How did john locke influence our government

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The only appeal left, for Locke, is the appeal to God. The “appeal to heaven,” therefore, involves taking up arms against your opponent and letting God judge who is in the right.

7. His education veered toward medicine and experimental philosophy, where he worked alongside the likes of Robert Boyle, enriching his understanding beyond the classical texts.

Locke's political philosophy is deeply rooted in his key works, particularly the "Essay Concerning Human Understanding" and the "Two Treatises of Government." These documents are fundamental in understanding his contributions to political thought, especially the American Founding Fathers.

In the "Essay Concerning Human Understanding," Locke challenges the notion of innate ideas, arguing instead that knowledge is derived from sensory experience and reflection.

Adam Seagrave (2014) has gone a step further. From this natural state of freedom and independence, Locke stresses individual consent as the mechanism by which political societies are created and individuals join those societies. Even in the state of nature, a primary justification for punishment is that it helps further the positive goal of preserving human life and human property.

A third view, advanced by Tuckness (2002a), holds that Locke was flexible at this point and gave people considerable flexibility in constitutional drafting.

A second part of the debate focuses on ends rather than institutions. He also frequently points out what he takes to be clear evidence of hypocrisy, namely that those who are so quick to persecute others for small differences in worship or doctrine are relatively unconcerned with much more obvious moral sins that pose an even greater threat to their eternal state.

In addition to these and similar religious arguments, Locke gives three reasons that are more philosophical in nature for barring governments from using force to encourage people to adopt religious beliefs (Works 6:10–12).

doi:10.1353/hph.2016.0044

Ryan, Alan, 1965, “Locke and the Dictatorship of the Bourgeoisie”, Political Studies, 13(2): 219–230. They hold that when Locke emphasized the right to life, liberty, and property he was primarily making a point about the duties we have toward other people: duties not to kill, enslave, or steal.

Forward-looking rationales include deterring crime, protecting society from dangerous persons, and rehabilitation of criminals.

As we will see below, even though Locke thought natural law could be known apart from special revelation, he saw no contradiction in God playing a part in the argument, so long as the relevant aspects of God’s character could be discovered by reason alone. Drawing on Locke’s later writings on toleration, he argues that Locke’s theory of natural law assumes that God, as author of natural law, takes into account the fallibility of those magistrates who will carry out the commands of natural law.

There is no command in the Bible telling magistrates to bring people to the true faith, and people could not consent to such a goal for government because it is not possible for people, at will, to believe what the magistrate tells them to believe. Locke describes a similar stalemate in the case where the chief executive has the power to call parliament and can thus prevent it from meeting by refusing to call it into session.

doi:10.1017/CBO9780511498114

Franklin, Julian, 1978, John Locke and the Theory of Sovereignty: Mixed Monarchy and the Right of Resistance in the Political Thought of the English Revolution, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Goldie, Mark, 1983, “John Locke and Anglican Royalism”, Political Studies, 31(1): 61–85.

Proast thought that unless one was a complete skeptic, one must believe that the reasons for one’s own position are objectively better than those for other positions.

Jeremy Waldron (1993) restated the substance of Proast’s objection for a contemporary audience. He posited natural rights, asserting all individuals are born with inherent entitlements to life, liberty, and property.

If we know only that a group of people are in a state of nature, we know only the rights and responsibilities they have toward one another; we know nothing about whether they are rich or poor, peaceful or warlike.

A complementary interpretation is made by John Dunn (1969) with respect to the relationship between Locke’s state of nature and his Christian beliefs.

Moreover, poor laborers no longer enjoy equality of access to the materials from which products can be made. The enduring impact of Locke's arguments for religious tolerance continues to resonate in America's ongoing commitment to the protection of individual conscience and the separation of church and state.