Rev J Kush's blog: "Rights"

REVOLUTION - THIS WORD FLOWS AROUND ALOT. . .

Every revolution was first a thought in one man's mind; and when the same thought occurs to another man, it is the key to that era.
Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1841

You cannot buy the Revolution. You cannot make the Revolution. You can only be the Revolution. It is in your spirit or it is nowhere.
Ursula K. Le Guin



RIGHT OF REVOLUTION

In political philosophy, the right to revolution (or "right of rebellion") is a right articulated first by the Monarchomachs in the context of the French Wars of Religion, by Huguenots thinkers who legitimated tyrannicides. It was then taken up by John Locke in Two Treatises of Government as part of his social contract theory. Locke declared that under natural law, all people have the right to life, liberty, and estate; he wrote that under the social contract, the people could instigate a revolution against the government when it acted against the interests of citizens and replace the government with another government in the interests of the citizens. The right of revolution thus essentially acted as a safeguard against tyranny. This is a concept similar to the right of rebellion exercised by Polish szlachta.

The right of rebellion in history

The right to revolution formed a philosophical defense of the Glorious Revolution, when Parliament deposed James II of England in 1688 and replaced him with William III of Orange-Nassau. Later, the right to revolution would be cited in the Declaration of Independence of the United States, which echoed many of the ideas on the right to revolution:

We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the consent of the governed.

That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is in the Right of the People to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new Government, laying its Foundation on such Principles, and organizing its Powers in such Form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient Causes; and accordingly all Experience hath shewn, that Mankind are more disposed to suffer, while Evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the Forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a Design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their Right, it is their Duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future Security.

It was then included in the 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen during the French Revolution.


Examples of Constitutions including the right of rebellion

Although many declarations of independence seek legitimacy by appealing to the right of revolution, far fewer constitutions mention this right or guarantee this right to citizens because of the destabilizing effect such a guarantee would likely produce. In the United States, for example, out of fifty state constitutions and one national constitution, only New Hampshire's guarantees its citizens the right to rebellion, in Article 10 of the constitution's bill of rights:

Whenever the ends of government are perverted, and public liberty manifestly endangered, and all other means of redress are ineffectual, the people may, and of right ought to reform the old, or establish a new government. The doctrine of nonresistance against arbitrary power, and oppression, is absurd, slavish, and destructive of the good and happiness of mankind.

Tennessee Constitution, Article I, § 2: "That government being instituted for the common benefit, the doctrine of non-resistance against arbitrary power and oppression is absurd, slavish, and destructive of the good and happiness of mankind."

North Carolina's constitution of November 21, 1789 also contains in its Declaration of Rights, "3d. That Government ought to be instituted for the common benefit, protection and security of the people; and that the doctrine of non-resistance against arbitrary power and oppression is absurd, slavish, and destructive to the good and happiness of mankind."




What is the Right of Revolution?

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes...


The Declaration of Independence, 1776

The "right of revolution" is a fundamental right. It is the foundation of consent of the governed. It is the guarantee that you can take matters into your own hands if you must.

We say "if you must," because the right of revolution is not easy to exercise. It means that the law stops working, and new law has to be made. It often means war.

The American Revolutionary War lasted more than seven years. The cost in lives and property was high. The suffering and disruption reached civilians as well as soldiers. Families lost their farms or businesses. Soldiers lost their lives, some of them after suffering terrible wounds, others by starvation and disease. Many of the signers of the Declaration were themselves killed, or imprisoned, or deprived of their property. They pledged "their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor." Many of them vindicated that pledge in blood.

Yet, once they were convinced that England intended to "reduce them under absolute despotism," the Founders believed that they had no choice but to exercise their right of revolution. The Declaration says that in those circumstances, a revolution is more than a right. It is a Duty.

The fact that our rights are unalienable means something more, merely than that we are born with them, or that we cannot give them away. It means also that if we fail to defend our rights, we dishonor ourselves. The price of liberty is high. To fail to pay that price is a great wrong.






Further reading:
Right of Revolution
The right of revolution, rightly understood — and the bar
LOCKE AND THE SOCIAL ORDER
Natural law
Two Treatises of Government