The Two Treatises of Government (or Two Treatises of Government: In the Former, The False Principles and Foundation of Sir Robert Filmer, And His Followers, are Detected and Overthrown. The Latter is an Essay concerning The True Original, Extent, and End of Civil-Government) is a work of political philosophy published anonymously in 1689 by John Locke. The First Treatise attacks patriarchalism in the form of sentence-by-sentence refutation of Robert Filmer's Patriarcha and the Second Treatise outlines a theory of civil society based on natural rights and contract theory.
Publication history
The Two Treatises is divided into the First Treatise and the Second Treatise. The original title of the Second Treatise appears to have been simply "Book II," corresponding to the title of the First Treatise, "Book I." Before publication, however, Locke gave it greater prominence by (hastily) inserting a separate title page: "An Essay Concerning the True Original, Extent and End of Civil Government." The First Treatise is focused on the refutation of Sir Robert Filmer, in particular his Patriarcha which argued that civil society was founded on a divinely-sanctioned patriarchalism. Locke proceeds through Filmer's arguments, contesting his proofs from Scripture and ridiculing them as senseless, until concluding that no government can be justified by an appeal to the divine right of kings.
The Second Treatise outlines a theory of civil society. Locke begins by describing the state of nature, a picture much more stable than Thomas Hobbes' state of "war of every man against every man," and argues that all men are created equal in the state of nature by God. From this, he goes on to explain the hypothetical rise of property and civilization, in the process explaining that the only legitimate governments are those which have the consent of the people. Thus, any government that rules without the consent of the people can, in theory, be overthrown.
Main ideas
The First Treatise is an extended attack on Sir Robert Filmer Patriarcha. Locke's argument proceeds along two lines: first, he undercuts the Scriptural support that Filmer had offered for his thesis, and second he argues that the acceptance of Filmer's thesis can lead only to absurdity. Locke chose Filmer as his target, he says, because of his reputation and because he "carried this Argument [jure divino] farthest, and is supposed to have brought it to perfection" (1 Tr., §79)
Locke ends the First Treatise by examining the history told in the Bible and the history of the world since then; he concludes that there is no evidence to support Filmer's hypothesis. According to Locke, no king has ever claimed that his authority rested upon his being the heir of Adam. It is Filmer, Locke alleges, that is the innovator in politics, not those who assert the natural equality and freedom of man.
First Treatise
The Second Treatise is notable for a number of themes which Locke develops therein. It begins with a depiction of the state of nature, wherein individuals are under no obligation to obey one another but are each themselves judge of what the law of nature requires. It also covers conquest and slavery, property, representative government, and the right of revolution.
Second Treatise
The work of Thomas Hobbes made theories based upon a state of nature popular in Seventeenth-Century England, even as most of those who employed such arguments were deeply troubled by his absolutist conclusions. Locke's state of nature can be seen in light of this tradition. Because there is no divinely ordained monarch over all the world, as was argued in the First Treatise, the natural state of mankind is anarchic. In contrast to Hobbes, who posited the state of nature as a hypothetical possibility, Locke is at great pains to show that such a state did indeed exist. Indeed, it exists wherever there is no legitimate government.
While no individual in this state may tell another what to do or authoritatively pronounce justice in a given case, men are not free to do whatever they please. "The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it, which obliges every one: and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind, who will but consult it" (2 Tr., §123)
What should be a state of peace very quickly begins to look like the state of war that Hobbes described (though the ill enforcement of the law of nature does not release individuals from their obligation to it, as it does in Hobbes).
It is to avoid the state of war that often occurs in the state of nature and to protect their private property that men enter into political society. It is also the state to which men return upon the dissolution of government, i.e., under tyranny.
State of nature
Ch. 4 ("Of Slavery") and Ch. 16 ("Of Conquest") are sources of some confusion: the former provides a justification for slavery, the latter, the rights of conquerors. Because the Fundamental Constitutions of Carolina provided that a master had perfect authority over his slaves, some have taken these chapters to be an apology for the institution of slavery in Colonial America.
Most Locke scholars roundly reject this reading, as it is directly at odds with the text. The extent of Locke's involvement in drafting the Fundamental Constitutions is a matter of some debate, but even attributing full culpability for its contents and for his having profited from the Atlantic slave trade, the majority of experts will concede that Locke may have been a hypocrite in this matter, but are adamant that no part of the Two Treatises can be used to provide theoretical support for slavery by bare right of conquest.
In the rhetoric of seventeenth-century England, those who opposed the increasing power of the kings claimed that the country was headed for a condition of slavery. Locke therefore asks, facetiously, under what conditions such slavery might be justified. He notes that slavery cannot come about as a matter of contract (which will be the basis of Locke's political system). To be a slave is to be subject to the absolute, arbitrary power of another; as men do not have this power even over themselves, they cannot sell or otherwise grant it to another. One that is deserving of death, i.e., who has violated the law of nature, may be enslaved. This is, however, "but the state of war continued" (2 Tr., §24), and even one justly a slave therefore has no obligation to obedience.
In providing a justification for slavery, he has rendered all forms of slavery as it actually exists invalid. Moreover, as one may not submit to slavery, there is a moral injunction to attempt to throw off and escape it whenever it looms. Most scholars take this to be Locke's point regarding slavery: submission to absolute monarchy is a violation of the law of nature, for one does not have the right to enslave oneself.
The legitimacy of an English king depended on (somehow) demonstrating descent from William the Conqueror: the right of conquest was therefore a topic rife with constitutional connotations. Locke does not say that all subsequent English monarchs have been illegitimate, but he does make their rightful authority dependent solely upon their having acquired the people's approbation.
Locke first argues that, clearly, aggressors in an unjust war can claim no right of conquest: everything they despoil may be retaken as soon as the dispossessed have the strength to do so. Their children retain this right, so an ancient usurpation does not become lawful with time. The rest of the chapter then considers what rights a just conqueror might have.
The argument proceeds negatively: Locke proposes one power a conqueror could gain, and then demonstrates how in point of fact that power cannot be claimed. He gains no authority over those that conquered with him, for they did not wage war unjustly: thus, whatever other right William may have had in England, he could not claim kingship over his fellow Normans by right of conquest. The subdued are under the conqueror's despotical authority, but only those who actually took part in the fighting. Those who were governed by the defeated aggressor do not become subject to the authority of the victorious aggressor. They lacked the power to do an unjust thing, and so could not have granted that power to their governors: the aggressor therefore was not acting as their representative, and they cannot be punished for his actions. And while the conqueror may seize the person of the vanquished aggressor in an unjust war, he cannot seize the latter's property: he may not drive the innocent wife and children of a villain into poverty for another's unjust acts, and so while the property is technically that of the defeated, his innocent dependents have a claim to it to which the just conqueror must yield. He cannot seize more than the vanquished could forfeit, and the latter had no right to ruin his dependents. (He may, however, demand and take reparations for the damages suffered in the war, so long as these leave enough in the possession of the aggressor's dependants for their survival).
In so arguing, Locke accomplishes two objectives. First, he neutralizes the claims of those who see all authority flowing from William I by the latter's right of conquest. In the absence of any other claims to authority (e.g., Filmer's primogeniture from Adam, divine anointment, etc.), all kings would have to found their authority on the consent of the governed. Second, he removes much of the incentive for conquest in the first place, for even in a just war the spoils are limited to the persons of the defeated and reparations sufficient only to cover the costs of the war, and even then only when the aggressor's territory can easily sustain such costs (i.e., it can never be a profitable endeavor). Needless to say, the bare claim that one's spoils are the just compensation for a just war does not suffice to make it so, in Locke's view.
Conquest and slavery
In the Second Treatise, Locke claims that civil society was created for the protection of property. In saying this, he relies on the etymological root of "property," Latin proprius, or that which is one's own, including oneself (cf. French propre). Thus, by "property" he means "life, liberty, and estate." By saying that political society was established for the better protection of property, he claims that it serves the private (and non-political) interests of its constituent members: it does not promote some good which can be realized only in community with others (e.g., virtue).
For this account to work, individuals must possess some property outside of society, i.e., in the state of nature: the state cannot be the sole origin of property, declaring what belongs to whom. If the purpose of government is the protection of property, the latter must exist independently of the former. Filmer had said that, if there even were a state of nature (which he denied), everything would be held in common: there could be no private property, and hence no justice or injustice (injustice being understood as treating someone else's goods, liberty, or life as if it were one's own). Thomas Hobbes had argued the same thing. Locke therefore provides an account of how material property could arise in the absence of government.
He begins by asserting that each individual, at a minimum, "owns" himself; this is a corollary of each individual's being free and equal in the state of nature. As a result, each must also own his own labor: to deny him his labor would be to make him a slave. One can therefore take items from the common store of goods by mixing one's labor with them: an apple on the tree is of no use to anyone — it must be picked to be eaten — and the picking of that apple makes it one's own. In an alternate argument, Locke claims that we must allow it to become private property lest all mankind have starved, despite the bounty of the world. A man must be allowed to eat, and thus have what he has eaten be his own (such that he could deny others a right to use it). The apple is surely his when he swallows it, when he chews it, when he bites into it, when he brings it to his mouth, etc.: it became his as soon as he mixed his labor with it (by picking it from the tree).
This does not yet say why an individual is allowed to take from the common store of nature. There is a necessity to do so in order to eat, but this does not yet establish why others must respect one's property, especially as they labor under the like necessity. Locke assures his readers that the state of nature is a state of plenty: one may take from communal store if one leaves a) as much and b) as good for others, and since nature is bountiful, one can take all that one can use without taking anything from someone else. Moreover, one can take only so much as one can use before it spoils. There are then two provisos regarding what one can take, the "as much and as good" condition and "spoilage."
Gold does not rot. Neither does silver, or any other precious metal or gem. They are, moreover, useless, their aesthetic value not entering into the equation. One can heap up as much of them as one wishes, or take them in trade for food. By the tacit consent of mankind, they become a form of money (one accepts gold for apples with the understanding that someone else will accept that gold for wheat). One can therefore avoid the spoilage limitation by selling all that one has amassed before it rots; the limits on acquisition thus disappear.
In this way, Locke argues that a full economic system could, in principle, exist within the state of nature. Property could therefore predate the existence of government, and thus society can be dedicated to the protection of property.
In the Twentieth Century, Marxist scholars made Locke into the founder of bourgeois capitalism. Those who were opposed to communism accepted this reading of Locke, but celebrated him for it. He has therefore become associated with capitalism.
Property
It is a misconception that Locke and his social contract demanded a democracy. Rather, Locke felt that a legitimate contract could exist between citizens and monarchies or oligarchies. His ideas heavily influenced, however, both the American and French Revolutions. His notions of people's rights and the role of civil government provided strong support for the intellectual movements of both revolutions.
Representative government
Locke believed that the relationship between the state and its citizens took the form of a 'contract,' whereby the governed agreed to surrender certain freedoms they enjoyed under the state of nature in exchange for the order and protection provided by a state, exercised according to the rule of law. However, if the state oversteps its limits and begins to exercise arbitrary power, it forfeits its 'side' of the contract and thus, the contract becomes void; the citizens not only have the right to overthrow the state, but are indeed morally compelled to revolt and replace it. A secondary view on Locke's position of revolution argues that Locke requires that the legislative power must be dissolved, not by the actions of the common people, which effectively puts people back into the state of nature. This view would not suggest that people have the right to revolt, but rather to resist an arbitrary power to dissolve itself in order to make way for a new political structure.
Right of revolutionReception and Influence
Although the Two Treatises would become well-known in the second half of the eighteenth century, they were somewhat neglected when published. Between 1689 and 1694, around 200 tracts and treatises were published concerning the legitimacy of the Glorious Revolution. Three of these mention Locke, two of which were written by friends of Locke. By 1815, Locke's portrait was taken down from Christ's College, his alma mater.
Britain
Locke's influence during the American Revolutionary period is disputed. While it is easy to point to specific instances of Locke's Two Treatises being invoked, the extent of the acceptance of Lockean ideals and the role they played in the American revolution is far from clear. The Two Treatises are echoed in phrases in the Declaration of Independence and writings by Samuel Adams that attempted to gain support for the rebellion. Thomas Jefferson opined that Locke was one of the three greatest men who ever lived. The colonists frequently cited Blackstone's Commentaries on the Laws of England, which synthesized Lockean political philosophy with the common law tradition. Louis Hartz, writing at the start of the Twentieth Century, took it for granted that Locke was the political philosopher of the revolution.
This view was challenged by Bernard Bailyn and Gordon Wood, who argued that the revolution was not a struggle over property, taxation and rights, but rather "a Machiavellian effort to preserve the young republic's "virtue" from the corrupt and corrupting forces of English politics."
America
The Second Treatise was traditionally taken to be a refutation of Thomas Hobbes's Leviathan, the latter's support of absolute monarchism seemingly antithetical to Locke's ideal majoritarian government. Scholarship in the Twentieth Century has modified this view somewhat, though the views of Locke that result from these interpretations often have little in common.
Leo Strauss in his Natural Right and History contentiously argues that Locke is more or less Hobbesian in his conception of politics. Strauss claims that the supposed egoism of Hobbes' natural law and the ostensible altruism of Locke's can be reduced to an identical moral framework, one in which people are to treat others as others treat them, to be selfless when others are selfless, selfish when others are selfish. Strauss argued that Locke only distanced himself from Hobbes rhetorically, in order to make his system more publicly acceptable. In this way, Locke corrects Hobbes on Hobbesian principles, and so should not be read as breaking from him philosophically.
At about the same time, C. B. Macpherson argued in his Political Theory of Possessive Individualism that Hobbes and Locke stood together in laying the groundwork for proto-capitalism. He saw them both as instigators of the liberal tendency to view the subject as a possessive entity in an economic sense, and argued that Locke's striking account of property rights in the state of nature should be read primarily as a justification for market economic relationships.
The Cambridge School of political thought, led principally by Quentin Skinner, John Pocock, Richard Ashcraft, and others, developed in opposition to interpretations such as Strauss's and, to a lesser extent, Macpherson's. It focuses on placing much of Locke's political philosophy within its historical context, following the trail laid by Peter Laslett in the Introduction to his edition of the Two Treatises. Laslett argued that, contrary to the traditional view that Locke had composed the Two Treatises in order to legitimize the 1688 Glorious Revolution, they were actually written surrounding the Exclusion Crisis a decade earlier. Laslett demurred to establish a firm relationship between Locke's thought and that of Hobbes, though he did note some similar themes.
Richard Ashcraft argued in Revolutionary Politics and Locke's "Two Treatises of Government" that Locke instead wrote the Two Treatises later, and that he should therefore be associated with the Radical Whigs and the intrigues surrounding the Rye House Plot and the Monmouth Rebellion. These associations, and the economic system prevalent in England at the time, Ashcraft argued, render Macpherson's interpretation historically implausible. He also asserted that the absence of any reference to Hobbes, the questionable utility of refuting Hobbes when he was a non-issue in the most immediate debates, and the fact that Locke claims to have never read Hobbes or Spinoza, "those justly-decried names," harms any interpretation that interprets Locke as in any way responding to Hobbes. This last point is leveled most vociferously against Strauss's interpretation.
Regarding the relation between Locke's thought and that of Hobbes, the core of the dispute centers on the literary character of the Two Treatises. Those who support a connection of any sort treat the work as having been intended, at least in part, as a philosophic tract, and therefore as potentially speaking beyond the immediate political context. Those who deny such a connection insist that the Two Treatises are nothing more than a particularly popular remnant of an ideologically driven political contest, and were not meant to address any broader questions.
Notes
Ashcraft, Richard. Revolutionary Politics and Locke's "Two Treatises of Government". Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986.
Ashcraft, Richard. Locke's Two Treatises of Government. Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1987.
Dunn, John. The Political Thought of John Locke. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969.
Laslett, Peter. "The English Revolution and Locke's 'Two Treatises of Government'." The Cambridge Historical Journal 12, no. 1 (1956). Pp. 40–55.
Laslett, Peter. "Introduction." Two Treatises of Government. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988.
Macpherson, C. B. Political Theory of Possessive Individualism. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1962.
Pangle, Thomas L. The Spirit of Modern Republicanism. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988.
Strauss, Leo. Natural Right and History. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1953.
Waldron, Jeremy. God, Locke, and Equality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002.
Zuckert, Michael. P. Natural Rights and the New Republicanism. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994.
Zuckert, Michael P. Launching Liberalism. University Press of Kansas, 2002.
