An Outline of the History of Libertarian Thought, Part 1: From Radical Calvinism to the American Revolution

Although it is impossible to give a complete history of libertarian thought in a couple of pages, the aim of this introductory review essay is to sketch a very rough outline of such a history. Later reviews will deal with each major period and topic in greater depth. Here, however, we are only concerned with giving the reader some feeling for the rich heritage and varied origins of modern libertarian thought. With a reading of the classic texts and the recommended secondary literature, we can begin to appreciate the importance of understanding libertarian ideas in their historical context and their uneven development over the centuries.

It must be remembered that only very recently has a comprehensive libertarian world-view, encompassing a belief in natural rights, the free and unhampered market economy, methodological individualism, anti-war and anti-imperialism and radical anti-statism, been developed.

Many people are aware of the contributions to liberal thought made by Ludwig von Mises, Ayn Rand, Murray Rothbard and Robert Nozick, but it should be remembered that libertarianism did not begin with these thinkers nor can it end with them. It has taken considerable time to reach the present stage in the development of libertarian thought and it would be a mistake to ignore the people and movements which have contributed to its formulation. Our interest in the history of Real Liberal thought is no mere antiquarian interest but rather a recognition that the concerns which preoccupied great libertarians of the past are still timely. The great historical struggle between Liberty and Power (see the essay on this subject by Roy Childs, “The Permanent Revolution: Liberty Against Power,” Laissez Faire Books, New York, 1975) is still with us and is far from over. We can learn much from previous efforts to come to terms with and understand State Power and it is for this reason we consider a study of the history of Libertarian ideas important.

To assist you in learning about the great libertarian movements of the past we will list some journal articles or chapters from books at the end of Part One. We feel these books and articles would be a useful way of introducing you to these ideas and could serve as basic reading for a study group or a weekly seminar.

I. Radical Calvinism and the Reformation

One should begin a history of Libertarian or Real Liberal thought with the Radical Calvinists of the 16th century Reformation. Out of the religious wars between the Protestants and the Catholic Church emerged a surprisingly modern theory of individual natural rights and justified violent resistance to authority. Using ancient Roman private law concepts to justify rebellion against tyrants, Radical Calvinists such as John Ponet, Christopher Goodman, George Buchanan in Scotland and England, and Francois Hotman, Theodore Beza and Mornay in France, transformed an essentially religious duty to resist into a secular, moral, and even natural, right of resistance. The best general introduction to the political thought of the Radical Calvinists is Quentin Skinner’s The Foundations of Modern Political Thought, Volume II: The Age of Reformation (Cambridge University Press, 1978), especially Part III: “Calvinism and the Theory of Revolution.” On the classical and medieval origins of tyrannicide see the older work by Oscar Jászi and John D. Lewis, Against the Tyrant: The Tradition and Theory of Tyrannicide (Glencoe, Ill., 1957). To read the original texts, see John Ponet’s A Short Treatise of Politic Power, reprinted in W. S. Hudson, John Ponet 1516–1556. Advocate of Limited Monarchy (Chicago, 1942); Christopher Goodman’s “How Superior Powers Ought to be Obeyed of Their Subjects...” in Puritan Political Ideas 1558–1794, ed. Edmund S. Morgan (Indianapolis, 1965), pp. 1–14; George Buchanan, The Powers of the Crown in Scotland, translated and edited by Charles Flinn Arrowood (Austin, University of Texas Press, 1949) and also the recent biography by I.D. McFarlane, Buchanan (Duckworth, 1981); Francois Hotman, Francogallia, translated by J. H. M. Salmon, ed. R. E. Giesey (Cambridge 1972); Theodore Beza, “The Right of Magistrates over Their Subjects,” in J. H. Franklin, Constitutionalism and Resistance in the 16th Century (N.Y., 1969); see especially the almost anarchic anonymous pamphlet in French, “Political Discourses on the Various Forms of Power Established by God in the World,” in Simon Goulart, Mémoires de d’état de France sous Charles neufième (Geneva, 1578); and Mornay, Vindiciae contra Tyrannos (Edinburgh, 1579).

One of the best examples of the abstract, universal, and secular reasoning of the 16th century monarchomachs comes from the young Catholic Étienne de la Boétie. His famous and influential Discourse of Voluntary Servitude (1548) was a spirited call for widespread civil disobedience. Boétie made two very profound insights into the nature of the State, viz., that all states are in essence a hierarchy of privilege which benefits a limited minority and that all states, including tyrannous ones, are based upon general popular acceptance. He concluded that tyranny can only be overthrown when the majority of the ruled withdraws its consent and thereby deprives the ruling minority of its support and grudging acceptance. The best modern edition is that introduced by Murray N. Rothbard, The Politics of Obedience (Free Life Editions, N.Y., 1975). For those who wish to view the original French alongside a 1735 English translation see The Will to Bondage, Libertarian Broadsides no. 6, ed. William Flygare (Ralph Myles Pub., Colorado Springs, 1974). For a discussion of Boétie’s views see Rothbard’s introduction and the essay by Nannerl O. Keohane, “The Radical Humanism of Etienne de la Boétie,” Journal of the History of Ideas, 38, 1977, pp. 119–130.

II. The Levellers and the English Revolution

The next major period of libertarian activity took place during the English Civil War (1642–1647), when a colossal outpouring of self-consciously libertarian pamphlets, speeches, and debates by the Levellers accompanied the Parliamentarians’ challenge to the Crown. The Levellers are crucially important in the history of libertarian thought because they mark the beginning of the Radical Liberal tradition in England. They were the first to argue for a natural right to property which was prior to and independent of any political or social structure. They should also be remembered for their formulation of the concept of “self-propriety,” or self-ownership, as well as for their uncompromising opposition to political and economic privilege in all its forms. The best way to learn about Leveller political theory is to read the collection of speeches, debates, and pamphlets from the turbulent 1640s, especially those by the most consistent and radical Levellers, Richard Overton, William Walwyn and John Lilburne. See C. H. Firth (ed.) The Clarke Papers (1891–1901 Camden Series, 4 vols.); W. Haller (ed.) Tracts on Liberty on the Puritan Revolution 1638–1647 (N.Y., 1934) 3 vols.; A. S. P. Woodhouse, Puritanism and Liberty (London, 1974); Don M. Wolfe (ed.) Leveller Manifestoes of the Puritan Revolution (N.Y., 1944); W. Haller and G. Davies (eds.) The Leveller Tracts 1647–1653 (N.Y., 1944); two smaller but valuable collections are those edited by G. E. Aylmer, The Levellers in the English Revolution (Ithaca, N.Y., 1975) and A. L. Morton, Freedom in Arms (N.Y., 1975). Useful secondary works include T. C. Pease, The Leveller Movement (Washington, DC, 1910); Joseph Frank, The Levellers (Cambridge, Mass., 1955); W. Haller, Liberty and Reformation in the Puritan Revolution (N.Y., 1955) and the books by H. N. Brailsford, The Levellers and the English Revolution, ed. Christopher Hill (Manchester, 1976); the very important work by C. B. Macpherson, The Political Theory of Possessive Individualism: Hobbes to Locke (Oxford, 1964); and Christopher Hill’s stimulating and rich The World Turned Upside Down: Radical Ideas During the English Revolution (Harmondsworth, 1974); as well as his recent biography of Milton, Milton and the English Revolution (Harmondsworth, 1979). All three authors should be used carefully because of their Marxist perspectives. Many authors cannot decide whether the Levellers are radical democrats or possessive individualists. Most importantly for libertarians, however, are their ideas on property rights, self-ownership, free trade, and their profound influence on the history of Classical liberal thought. The extent to which they wanted to extend the franchise is only of secondary importance. On Richard Overton see the essay by Carl Watner, “‘Come What, Come Will!’ Richard Overton, Libertarian Leveller,” Journal of Libertarian Studies, IV, Fall 1980, pp. 405–432.

III. The Glorious Revolution and the Commonwealthman Tradition

Before leaving the 17th century, mention must be made of the Glorious Revolution of 1688 and the two libertarian authors working at that time whose political theories were to be so influential in the 18th century: John Locke and Algernon Sidney.

The importance of John Locke rests on his theories of property rights, justified revolution, and limited and constitutional government. Locke wrote his first draft of the Second Treatise of Government during the period 1679–1683 to provide a theoretical justification for resistance to the sovereign. Later, during his exile in Holland, the draft was completed and published in 1690. Locke’s theory of the individual’s natural right to property and his “homestead” principle for acquiring previously unowned property by “mixing one’s labor” with it, provided the basis for his theory of the limited and revocable powers of any government. When the state overstepped its bounds and violated the natural rights of its subjects, it was the state, rather than the citizens, which was guilty of rebellion and must therefore be resisted by force. Locke’s ideas were to provide a fundamental justification for the American colonists’ revolt against the British empire and they remain a classic formulation of libertarian political theory.

The definitive edition of Locke’s Two Treatises is Locke’s Two Treatises of Government, A Critical Edition with an Introduction and Apparatus Criticus. ed. Peter Laslett (Cambridge University Press, 1965) whose introduction is important for having proved that the draft of the Treatises was written before the Revolution and was not an ex post facto justification. As a reminder that Locke was not a thoroughgoing libertarian see J. W. Gough’s Introduction to John Locke, Epistola de Tolerantia. A Letter on Toleration, ed. R. Klibansky (Oxford, 1968), where it is shown that Locke did not believe in complete toleration, espe-cially for atheists. Important secondary works on Locke include Maurice Cranston’s definitive John Locke, A Biography (London, 1957); Richard Cox, Locke on War and Peace (Oxford, 1960); John Dunn, The Political Thought of John Locke (Cambridge, 1969); Julian H. Franklin, John Locke and the Theory of Sovereignty (Cambridge, 1978) and C. B. MacPherson’s The Political Theory of Possessive Individualism: Hobbes to Locke (Oxford, 1977). See also the bibliographical review essay by Karen Vaughn, “John Locke’s Theory of Property,” in Literature of Liberty, (Spring, 1980) and her John Locke: Economist and Social Scientist, (Chicago, 1980). A very useful collection of essays on Locke has been edited by Gordon J. Schochet, Life, Liberty and Property: Essays on Locke’s Political Ideas, (Belmont, Calif., 1971).

As important as Locke is, one should not forget Algernon Sidney, whose Discourses Concerning Government (1698), justifying rebellion against the king and the primacy of parliament, became a virtual “textbook of Revolution” in the 18th century. Sidney influenced Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Jonathan Mayhew and even William Lloyd Garrison in America. The English Radical Whigs, Robert Molesworth, John Toland, Thomas Gordon, John Trenchard, and Thomas Hollis considered themselves part of the tradition begun by Sidney, Milton, Harrington, Marchmount Needham and Henry Neville. Fortunately, the Discourses have been reprinted by the Arno Press in their European Political Thought: Traditions and Endurance series (1979). Caroline Robbins’s article is also useful, “Algernon Sidney’s Discourses Concerning Government: Textbook of Revolution,” William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd series vol. IV, no. 3, 1947, pp. 267–296. On the 17th-century origins of the Commonwealthman and Radical Whig tradition see the important work by Caroline Robbins, The Eighteenth-Century Commonwealthman (Harvard University Press, 1959), Chapters II and III.

A lesser known figure in the Commonwealthman tradition is William Wollaston, whose essay The Religion of Nature Delineated (originally published in 1722, but reissued by Stanley Tweyman, N.Y., 1974) George Smith has called “one of the finest essays on property rights ever penned.” (See Smith’s essay, “William Wollaston on Property Rights,” Journal of Libertarian Studies, vol. 2, no. 3, Fall 1978, pp. 217–224.) Wollaston’s essay is important because of its more radical defense of property rights than even Locke achieved. Wollaston stresses the right of “prime occupancy,” the right to transfer property “by compact or donation,” the absolute right to defend with force one’s person and property from aggression, and the crucial importance of restitution in remedying rights’ violations.

Introductory Readings.

1. Radical Calvinism.

Quentin Skinner, The Foundations of Modern Political Thought (Cambridge University Press, 1978); Volume II, “The Age of Reformation”, Part III “Calvinism and the Theory of Revolution,” chapters 7,8,9. Étienne de la Boétie, The Politics of Obedience, Murray N. Rothbard (ed.), (Free Life Editions, N.Y., 1975).

2. The Levellers.

C.B. Macpherson, The Political Theory of Possessive Individualism: Hobbes to Locke (Oxford, 1964). Part three deals with the Levellers.

G.E. Aylmer (ed.), The Levellers in the English Revolution (Ithaca, N.Y., 1975). The Introduction and Overton’s great “An Arrow against all Tyrants”, pp. 68f.

3. The Commonwealthmen.

John Locke, Second Treatise of Government (any edition.)

John Dunn, “Consent in the Political Theory of John Locke”, in G.J. Schochet (ed.) Life, Liberty and Property. Essays on Locke’s Political Ideas (Belmont, Calif., 1971), pp. 129–161.