Locke and the Legitimacy of the State: Right vs. Good

Locke and the Legitimacy of the State: Right vs. Good

John Locke’s conception of the “legitimate state” is surrounded by much controversy and debate over whether he emphasizes the right over the good or the good over the right. In the midst of such a profound and intriguing question, Locke’s Letter Concerning Toleration, provides strong evidence that it is ineffective to have a legitimate state “prioritize” the right over the good.

Locke’s view of the pre-political state begins with his statement that “man is ‘naturally in,’ the state of ‘perfect freedom’ and equality,” (Christman 42). Locke believes that man naturally has the capacity for Reason which in turn allows man direct access to moral laws. Reason provides man with his own individual rights and obligations and moral rights and duties. Furthermore, Locke writes that “‘The State of Nature has a Law of Nature to govern it, which obliges everyone: And Reason, which is that Law, teaches all Mankind, who will consult it, that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his Life, Health, Liberty, or Possession,’” (43). Moreover, man needs an authority to protect and preserve these moral rights which can only executed when, as Locke states, when the “ ‘power and jurisdiction is [are] reciprocal,’” (42). Therefore a social contract is created when human beings unite and the majority of a people agree upon a particular state which protects mans natural freedom and equality.

Consequently, since all human beings have certain moral rights to health, liberty, and possessions; they also have the right to enforce the protection of those rights by way of punishing violators. And it is in this maintaining of ones own rights that it is necessary for man to initially come together and form a social contract. By forming a social contract they are agreeing to sustain from living purely in a state of nature. According to Locke, living in such a state of nature is ‘inconvienent’, for there is no common ground by which to appropriately judge an individual who infringes upon another person natural rights (Christman 43). Therefore, one can not ‘effectively enjoy’ their own rights until they join under a ‘common political authority’ (44).