Dear KAG: 20201125 Open Thread

“𝔽𝕚𝕣𝕤𝕥 𝕒 𝕣𝕚𝕘𝕙𝕥 𝕥𝕠 𝕝𝕚𝕗𝕖, 𝕤𝕖𝕔𝕠𝕟𝕕𝕝𝕪 𝕥𝕠 𝕝𝕚𝕓𝕖𝕣𝕥𝕪, 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕣𝕕𝕝𝕪 𝕥𝕠 𝕡𝕣𝕠𝕡𝕖𝕣𝕥𝕪; 𝕥𝕠𝕘𝕖𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕣 𝕨𝕚𝕥𝕙 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕣𝕚𝕘𝕙𝕥 𝕥𝕠 𝕕𝕖𝕗𝕖𝕟𝕕 𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕞 𝕚𝕟 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕓𝕖𝕤𝕥 𝕞𝕒𝕟𝕟𝕖𝕣 𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕪 𝕔𝕒𝕟.”

These are John Locke’s 3 natural rights,  Locke believed that the most basic human law of nature is the preservation of mankind. To serve that purpose, he reasoned, individuals have both a right and a duty to preserve their own lives.

I sure as heck wish they had left THE LOCKE VERSION in our founding documents!!

……..

John Locke: Natural Rights to Life, Liberty, and PropertyLocke’s writings did much to inspire the American Revolution.

[QUOTE]
“….Locke established that private property is absolutely essential for liberty: “every Man has a Property in his own Person. This no Body has any Right to but himself. The Labour of his Body, and the Work of his Hands, we may say, are properly his.” He continues: “The great and chief end therefore, of Mens uniting into Commonwealths, and putting themselves under Government, is the Preservation of their Property.”

Locke believed people legitimately turned common property into private property by mixing their labor with it, improving it. Marxists liked to claim this meant Locke embraced the labor theory of value, but he was talking about the basis of ownership rather than value.

He insisted that people, not rulers, are sovereign.

He insisted that people, not rulers, are sovereign. Government, Locke wrote, “can never have a Power to take to themselves the whole or any part of the Subjects Property, without their own consent. For this would be in effect to leave them no Property at all.” He makes his point even more explicit: rulers “must not raise Taxes on the Property of the People, without the Consent of the People, given by themselves, or their Deputies.”

Locke had enormous foresight to see beyond the struggles of his own day, which were directed against monarchy:

’Tis a Mistake to think this Fault [tyranny] is proper only to Monarchies; other Forms of Government are liable to it, as well as that. For where-ever the Power that is put in any hands for the Government of the People, and the Preservation of their Properties, is applied to other ends, and made use of to impoverish, harass, or subdue them to the Arbitrary and Irregular Commands of those that have it: There it presently becomes Tyranny, whether those that thus use it are one or many.

Then Locke affirmed an explicit right to revolution:

whenever the Legislators endeavor to take away, and destroy the Property of the People, or to reduce them to Slavery under Arbitrary Power, they put themselves into a state of War with the People, who are thereupon absolved from any farther Obedience, and are left to the common Refuge, which God hath provided for all Men, against Force and Violence. Whensoever therefore the Legislative shall transgress this fundamental Rule of Society; and either by Ambition, Fear, Folly or Corruption, endeavor to grasp themselves, or put into the hands of any other an Absolute Power over the Lives, Liberties, and Estates of the People; By this breach of Trust they forfeit the Power, the People had put into their hands, for quite contrary ends, and it devolves to the People, who have a Right to resume their original Liberty.

….Locke believed that setting a personal example is the most effective way to teach moral standards and fundamental skills, which is why he recommended homeschooling. He objected to government schools. He urged parents to nurture the unique genius of each child.

Locke denounced the tendency of many teachers to worship power.

All the entertainment and talk of history is of nothing almost but fighting and killing: and the honour and renown that is bestowed on conquerors (who are for the most part but the great butchers of mankind) further mislead growing youth, who … come to think slaughter the laudable business of mankind, and the most heroic of virtues.

[UNQUOTE]

So I will give thanks for people like John Locke, the Baron de Montesquieu and Algernon Sidney who inspired Jefferson, writer of the rough draft of the Declaration of Independence, who were so fundamental in establishing our NATURAL GOD GIVEN RIGHTS.