The Many Faces of Locke in America's Early Nineteenth-Century Democratic Philosophy

Abstract

In this article debates among early nineteenth-century politicians regard ing America's commitments to rights and popular government are exam ined. Rather than attribute ideological differences to the influence of alternative intellectual traditions, the author argues that divergent perspec tives on these commitments are best understood as alternative interpreta tions of Locke's Second Treatise. Nineteenth-century politicians may not have read this text, but their arguments parallel important aspects of it. Politicians who wanted to expand the people's power argued that nature and higher law mandated both personal and political rights. Their argu ments resemble those of the radical democratic Locke which Ashcraft (1986) describes. Those against increasing popular power argued that people left the state of nature to protect life, liberty, and especially property. Their arguments resemble the traditional Locke of Grant (1989) and the bour geois Locke of Macpherson (1962). Ongoing debates among scholars of the Second Treatise verify that Locke has many faces; nineteenth-century American political thought mirrors those ambiguities.