but

every individual’s right to property. Since every person is a creation of God’s,

and it must be God’s wish that we serve him through the abilities that he’s

given us, to interfere with a man and his labor, or the consequence of his labor, that is,

his property, would be to interfere with God’s wishes. It is here that we begin to

see the limits of men as well as the limits of the soveriegn. After all, how anyone

interfere with the wishes of God?

Locke believed that the power for social control must come from the

sovereign. This sovereign is responsible to the will of the people, but has a protective

authority, governing both over land and people. Locke believed that if a body of people,

that is a community of people, chose to live and interrelate amongst each other, they must

choose to live by a greater force, that is they must enter into a social contract. This

force was the power of the majority manifested through the creation of a sovereign.

Problems can arise, when individuals cannot agree. For this reason there must be a ruler

and government to decide disagreements, make and enforce laws, and govern man.

The enforcement of rules is not as absolute as it may sound. Even with

the existence of a limited monarchy, man retains his individual and God given rights. As

such, the sovereign, had no right to aquire or take away the property of another. If he

did so he would be going against, God, the people, and all that is natural. The extent of

the services of the existing sovereign is to govern over, protect, and enforce the laws of

the people. Locke believed that the role of the sovereign and his authority is in serving

the people and that there must not be parental, that is absolute authority. Yolton

explains this like so, “If royal authority is derived from parental authority …

there would be as many kings as fathers… from parental power it necessarily follows

either that that all fathers have royal authority – in which case a contradiction arises -

no one has royal authority.” In this way Locke is seen as a man who wants to limit

the power of the sovereign over the individual. Locke believed

that the sovereign, created out of the need for the protection of individual rights, that

is, out of the need for protection of the privacy of property, could not manifest itself

publicly through excessive social control. Perhaps Locke’s idea is better explained

this way. “From privacy of possession, publicity of sovereignty does not follow…`no

Man could ever have a just Power over the life of another, by Right of property in Land or

possessions’” This, of course, would include the man of sovereignty and the men

of government. Property sets the limit of sovereignty, in that no man has just power over

another or another’s property. This right comes directly from God, because it is a

God given right that a man should gain property through labor. This also sets the tone of

the role of government, that of servitude instead of command.

Locke believed that civil society existed to free individuals from the

insecurity of the state of nature. He thought that men united voluntarily in a concerted

effort of preserving and protecting life, liberty, and estate. Here again we see the

importance of property. Government within limits can work beneficially for all of man

kind. This means that a sovereign would be necessary for the preservation of lives, the

promotion of freedom, and the protection of estate. Locke is quite adamant about the

preservation of individual freedom which Aaron describes as “need(ing) to be

jealously preserved.”

This right to the property produced through labor is an inalienable

right that each and every individual has. Even the soveriegn has no right to interfere

with or take away a man’s property. This is the true limit of any man or governing

body.

Locke favored a limited monarchy. This is an elected legislative

assembly and a monarch that have the power to direct the commonwealth to preserve the

community and it’s members and their rights. Locke believed that people were the

absolute sovereign, and that if the appointed sovereign abused his authority the people

would have the right to dissolve the government. This right of the people reinforces the

limitations of the sovereign, while enforcing the accountability of the sovereign. It is

in this sense that the community or the aggregation of individuality, retains power over

the sovereign and in essence limits it’s power. This is the extent of the limitation

of authority of the sovereign. The sovereign is a servant of the people, that has limited

power only as long as the majority allows it to have power. It was Locke’s intent

that the state was made for the individual and that the sovereign be used as a protective

instrument for the good of the individual.

Locke’s ideas of property are based on God given rights. Each

person has been given a body, with certain abilities and potentials, to use by God. The

use of this body is called labor and its product is called property. Since everyone has a

body and a level of potential everyone is capable of producing property. The purpose of

the sovereign is to protect the individuals right to property and their property. The

sovereign is limited in it’s power and authority and does not have the right to take

or interfere with any man’s property, since to do so would be an interference with

the right’s of man as given by God. It was Locke’s hope that with such an

ideology behind a people and their government that they might attain and retain

Locke’s version of the good life, that is life, liberty, and most importantly estate.

Bibliography:Aaron, Richard, John Locke, Oxford University Press, Toronto, 1963.Bowie, James, Twenty Questions: An Introduction to Philosophy, MacMillan

Publishing, New York, 1964.Locke, John, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Oxford

University Press, London, 1975.Magill, Frank, Masterpieces of World Philosophy, Harper and Row,

New York, 1961.O’Connor, D.J., John Locke, Pelican Books, London, 1952.Squadrito, Kathleen, Locke’s Theory of Sensitive Knowledge, University

Press of America, Washington, 1978.Yolton, J.W., Locke and the Compass of Human Understanding,

Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1970.

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