As the United States approaches the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution, it’s worth revisiting the philosopher whose ideas made that revolution possible, and whose warnings still apply today — a time when government faces gridlock over spending and public trust bottoms out.
John Locke argued in the late 1600s that governments derive their legitimacy from the consent of the governed. People surrender very limited powers to the state so that it can protect their natural rights to life, liberty, and property. When a government fails in that duty — for example when it becomes wasteful, coercive, or detached from the people’s interests — citizens must demand reform.
Those words resonate as both Raleigh and Washington grind through budget crises that threaten essential services while further eroding public approval. North Carolina lawmakers remain locked in an impasse over Medicaid rebase, a program whose resources has been stretched to the breaking point after expansion and the flood of Covid-era, taxpayer-paid subsidies. At the same time, the month-long federal government shutdown has left tens of thousands of workers without pay and families struggling, all for political leverage.
Locke would see both examples as failures of the “social contract” that government hold with citizens. Government, in his view, must be judicious stewards of the people’s resources, not masters of them. When taxpayer dollars are spent without accountability, or when partisan gridlock paralyzes essential functions, it is the citizens, not the state, who bear the burden.
When that social contact is broken, public trust in institutions deteriorates and is difficult to rebuild. Amid shutdowns, missed paychecks and political posturing, it is critical to remember government’s contract with us includes the duty to protect a right to the fruits of our labor.
Locke’s defense of property rights and free exchange offers a clear lesson: Prosperity depends on protecting the individual’s right to work, trade, and plan freely. Fiscal restraint is not a just merely aspirational; it is the very condition that allows citizens to pursue their own happiness without arbitrary bureaucratic interference.
John Locke’s Two Treatises of Government became the philosophical blueprint for the American Revolution. His principles directly inspired America’s Founding Fathers, evident in Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence and in James Madison’s work in The Federalist Papers, a collection of 85 essays (what we might consider opinion editorials here at Carolina Journal).
Today, the John Locke Foundation, publishing organization of CJ, works to carry that legacy forward, proving that his insights aren’t dusty history, but living ideas guiding how our government must act and what citizens must expect. Protecting private property and individuals’ right to innovate, resisting growth of state control over health care or markets, is a modern extension of Locke’s core principles that are woven into our founding fabric.
As we approach the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution, readers can count on the Locke Foundation and Carolina Journal reaffirming what the Founders understood: Government exists to preserve freedom, not to expand itself. Judicious management of taxpayer money isn’t just sound policy; it is a moral duty rooted in the very philosophy that gave birth to the American experiment.
