The Online Library of Liberty

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• III: Consent and Coercion
• The Right Against Coercion
• Private Property and Coercion
• Consent, Coercion, and Property
• Threats Vs. Offers
• A Clockwork Orange, Freedom, and Coercion
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• VI: The Liberal Tradition
• The History of Liberalism
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Dissent and Virtue

Laurence Berns

• St. John's College, Anapolis, Maryland

“Political Philosophy and the Right to Rebellion.” Interpretation 5 (1976): 309–315.

Political philosophy asks fundamental, embarrassing, and radical questions about politics, such as the purpose of government. To speculate about the principles justifying government is to raise the possibility of altering or abolishing any government that does not measure up to these principles. Political philosophy can, then, lead to the doctrine of the right to rebellion.

However, both the Declaration of Independence and Thomas Aquinas distinguish between possessing a right and exercising it. A just person, to avoid a greater evil, does not exercise his right. The survival of any right or any freedom rests upon the ability of its possessors to use it well.

One can challenge those who believe that liberty is the supreme political value with the question: “Can political institutions predicated upon equality in certain unalienable rights survive if they and the liberty they provide are not used for the cultivation of human excellence, which is the ultimate justification of any good government?” This question presents two challenges:

• (1) Is human excellence the ultimate justification of good government or is liberty? Why? What is their relationship, if any?
• (1) Suppose that liberty is the supreme political value or, perhaps, that it is intrinsic to human excellence. Will this value survive without the development of private virtue and moderation, possibly even in the rightful exercise of our unalienable rights?

In sum, are there certain institutional and personal developments necessary to maintain liberty itself?