Does John Locke offer enduring principles of political philosophy that harmonize with the conservative tradition? One of the puzzling trends in contemporary American conservative thought is the insistence that John Locke and conservatism as outlined by Russell Kirk have little to do with one another. Conservative critics have accused Locke of promoting materialistic individualism, unprincipled utilitarianism, and a political society driven by contractual and consensual relationships unhinged from the permanent bonds of community and culture.
At a moment when conservatism is reexamining its first principles, it’s time to readdress this blithe dismissal of Locke. Without a doubt, Locke’s social philosophy—as exemplified by his emphasis on the importance of contracts and consent regarding social institutions such as marriage—drifts toward utilitarian inclinations. I happen to disagree with Locke on the purpose and significance of these institutions. Yet fundamental themes in Lockean political thought in Two Treatises of Government offer profound reflections into the relationship between man and government that furnish the political foundation for Kirkian conservatism.
The first conservative lesson we can extract from Locke’s moral philosophy is the importance of order as revealed by natural law. Locke’s popularity in Britain and America derived largely from his commentary on natural rights, but an overlooked element of his commentary in the Second Treatise is the function natural law plays in ordering human action. Locke’s state of nature preserves individual freedom, but it is not a “state of license,” as he writes.[i] The proper exercise of individuals’ perfect freedom stays “within the bounds by the law of nature”[ii] to “order their actions,”[iii] and which “obliges every one.”[iv] “[T]he law of nature stands as an eternal rule to all men, legislators as well as other,” he contends.[v] Individuals possess rights, but those rights come with responsibilities and duties. And even though conservatives rightly criticize Locke for failing to identify original sin in his conception of the state of nature, Locke is acutely aware of the human temptation to sin through licentious action severed from moral obligation. This awareness is evident by virtue of the fact that he asserts the primacy of natural law and moral limits in the Second Treatise’s very first paragraph describing the state of nature.
No, Locke’s moral philosophy is not reminiscent of Plato’s transcendent moral order. No, the purpose of identifying Locke’s acknowledgment of natural law is not to transmogrify him into an English Thomas Aquinas. And no, the command of natural law is not an end in and of itself in traditional conservatism. The purpose of considering Locke’s moral philosophy, rather, is to demonstrate his understanding of the moral futility of unrestrained freedom; to show his principled desire for ordered liberty; and to challenge the claim from some conservatives that Locke promoted hedonistic individualism liberated from ethical constraints. One more interrelated point on this conservative critique: if conservative critics charge that Locke’s appeals to natural law and Richard Hooker in the Second Treatise were polemical instruments intended merely to attract the ears of contemporary religious readers—rather than as genuine insights into morality—then one could claim with just as much textual evidence in Reflections on the Revolution of France that Edmund Burke’s overtures to natural law were included simply to placate potential criticism that his Reflections dipped into a quicksand of moral relativism.
Order is inextricably linked with limits, and limits signify the core of conservatism. Not only do limits on individual action occupy a role in Locke’s moral philosophy, but limits on institutional action exert even a larger role in preserving ordered liberty in Locke’s political philosophy.
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