A History of the Origins of World Philosophy, British Empiricism IV: John. Locke 4

British Empiricism NO. 4: John. Locke 4

(2) Property rights, which cannot be infringed

　　Locke attached the greatest importance to the property rights of citizens, and he believed that the property rights of individual citizens were the basis of all rights. It was this theory of the inviolability of private property that he advocated that became one of the most important pillar principles of later capitalist civilization and one of the most important elements of the British and French revolutions and the American Declaration of Human Rights. Locke's analysis of the property rights of citizens is also based on his whole theory, which is his theory of the value of labor. He believes that God originally allocated some of the objects in nature to personal use, but these gifts from God became personal property as soon as individual labor was involved. And all that is personal property is completely owned by the individual and has a sacrosanct and inviolable nature. No one has the power to question or possess it anymore.

Locke gives an interesting illustration of this. He wrote: "Even among us, whoever catches a hare while in the paddock is considered his possession. For the beast is still regarded as communal, not owned by anyone, and as long as someone has spent so much labor on this animal to discover and chase it, he has taken it out of its original common state of nature and begun to become a property. It's a very dashing and very common sense statement indeed. A hare, the hare of nature, is naturally not anyone's property— and although the hare is small, it is shared by mankind. But as soon as the hunter discovered and captured it—the hunt began to have labor to participate in, well, the hare, which had theoretically belonged to all mankind, immediately became the hunter's personal property. This view may not be profound, but it is very common sense. Even in China in the 1990s, if you went hunting where hunting was allowed, when you spotted a hare, the hare began to belong to you. And you catch it again, then, no, the hare belongs to you. If anyone wants to take it out of your hands, you must not do it, there is no other, because this rabbit you found and caught by you. Although this seemed to many Orientals to be nothing more than common sense, the illustrious Locke found the truth in it.

　　He concluded that goods which were not subject to labour participation belonged to the state of nature, and that once labour participation was the property of the individual participant. He not only believed in this, but also wrote books and wrote a book for this purpose, and struggled all his life.

　　(3) Free power, unconstrained

　　Locke's theory of citizenship, although it focuses on property rights, is not limited to property rights. In his view, all individual rights, such as life, liberty and property, are inviolable. Freedom and the right to life, like property rights, can belong only to the citizens themselves, that is to say, not only property rights, but also the right to liberty is a sacred right that is not bound by any constraint but only by law. He said: "Man's natural freedom is not bound by any superior power in the world, not under the will or legislative power of man, and only natural law as his criterion. The freedom of the person in society is to be free from any legislative power other than the legislative power established in the state with the consent of the people; He added: "This freedom from absolute, arbitrary power is so necessary and so closely connected to a man's self-defence that he cannot lose it unless even his means of self-defence and his life are lost together." "

Not only that, but his free power must be radiated in all aspects. In particular, he believed that man had the right to think freely. "Everyone has an inviolable right to freedom to express one's thoughts in every word at will," he said. Therefore, although others use the same word as us, we have no power to cause them to produce in their minds the same thoughts that the words we use express. So, although the great Augustus had the power to rule the world, he also admitted that he could not create any new Latin words. In civilized society, man is not guilty of the crime of thought. If thought can also sin, then the only way is to return to God's rule, or to surrender one's soul with both hands and willing to be a slave.

　　(4) Civil rights, inalienable and non-transferable

　　Another difference between Locke and Hobbes's theory of rights is that Hobbes believed that because human nature is selfish, selfishness cannot be interdependent, it is necessary to give all individual rights to the state - "Leviathan", and then the state to protect the legitimate rights and interests of citizens, but he ignores that if the state - "Leviathan" becomes selfish or cruel, the consequences must be more serious.

　　Locke, on the other hand, considered individual rights to be sacred and inviolable, and therefore logically concluded that the power given to the state by the individual was not only limited but also purposeful. Separately, it is:

　　First, civil rights, including the right to life, liberty and property, and all corresponding rights, can neither be renounced nor transferred, but belong only to individual citizens. He said, "We are born free." If a person who is born free surrenders his right to freedom, he is tantamount to surrendering his soul and life. This is not only unreasonable, but also inhumane.

　　Second, citizens may surrender some power for their own benefit, but the purpose of surrendering power is only to protect themselves from harm and aggression by others. In his view, no one in power, including the highest authority, "may take any part of any person's property without his or her consent." For since the protection of property is the aim of the government and of man's entry into society, this necessarily assumes and requires that the people should enjoy the right to property, otherwise it must be assumed that they have lost what is their purpose in joining society as a result of their participation in society; this is a very paradoxical thing that no one will recognize. "

　　Whether citizens have rights or not is one aspect, and whether these rights can be effectively protected is another aspect, or more important aspect. If you nominally have all kinds of rights, you are the happiest person in the world, in fact, these rights are like a basket of eggs on the shoulders of an 80-year-old stroke old man, and if you are not careful, you will make a mess. There are even ways to force you to hand over this right in both hands, and a smile of great happiness will appear on your face. Such a civil right is not equivalent to a "zero egg". This is not the case at all here in Locke. He believes that citizens surrender some of their power because they want to make their rights and interests more effectively protected. The purpose of the government's existence is nothing else, but precisely to protect these rights of the people from interference and infringement by any force.

　　Naturally, Locke's right to freedom was not unlimited. He considers the state of freedom to "not be laissez-faire." He said: "Although man has unlimited freedom to dispose of his person or property, he does not have the freedom to destroy himself or any creature in his possession. For example, if you own a cultural relic, 100% of the artifact belongs to you, but you do not have the right to let it destroy it casually. For example, if you have a panda – forgive me for saying that 100% of this panda belongs to you, but you can't do any harm to it either. His theory was, "Since people are equal and independent, no one may infringe upon the life, health, liberty, or property of others." Although these words were uttered by him when he spoke of man's natural state and natural law, it is clear that the most rational social system and principle of value in his mind must also be the same.

(5) All persons are equal before the law

　　Locke values contracts and must value the rule of law. His basic view is that all persons are equal before the law. His counter-proof was that since all persons were equal before the law, no member could claim an exception.

　　On the one hand, he concluded: "The legislature cannot transfer the power to make laws to any other person, because since it is only a delegated power derived from the people, those who enjoy this power cannot cede it to others." Only the people can choose the form of the state by forming the legislature and by designating who exercises the legislative power. On the other hand, he argues that even the powers of the legislature must be strictly limited.

　　This includes:

　　"First, they should be governed by officially promulgated, established laws that treat people equally, rich or poor, the powerful and the croppers, and do not differ from particular circumstances."

"Secondly, these laws should have no purpose other than the ultimate purpose of the welfare of the people."

Thirdly, the property of the people should never be taxed without the consent of the people themselves or their representatives."

　　Fourthly, the legislature should not and cannot cede the power to make laws to anyone else, or put it anywhere else that is not arranged by the people."

These four limitations, especially the provision in article I that "the law treats whether rich or poor, whether the magnate or the cropper is equal, and does not differ due to special circumstances", is actually the best annotation to "equality before the law". Whether you are a high-ranking official, a noble relative, a religious leader, or a king, you can only act according to the law, otherwise, you will be sorry.

　　(6) A law is not the same as a decree, and the government may not substitute an order for a law

　　Locke was a complete legalist, so in his theory of the form of government, he necessarily placed the law in the dominant position, and had no solution in the face of the decrees, orders, and temporary plans issued by the rulers. He did not despise those in power, but demanded that those in power should not act beyond the scope of the law.

　　Locke could not tolerate the despotists doing as they pleased, nor was he firmly opposed to the so-called rule of the wise. He argues: "It is as if when man enters society out of his natural state, he agrees that all but one should be bound by the law, but that he alone may retain all the freedoms of the state of nature, which is enlarged by his power and becomes unscrupulous by his freedom from punishment." To hand over social power to a man, whether he is a saint or a leper, a gentleman or a villain, in short, everyone has become a slave, and there is only one master, and one master is no better than 10 million people fighting each other for personal gain. He sarcastically said that such ideas and behaviors "were so foolish that they were willing to be devoured by lions and thought it safe not to be disturbed by the possibility of a tanuki or a fox." "Even heroes or sages, we cannot blindly hand over to them the power that belongs to us, otherwise the hero will have a fever and the whole country will go mad; as soon as the sage sneezes, the people will catch a cold."

　　(7) Adhere to the principle of separation of powers and advocate checks and balances of power

　　Although Locke was not the first thinker to advocate the rule of law, he was the first modern thinker who advocated the separation of powers and the exercise of checks and balances on power, a pioneer of montesquieu and the democratic ideas of the founding fathers of the United States, and he did not put forward only one principle, but had a whole set of theories.

　　First, he argues that no separation of powers means no freedom. His theory of decentralization is to divide state power into legislative power, executive power and alliance power, and the alliance power mentioned here mainly refers to foreign-related power. He believes that the legislative power is how to use the power of the state to guarantee the basic rights of society, especially the members of society, in the form of law, and the right to enforce is the right to enforce the law, including the right to war and peace, union and alliance, and other foreign-related powers. Compared with the three powers, the legislative power belongs to the highest power, but the supreme power is by no means arbitrary. The maximum scope of legislative power still cannot go beyond the basic scope of social and citizen welfare, in other words, the principles and fundamental purposes of legislation are only to serve the interests of citizens.

　　Locke also divided the form of state government into three forms according to the attribution of legislative power:

　　A democracy in which legislative power is vested in the overwhelming majority of members of society and enforced by officials entrusted by them;

　　The legislative power in the hands of a small number of people belongs to the oligarchy;

　　The legislative power vested in the individual belongs to the monarchy.

　　Locke himself was a champion of constitutional monarchy. And his idea of separation of powers, although it is not very practical than Montesquieu's model, it is also not rigorous enough. But the basic idea is coherent. Locke's decentralized writings are undoubtedly of a classical character.

　　(8) In response to tyranny, the people have the right to revolt

　　Locke advocated the equilibrium of social power and was adamantly opposed to any form of authoritarian behavior. His brilliance lies in the fact that he put forward not only the theory of separation of powers and checks and balances, but also the idea of the disintegration of the government and the right of the people to rebel. He said: "In an organized State which is based on itself and acts according to its own nature, that is, acting for the protection of society, although there can be only one supreme power, the legislative power, and all the other powers are and must be subordinate, the legislative power, since it is a delegated power exercised only for some purpose, the people still have the highest power to recall or replace the legislature when they find that the legislative act contradicts their commission." That is to say, while the people can hand over legislative power to legislators, if legislators tarnish those powers, the people have the right to remove them. This is true for legislators, and naturally for executors.

And Locke clearly stated: "In all circumstances and conditions, the real remedy for the force of abuse of power is to deal with the force with the force." The use of force beyond authority often puts the person who uses force in a state of war and becomes an aggressor, so he must be treated as an aggressor. Against tyranny, violence can be used. Although he has also said that violence can only be used to oppose unjust and unlawful violence. But what is unfair and lawless, I am afraid that people who stand on different positions will have different understandings, and Mr. Russell is also quite critical of this. But it's always good to be able to come up with such insights. Only by institutionally, at least theoretically, affirming this ultimate veto right of citizens can the theory of modern Western democracies take on a complete form.

　　These ideas of Locke were tested by the French Enlightenment and the American independence movement, proving that although they were not sensational, let alone unfathomable, they were practical and therefore had a particularly strong vitality.

　　Locke's philosophical thought, Berkeley and Hume, gave critical continuation and interpretation; his theory of the form of government was absorbed and developed by Montesquieu.

　　Lucky Locke gets a lucky ending.

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