John Locke Views On Government

The Second Treatise of Government provides Locke's theorizes the individual rights and involvement with the government; he categorizes them in two areas -- natural rights theory and social contract. 1.Natural state; rights which human beings are to have before government comes into being. 2.Social contact; when conditions in natural state are unsatisfactory, and there's need to develop society into functioning of central government.

In 1981, the nation was a loose confederation of states, which each operated like an independent country. The government had no judicial branch or executive officer. It lacked the authority to enforce its requests for money or troops from states. Since recently earning independence, the founders and public sought to protect the following in the Constitution: freedom of speech, freedom of press, freedom of religion, the right to bear arms, the right to not be subject to unreasonable seizures or searches, the right to not be forced to quarter soldiers, the right to due process of the law, the right to a fast and public trial by jury with counsel, the right to a civil trial by jury, the right to not be subjected to excessive bail and cruel punishment, and protection of state’s rights. Current protections and responsibility of states and Americans found in the U.S. Constitution were based upon John Locke’s Second Treatise of Government, the Magna Carta, and the English Bill of Rights.

John Locke argued for individual freedom. If we had individual freedom we would have a strong government. Locke said it was necessary to a good government. Locke wrote “People are naturally free and have the right to maintain their freedom.”(Document A) To keep this freedom people needed to construct a government that has both an executive and a legislature. To Locke a government created by the people was the best government in his futuristic sense of

When looking at the Declaration of Independence and the justifications which Jefferson used in order to encourage the dissolve of the ties between the United Colonies and Great Britain, it becomes apparent how much of the theories of John Locke that Jefferson used as the basis for his argument. Focusing particularly on the second paragraph of the Declaration, the arguments for the equality of each man and the formation and destruction of governments come almost directly from Locke's Second Treatise of Government. The other arguments in the Declaration of Independence deal primarily with each citizen's rights and the natural freedoms of all men, two areas that Locke also spent

John Locke was born on August 29th, 1632 in Wrington, Somerset. John’s father was a lawyer and a small landowner. He fought on the parliamentarian side during the English civil war of the 1640s. John attended elite Westminster School. Between 1652 and 1667, John enrolled in Christ Church, Oxford where he was a student and a lecturer. He attended Christ Church so he could study medicine. Medicine has played a large role in his life and he was always fascinated of it. John received an outstanding education because of his father’s connections and allegiance to the English government. He, later on, became a highly influential philosopher, writing about political philosophy, epistemology, and education. John Locke’s writings helped found modern Western philosophy.

Even though the American colonists are their own entity, the British government still assumed control over the colonies. Situations such as the belief that the Parliament “had the right to impose taxes on the colonists” increased the distaste of the colonies to the British (Boundless). Though the Parliament had virtual representation, or “the members of Parliament spoke for the interests of all British subjects rather than for the interests of only the district that elected them” over the colonies, the colonies argued that since there is no direct representation, or “proposed form of representative democracy where each representative’s vote is weighted in proportion to the number of citizens who have chosen that candidate to represent them”

John Locke set the foundation for the government of the United States (1). Locke was born August 29, 1632 in Wrington, United Kingdom and died on October 28, 1704 in Essex, United Kingdom(2). He was from a wealthy family, therefore his dad sent him to Westminster School; he then went to Christ Church, University of Oxford where he was a lecturer and studied medicine(3). Locke believed that education was extremely important(4). He also had written many influential pieces on education and government(5).

When the topic of government and politics in America come to mind, the first question that crosses my mind is where did the ideas come from when forming a government? Most people who would answer that would say our “Founding Fathers”. This seems realistic, but the ideas that our founding fathers obtained had to come from somewhere. During the post revolution America, soon to be Americans had no idea on how to approach a way to stand up

Democracy was not created in a day. Instead it was made after years of monarchy where any democratic ideas were unthinkable. Luckily, for us in the seventeenth century a man by the name of John Locke reevaluated many ideas from Ancient Greek and Rome and created a stable foundation for many of our government ideas. This document was named Two Treatises of Government and though he got backlash from many people it was the structure used to create two very important documents. These two documents were The Declaration of Independence written by Thomas Jefferson and A Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen recorded by the National Assembly of France.

John Locke was born on August 29, 1632, into a middle class family during late Renaissance England. Locke started his studies at Christ Church in Oxford. He then went into medical studies and received a medical license, which he practiced under Anthony Cooper. They became friends, and when Cooper became Earl of Shaftesbury, Locke was able to hold minor government jobs and became involved in politics. Shaftesbury steered Locke towards the views of a government whose law was fair to all, and all were under the law.

John Locke’s Views on Property and Liberty, as Outlined in His Second Treatise of Government

The civic issue where my opinion changed is Canadian Foreign Aid Funding. This issue is very important, because it affects many people in Canada and in other countries. Also, with the increasing amount of safety threats in the world, it is important for Canada to establish the amount of money we are willing to spend helping other countries. This issue affects many people all over the world. It mostly affects the inhabitants of countries being directly affected by the threatening groups.

John Locke (1689) and Thomas Hobbes (2010) share a common underlying concern: establishing a social contract between the government and the governed. To be legitimate, government must rest in the final analysis on the “consent” of the governed, they maintain. They also share a common view of humanity as prone to selfishness (Morgan, 2011 p. 575-800). Given the modern era, Hobbes views of the state of nature and government seem antiquated; no longer do the masses wish to be subservient to anyone man without question. Lockean principals are now the base for today’s modern, just, prosperous and free states.

In the society illustrated by John Locke, the human nature is characterized as free and independent; however, the problem with society is that it has too many small inconveniences, which could be as trivial as a tree blocking the sidewalk. To solve these problems, a legitimate government, characterized by explicit consent, checks on institutions and the right to revolt by the people, is needed. The utmost legitimate government, in comparison to Thomas Hobbes and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, is based on John Locke’s social contract in Second Treatise of Government because each aspect of a legitimate government protects the citizen’s life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Through each aspect, the people can actively participate in government to prevent the sovereign from taking advantage of their powers to further their own goals.

What would the American government be like today if it was not for the mind and political theory of John Locke? Some historians and philosophers believe that without John Locke our government would only be a shadow of what it is today. Arguably, one of his most important political and philosophical works was his Two Treatises of Government. There he argues that the function of the state is to protect the natural rights of its citizens, primarily to protect the right to property. John Locke, in many eyes, can be viewed as one of the father’s of Democracy. He embraced many of ideas in his theories on the state of nature and the rise of political society today. In Locke’s political society,