Natural Rights and the New Republicanism

by Zuckert, Michael P.

• ISBN13: 9780691059709
• ISBN10: 0691059705
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1998-02-17
• Publisher: Princeton Univ Pr

Summary

InNatural Rights and the New Republicanism, Michael Zuckert proposes a new view of the political philosophy that lay behind the founding of the United States. In a book that will interest political scientists, historians, and philosophers, Zuckert looks at the Whig or opposition tradition as it developed in England. He argues that there were, in fact, three opposition traditions: Protestant, Grotian, and Lockean. Before the English Civil War the opposition was inspired by the effort to find the "one true Protestant politics--an effort that was seen to be a failure by the end of the Interregnum period. The Restoration saw the emergence of the Whigs, who sought a way to ground politics free from the sectarian theological-scriptural conflicts of the previous period. The Whigs were particularly influenced by the Dutch natural law philosopher Hugo Grotius. However, as Zuckert shows, by the mid-eighteenth century John Locke had replaced Grotius as the philosopher of the Whigs. Zuckert's analysis concludes with a penetrating examination of John Trenchard and Thomas Gordon, the English "Cato," who, he argues, brought together Lockean political philosophy and pre-existing Whig political science into a new and powerful synthesis. Although it has been misleadingly presented as a separate "classical republican" tradition in recent scholarly discussions, it is this "new republicanism" that served as the philosophical point of departure for the founders of the American republic.

Table of Contents

Preface	xi	(2)
Acknowledgments	xiii	(2)
INTRODUCTION	xv
PROLOGUE	3	(24)
Two Revolutions, Two Declarations	4	(10)
Contract and the Declaration of Rights	14	(1)
Locke and the Two Revolutions	15	(3)
Locke and the Americans	18	(9)
PART ONE: Protestants	27	(68)
CHAPTER ONE Aristotelian Royalism and Reformation Absolutism: Divine Right Theory	29	(20)
Dimensions of Divine Right	30	(4)
The Similitudes of Rule	34	(5)
The Reformation Attitude and the Transformation of Aristotle	39	(4)
Patriarchalism and the Reformation Attitude	43	(6)
CHAPTER TWO Aristotelian Constitutionalism and Reformation Contractarianism: From Ancient Constitution to Original Contract	49	(28)
The Ancient Constitution	51	(5)
The Mixed Constitution	56	(8)
Contractarianisms	64	(1)
The Original Contract and the Reformation Attitude: Philip Hunton	65	(6)
The Aristotelianism of the Original Contract: Henry Parker	71	(6)
CHAPTER THREE Contract and Christian Liberty: John Milton	77	(18)
Two Revolutions, Two Contractarianisms: Milton's "Tenure" and the Declaration of Independence	79	(4)
Miltonic Politics and the Reformation Attitude	83	(6)
Milton's Christian Republicanism	89	(2)
Two Contractarianisms, Two Fundamental Attitudes	91	(4)
PART TWO: Whigs	95	(90)
CHAPTER FOUR Whig Contractarianisms and Rights	97	(22)
The Restoration and the Emergence of the Whigs	98	(3)
Exclusion and Whig Non-Contractarianism: Grotian Legalism	101	(5)
Whig Contractarianism and the Glorious Revolution: Right Grotians	106	(7)
Whig Contractarianism and the Glorious Revolution: Left Grotians	113	(3)
Contractarianisms	116	(3)
CHAPTER FIVE The Master of Whig Political Philosophy	119	(31)
Grotius and the Reformation of Natural Law	119	(4)
The Source of Political Power	123	(3)
The Problem of Natural Law	126	(3)
Nature and Convention in the Roman Law	129	(5)
Grotius's Break with the Natural Law Tradition	134	(12)
Nature and Convention in the Grotian Natural Law	146	(4)
CHAPTER SIX A Neo-Harringtonian Moment? Whig Political Science and the Old Republicanism	150	(35)
The Politics of Liberty: Bernard Bailyn	152	(3)
The Politics of the Organic Community: Gordon Wood	155	(4)
The Politics of "Zoon Politikon": J.G.A. Pocock	159	(5)
Political Philosophy and Political Science	164	(2)
Harrington and Neo-Harrington	166	(4)
In the Neo-Harringtonian Workshop	170	(5)
Whig Political Science	175	(10)
PART THREE: Natural Rights and the New Republicanism	185	(136)
CHAPTER SEVEN Locke and the Reformation of Natural Law: Questions Concerning the Law of Nature	187	(29)
Grotius, Pufendorf, Locke	188	(7)
Locke and the Immanent Natural Law	195	(9)
Natural Law: Natural Sociability and Natural Morality	204	(3)
Transcendent Natural Law	207	(9)
CHAPTER EIGHT Locke and the Reformation of Natural Law: Two Treatises of Government	216	(31)
The Transcendent Natural Law in "Two Treatises"	216	(6)
Thomist Natural Law and the Natural Executive Power	222	(8)
Grotian Natural Law and the Natural Executive Power	230	(4)
Natural Right and the Natural Executive Power	234	(6)
Transcendent Natural Law: Suicide	240	(7)
CHAPTER NINE Locke and the Reformation of Natural Law: Of Property	247	(42)
Grotius, Pufendorf, Property	248	(4)
Transcendent Natural Law: Property	252	(7)
Property as Natural Right	259	(13)
Natural Law and Natural Rights	272	(3)
Natural Right as Property	275	(12)
Lockean Paradoxes	287	(2)
CHAPTER TEN Locke and the Transformation of Whig Political Philosophy	289	(32)
Lockean Whiggism: "An Argument for Self-Defence"	291	(6)
"Cato's Letters": A Lockean Political Philosophy	297	(8)
"Cato's Letters": Natural Rights and the Old Republicanism	305	(7)
"Cato's Letters": Natural Rights and the New Republicanism	312	(9)
Notes	321	(56)
Bibliography	377	(14)
Index	391