Second Treatise of Government - 2 - Parental Power and Political Power
Chapters 6 - 9
Quote
... the end of Law is not to abolish or restrain, but to preserve and enlarge Freedom.
Notes
🔥 All men have equality in their right to freedom and to not be subject to the will of someone else. But there is an exception for children, who are dependent on their parents. Law, in the state of nature, is only accessible through Reason, and children don't have the gift of Reason immediately once they're born. It takes time to develop.
🔥 Parents, then, have an obligation to "preserve, nourish, and educate their children" until they're adults and can exercise Reason themselves.
🔥 If someone doesn't have enough Reason, "he is never capable of being a Free Man." This applies to children until they are adults, and also to the mentally ill, says Locke.
🔥 Even though the authority of the parents over their children is often called called "paternal power," that authority belongs to both the father and the mother. Maybe "parental power" would be a better word to use, Locke suggests.
🔥 Children must honour their parents, just as parents must nourish and raise their children. As it says in the Bible.
🔥 With earlier societies, it was natural for the father to become a kind of political authority, because of the paternal authority he had by nature. But paternal and political authority are two different things.
🔥 God created man with a drive to be in society. It's not good for man to be alone, as it says in the Bible (one of the reasons why God created Eve).
🔥 The first society in nature is the family, but that is not a political society. Man and woman are brought together and stay together to raise the next generation.
🔥 There is a Master and Servant relationship governed by a contract and it's usually temporary. There is also a Master and Slave relationship where the slave has been captured in war and, "not capable of any Property, cannot in that state be considered as any part of Civil society."
🔥 Civil society occurs where people resign their natural rights to personally preserve their property and punish offenders, giving those functions to a common authority who will govern those laws as agreed on by the group. The state of nature is where everyone is exercising those rights individually.
🔥 "Here it is evident, that absolute Monarchy, which by some men is counted the only government in the World, is indeed inconsistent with civil society, and so can be no form of Civil government at all." Since there's no separate authority to go to for offenses committed by the monarch, he would be exercising that authority himself, which is more similar to how it works in the state of nature, not in a political society. And worse, the people under his rule are more like slaves having no real right to protect their property as they would have in the state of nature.
🔥 "As if when Men quitting the state of Nature entered into Society, they agreed that all of them but one, should be under the restraint of Laws, but that he (the Monarch) should still retain all the Liberty of the state of Nature, increased with Power, and made licentious by Impunity. This is to think, that Men are so foolish, that they take care to avoid what Mischiefs may be done them by Pole-Cats or Foxes; but are content, nay think it Safety, to be devoured by Lions."
🔥 He sums up: "No man in civil Society can be exempted from the Laws of it."
🔥 Men form a society, giving up some of their natural liberty, only be consent. They choose to submit to the will of the majority. It's virtually impossible to get unanimous consent for anything, so it has to be a majority.
🔥 Most examples of early governments are with single rulers, an extension of the father's authority over his children. Since those people weren't yet as aware of the dangers of monarchies, they didn't take time to explore other forms of government. Monarchy worked well enough for them, and it was familiar enough. Also, leadership in war was another big factor for choosing a monarchy (the king was often like a warlord).
🔥 Once kings become more corrupt with power, "men found it necessary to examine more carefully the Original and Rights of Government; and to find out ways to restrain the Exorbitances, and prevent the Abuses of that Power, which they having intrusted in another's Hands only for their own Good they found was made use of to hurt them."
🔥 Back to the idea of consent, there is a common objection raised which is, what about people born into a society? Can they be said to have given their consent to be ruled by the government in that society? Locke's response is that there are many examples of people withdrawing from the society they were born into and then setting up a new one elsewhere. (Though this often requires some force or violence to accomplish.)
🔥 A son is under his father's authority until he comes of age. Then he can go to whatever country he chooses.
🔥 What is meant by consent? There is a tacit consent that's implied when you live within the jurisdiction of a society and enjoy its benefits. But explicit, positive consent is required to become an actual member of the society. A foreigner can still live in a government's territory and not be an actual member of that society.
🔥 If people have freedom in the state of nature, why would they give that up? Because there are many dangers and fears when everyone governs him/herself. There is more security when living with others, even if it costs some freedom. There is a more secure protection of property, that being life, liberty and estates.
🔥 With government, you get laws, an impartial judge, and a power to the execute and enforce the law.
Thoughts
I remember a passage from Herodotus's Histories (which I wrote about here). In that section, Darius and his conspirators have just taken over Persia and are discussing how to set up the new government, and which type of government it should be. Darius argues that monarchy is best and, he says, the most natural. All governments eventually return to monarchies in the end.
According to John Locke, a monarchy was the natural choice for early societies because of their familiarity with paternal power and the father's authority in the family. And it's only when they began seeing the dangers of monarchy and the ways that a monarch can abuse their power, that they started looking into alternatives.
But there still seems to be something to Darius's argument, that governments tend to return to monarchy. As much as other types of governments can mitigate against the abuses of power, they can also be complicated, frustrating, and slow. A single ruler can seem more decisive, act more quickly, and be simpler to understand.
Until, maybe, we're forced to relive and remember those abuses of power that made us want to get away from monarchies in the past. Pretty complicated stuff.