Transcript Reading: Locke Part 6

We're going to continue now with Locke's political theory. I had left off by explaining that Locke believed there were ethical or legal principles that all people intuitively knew. He thought these principles were the basis for law when a state is formed. In his view, people were originally solitary. While he didn't think that people were necessarily poor or living short, brutish lives, as Hobbes suggested, Locke did believe that humans entered the world as sovereign individuals, each governing their own bodies and what they do with them. However, there were ethical constraints, and he argued that there is a natural law, known to everyone intuitively. This natural law exists in the state of nature, where "state" refers to the condition of nature.

Since all people are equal and independent, Locke asserts that no one ought to harm another in their life, health, liberty, or possessions. Everybody intuitively knows this. Notice that the term "state" has two meanings in English: it refers to a condition someone or something is in (as in, "What a state this room is in!"), but it also refers to a social institution. The latter meaning is what Locke uses when referring to the state as a social institution that administers justice, creates a public legal order, enforces that order, and protects people from foreign invasion.

Locke's theory is that while humans were originally sovereign individuals, they lived without civil society, meaning they had to do everything themselves—defend their own lives, make their own clothes, build their own homes, and find their own food. This created competition, but Locke believed that because people knew this natural ethical law, they didn’t necessarily need to be in conflict. So, unlike Hobbes, who thought that in the state of nature people were always at war with each other, Locke believed it wasn’t that bad. He thought that humans could live in relative peace because of their intuitive understanding of right and wrong.

However, Locke did agree with Hobbes that it was a great inconvenience to have to avenge every wrong done to oneself. Imagine you have a good farm, plenty of food, and all the resources you need to survive. But then someone comes along, robs you, or kills a family member. With no public legal order, no police, and no courts, you have to personally seek out and punish the wrongdoer. If you don’t, you’ll become a target for all criminals, as they’ll know nothing will happen to them if they attack you. This is a major inconvenience, and Locke says that this is what drives people to form a state.

After this point, Locke's account of how the state is formed becomes similar to Hobbes’s. People with property to protect, families to care for, and vulnerable members—children or the elderly—band together and say, "Let’s form an institution that will create a public legal order and protect us." To do this, they sign a contract. For Locke, this is a literal contract, written and signed by the people who agree to form the state. They pay taxes to support it, which fund judges, courts, and police. They also establish a military force to go after criminals, so individuals no longer have to abandon their lives and families to seek justice. This new institution, supported by taxes, will handle enforcement, allowing people to focus on their own lives.

That, in brief, is Locke’s view of how the state is formed. However, there are several details missing, such as the precise relationship between the state and the people. First, the people who sign on as citizens agree to pay taxes, to have laws made, and to have those laws enforced. But how much say do the people have in what laws are passed? That’s not entirely clear. Locke seems to assume that something similar to the British parliamentary system will emerge, where citizens will have some input into lawmaking.

Once laws are established, the police force will not only enforce them but also protect citizens from foreign invasion and enslavement. At this point, the people become a nation, bound together by a legal contract. They sign over their natural right to defend themselves to the sovereign, who then operates according to laws and uses the armed forces to protect the people. This sovereign may be an individual or a committee.

Locke's not too clear about whether you have to have some specific form of government, but he is clearer on these basic questions. However, it’s odd that he doesn’t address very clearly the relationship this newly formed institution, with the power of military coercion, has to families, businesses, schools, churches, labor unions, hospitals, and other societal institutions. There are all kinds of institutions in society, so what is the relationship of the state to them? Locke urges that the state should be restrained in the way it uses its power, but ultimately, he concludes that the state exercises legal power over all other institutions in life. This suggests that Locke subscribes to, or at least does not challenge, what I call a hierarchical view of society—where society is a hierarchy with the state at the top.

In this hierarchical model, the state (represented here by a crown) makes the laws and exercises its power, not only over individual members of society but also over marriages, families, schools, churches, businesses, and labor unions (though in Locke’s day they were called guilds). Essentially, all other institutions are subject to the lawmaking power and military enforcement of the state’s laws. When I say military, I mean that if someone violates the law, individuals armed with weapons—representing the state's coercive power—will come and arrest them. The accused are then brought before a court, arraigned, and held for trial.

The idea of a jury of peers had already taken root in England by Locke’s time, going back to the Magna Carta in 1215 when the barons threatened to charge King John if he didn’t sign it. So, trial by a jury of peers was already well established by the time Locke was writing. He assumed some form of trial by jury in his theories, although other places, like Spain, used panels of judges rather than juries. Mexico, for example, still uses a panel of judges. Whether one system is better than the other is debatable. In some cases, I might prefer a panel of judges who know the law, rather than 12 randomly selected people who might not understand the issues at hand.

In Locke's hierarchical view, society is structured with the state at the top. And it's significant that Locke places the state and its lawmaking and coercive power above the church as well. In medieval society, this was a major controversy that threatened to tear society apart. Thomas Aquinas, for example, argued that the authority of the Church was higher than the authority of the state. In many countries in Europe, the government acknowledged the divine right of kings, and the church, in turn, acknowledged the king as God's chosen ruler, consecrating him as such. Meanwhile, the king recognized the church's supremacy in moral matters and spiritual affairs. The state governed the temporal affairs—people’s bodies and everyday lives—while the church was in charge of their souls.

While this arrangement might sound tidy, in practice, it was anything but, and there were constant conflicts over which authority should prevail—the Church or the state. In Britain, that controversy was effectively ended by Henry VIII, who, by the late 1530s, declared himself and all successive kings or queens as head of the Church. The king, not the Pope, would appoint bishops, and the country would no longer be ruled by a foreign power (i.e., the Pope). Locke certainly supported this view and had no intention of overturning it.

Of course, there were still those who believed the Church’s authority should be supreme, while others wanted the state to have supremacy. Locke sides with the state but does so gently. He doesn’t want to seem as though he’s attacking the Church or accusing it of wrongdoing, but he asserts that the state's laws can preempt Church practices. Locke writes, “It is absurd that things should be enjoined by laws that are not in a man’s power to perform. To believe that this or that is true doesn’t depend on our will. The business of laws is not to provide for the truth of opinions, but for the safety and security of the Commonwealth and of every man’s goods or person.” He goes on to argue that “truth will do well enough if left to shift for herself, for the case of each man’s salvation belongs only to himself.”

This is a very Protestant perspective. The Catholic view at the time was that each person’s salvation was tied to their relationship with the Church. Protestantism, in contrast, emphasized individual judgment. Locke’s argument is that while one person may exhort another toward salvation, all force and compulsion are forbidden. Each man has the absolute authority to judge for himself.

This is a perspective that comes from the Reformation, particularly from Martin Luther’s 1518 work, On the Babylonian Captivity of the Church. Luther asked, “What gives one Christian the right to make a law that binds what another Christian can or can’t do?” He pointed to passages like Galatians 3, which says that all are one in Christ—there is neither slave nor free, Jew nor Greek, male nor female. This implies a kind of equality. Luther answers his own question by saying that no one can be bound by a law made by another without their consent. Public legal order, therefore, only has legitimacy if people consent to be ruled by those laws.

Locke builds on this idea by proposing an actual contract between the people who are to be protected by the state and the state itself. He suggests that citizens should be able to sign a contract, agreeing to pay taxes to support the state. If someone refuses to sign the contract, they don’t have to pay taxes but also don’t receive the benefits of the state’s protection. Locke even believes that it should be public policy for everyone to have a chance to sign this contract. You would receive a document to read and sign, and if you don’t sign, you’re not subject to taxation or state protection. If your house is set on fire or your family is harmed, and you haven’t signed on as a tax-paying citizen, the state won’t lift a finger to help. You’re on your own.

Locke envisions the state as mostly laissez-faire, meaning the state won’t actively look for trouble but will respond when petitioned about a wrong, such as a robbery, murder, or contract fraud. Locke makes it clear that this includes the state’s supremacy over the church, which is significant given the centuries of church-state conflict. Locke argues that religious controversies should be left alone because the state has the power to end them.

He writes that if distinctions were made between people based on trivial characteristics, like complexion or hair color, and those people were united by common persecution, they could be as dangerous to the magistrate as anyone else. Locke doesn’t want to see such controversies arise because the state has the power to put an end to them.

Here’s what Locke is saying: If this be so, why is the magistrate not afraid of his own church, and why does he not forbid assemblies as dangerous to government? Let’s deal plainly—the magistrate is afraid of other churches, but not his own, because he is kind and favorable to the one, but severe and cruel to the other. So, let him turn the tables. Let those dissenters enjoy the same privileges in civil matters as his own subjects, and he will quickly find that these religious meetings are no longer dangerous.

Then Locke gives an example of a case in which the state has every right to interfere. He says, suppose people have the right in their religion to sacrifice animals. Anyone has the right to slaughter an animal they own, whether for food or for religion, and that right doesn’t disappear if they meet with others who share their faith and slaughter the animal to burn it as a sacrifice on an altar. But, if a disease sweeps through the country and kills most of the cattle, and it becomes crucial to preserve the cattle as a food source, then the civil government can justifiably say, No more slaughtering animals for any reason, because the cattle are needed for the survival of the Commonwealth. In such a case, the government would have the right to impose restrictions, even on religious liberty.

Locke’s point is clear: the state has the final say. The state makes the laws and enforces them. The church can have its own moral rules and conditions for being a full member, and it can teach whatever it wants about salvation—such as claiming that non-members are destined for hell. But ultimately, the church must conform to the laws of the Commonwealth. That’s Locke’s view.

I remind you that Locke didn’t challenge the hierarchical view of society as a whole. There are individuals who make up various institutions of society—social organizations like marriage, family, school, business, union, and church. We can also include hospitals, political parties, and other free associations, such as book clubs or sports teams. All of these institutions are subordinate to the state. The state is supreme over all.

Now, I raise this point to encourage you to think, as I have, about the other major aspects of Locke’s philosophy. What should a Christian say about this? While Locke was a believer, he didn’t think there were uniquely Christian views on every issue. If there were, surely the church would have discovered them in the Middle Ages. I beg to differ, and I want to present an alternative political theory—a theory developed by Abraham Kuyper (1837–1920).

Kuyper was a remarkable individual. He was a scholar, a pastor, and the founder of a Christian political party, a Christian university, and a Christian labor union. Eventually, he became the Prime Minister of the Netherlands, serving around the same time Theodore Roosevelt was president of the United States. Kuyper’s political theory rejects the hierarchical view of society.

Kuyper proposed a different model: every individual lives their life with respect to various social concerns. One of these concerns is the education of the young, another is the maintenance of justice, and yet another is the preservation of health. Other institutions promote art or faith—churches, synagogues, mosques, temples, and so on.

We also have the economic sector, where businesses are created to provide a living, banks offer ways to save and get loans, and the stock market operates. All these aspects of life give rise to institutions created to promote and preserve these particular concerns—such as art schools, orchestras, hospitals, clinics, emergency services, and courts of law.

For justice, we have the state, and the ruling organ of the state is the government. We are all citizens of the state, but not all of us are officials. We elect representatives, such as the president or governor, who serve as officials in the state. The state is tasked with promoting and preserving justice in society, while the church (or synagogue, mosque, or temple) is concerned with promoting and preserving faith.

For education, we establish schools, and for the economy, we create businesses, unions, and banks. While I haven’t filled out every concern here, the point is that there are many aspects of life that give rise to institutions meant to preserve them.

Another way to think about this is by considering the different kinds of authorities in life. Scripture tells us that parents have authority in the family, and one of the Ten Commandments is Honor your father and mother. That’s the first authority we encounter in life, and it represents any legitimate authority. Parents are the most immediate and prominent authority for children.

But authority also exists in other areas of life. In a business, ownership confers authority. The owner decides what products or services to offer, sets salaries, and determines prices. Labor unions also have authority, as does the family itself, particularly in matters of reproduction and raising children.

Kuyper’s theory emphasizes that there are multiple, distinct areas of life, each with its own authority, and the state should not exercise control over all these areas. Instead, each institution—whether it’s a family, a business, a school, or a church—has its own sphere of authority, and the state’s authority should be limited to its own sphere: the promotion and maintenance of justice.

The authority in the family is the parents, not the children—it's the parents. And if you think that what I ought to be saying is that the husband is the supreme authority, then I think you understand those verses of the New Testament incorrectly. What they say is that the husband is the head of the family in the sense that Christ is the head of the church. It doesn't make him a big boss, someone who gets to tell people what to do and impose punishments or ostracism. No, it doesn't make him the boss over his wife. As Calvin commented on those texts, it doesn't mean men are superior to women. It's a religious concern there—the husband is given the ultimate religious responsibility for the welfare of his family.

It's religious authority only. But anyway, we have a very different view of society. Notice that what's in the center of this circle is the individual person. Every individual person is a member of some family, has some concern for art, certainly has a concern for their health, and wants to see justice enforced. They may or may not belong to an organization that promotes a faith, but I would say it doesn't matter whether a person belongs to one of those organizations. Everyone has some faith or other. Everyone, by the values they accept and the way they live their lives, presupposes something as the self-existent reality that creates all the rest. So they have something that, in their scheme of things, is divine, and that's a religious belief, whether they want it to be or not, and whether they practice anything or not.

Remember, there are major religions in the world that do not practice worship—Brahman Hinduism and Theravada Buddhism, for example. So worship is not a necessary hallmark of religious belief or practice. But anyway, let's return to our non-hierarchical view of society. Each of these—the institutions created by humans to promote and preserve the interests they correspond to—functions with a different focus. By "interests," I don't just mean financial interests. People have a natural interest in justice, art, and the education of their children. These natural interests are fulfilled by the creation of institutions. I don't think humans have ever had some kind of social life interest and not created an institution to promote and preserve it.

The same is true for justice. A state is an institution that creates an order of public justice and enforces it. What's different in a primitive society? It occurs to me to use this illustration: In a primitive, say, tribal society, the difference between that and, say, the nation-states of Western Europe and North America is that in the tribe, everyone functions in all of those interests. The chief may be the one who assembles the wise of the tribe and seeks their advice on different issues, but there is no distinct group of people who are experts in law, art, education, business dealings with other tribes, and so on. That's what we regard as primitive—that they haven't clearly differentiated these interests and authorities and devoted a specific institution, or group of experts, to promote and preserve those interests.

But in our modern society—again, Western Europe, and it also includes Asia, certainly China and India—they have a state, which is the government. And they, too, grapple with the problem of what the relationship should be between the lawmaking and enforcing institution and all the other institutions of society. Generally, what they have is a hierarchical view.

Now, this other view, this non-hierarchical view, arose in the Calvinist revival movement, of which Abraham Kuyper was an important and influential member. He claimed that this view is closer to what Scripture would lead us to conclude than the hierarchical view. So, this is a theory. It's a theory of government—a political theory. Nobody denies that, but it is at least inspired by things in Scripture.

For example, Scripture looks approvingly on the idea that the owner of a business has authority in the business. It explicitly endorses the proposition that parents are the ruling authority in the family, and it similarly endorses the notion that clergy are the ruling body in the church. Scripture endorses other authorities as well. So, Kuyper heard all of this and said, "Wait a minute, maybe this is the way to see the whole of society." Many different interests need to be preserved, and people live their lives in all of these interests at once. I am at once the child of some people, the parent of others. I do business with these particular businesses. I worked in a business myself. I was a college professor, so I was involved in education.

That's another interest everyone has—ensuring the next generation is educated. Even in a primitive tribe, there were teachers who instructed the young. Usually, it was the father of the family. So, they didn’t differentiate education as a specific need and create an institution devoted to it, but everyone took part in it. Notice again that in this non-hierarchical view, the segments of the pie are not groups of people. All people function in all of these areas in their lives. The person is in the center. Every person is concerned about their health and has some concern for art.

It may not be an intense concern, but when they go to buy a car, they think one looks better than another. When they buy clothes, they choose one item over another because they like its style better. That's an art judgment. Probably both pieces of clothing will keep them warm enough or cool enough or modest enough, whatever the concern is, but it's an artistic judgment. Then, everyone has an interest in some form of education—it doesn't have to be formal. Being an apprentice to someone is just as much education as going to college. Someone can apprentice to a plumber, an ironworker, a welder, a house builder, or become a master carpenter. All of that is education—a skill or trade passed on.

I did that for a while. I had so many different jobs trying to work my way through school, and one of them turned out to be an apprenticeship to a man who tuned and repaired pipe organs. That's pretty esoteric. While working with him and observing what he did, I learned to tune pianos. Later, I put myself through seminary by giving music lessons and tuning pianos. People don't often think of those as ordinary occupations. They're not ordinary, but they're learned through apprenticeship. That's education too, and sometimes it's even better than going to college. Remember, Abraham Lincoln became a lawyer and never went to college. He apprenticed to a lawyer for years and learned enough to pass the bar exams and become a lawyer himself.

Look again at the circle. For example, in faith, Indian tribes or primitive tribes would also have a religion. The tribe would have its gods, and sometimes they would have a particular person who was an expert in that, called a medicine man or a spiritual man. Western Europeans often misinterpreted those terms when they translated them from the Indian languages. It wasn't about "medicine" but about spirituality. The man they called Crazy Horse was not "crazy," but inspired by the Divine Horse. Sometimes there were specific people who had visions and believed themselves to be more in contact with the gods than the average person. These people became spiritual experts.

As society became more differentiated and larger, we had people devoted as experts in these fields, who eventually became authorities in institutions created to preserve and promote those interests. Kuyper argued that this view is more Christian because it aligns with how Scripture sees these different authorities as all applying to human life at once. Again, these are not groups of people. Every person functions in all of these areas. Every person is a member of a family, born of some parents, is a member of a state, and probably a member of some worship institution. Every person engages in business unless, of course, they decide to become a hermit and live in absolute isolation in the woods. If they manage to survive that way, then they become, as Aristotle said, either animals or gods—they are either subhuman or superhuman, but aside from their relations to society, they can't actually be human. Aristotle advised banning them from any state.

Now, is this view individualist or collectivist? Well, there can be egalitarian versions of the hierarchical view. You could have a view where the primary authority in the state is vested in the individuals who vote.

So the primary authorities here, by their vote, confer that authority on the officials of the state, and after that, the state is supreme over all the other institutions and individuals. You can have a hierarchical view that's a democracy. The individual citizens all get to vote, and that's the fundamental authority—the people they elect. Then, if the elected officials carry out the policies they promised, they have the authority conferred on them by the people, and they head the state, and the state rules everything—hierarchy from the top down. Or you might have a version of this that's not democratic at all. Here are the individuals at the bottom. They're on the bottom rung of society, and they are not the primary authority. The primary authority is carried out by the state itself. And if the state's a monarchy, that authority is carried out by having the next nearest relative to the king who just died become the new ruler, king, or queen. The people don't elect that person. That person becomes king by the rule of genetic succession—the closest living relative steps into the throne. In medieval society, the church consecrated the king and put its approval on that, so authority might be vested in the state itself, and authority flows top-down. Or it might be a democratic version where authority is conferred from the bottom up, but then the rule is still top-down. But if you have a hierarchical view of society, the state rules everything.

However, if you have a view of society that says there are multiple interests and aspects to human life, every individual lives in all of these in some respect. Someone may say, "I don't have any religion," but they are ignorant of the definition of religious belief. They may not participate in any faith institution, but they still have some religious belief. Or they can say, "I'm against all education. I'm not going to send my kids to school," but they're not against all education, because even if they don’t send their kids to school, they teach them to do things at home. They might teach them to farm or drive a tractor or learn some other skill. Everyone has some economic interest. They can't avoid that very well. They can't say, "I don't want any money and I don't need it, and I'll live entirely without it." You won't last very long that way.

But then, what's the relation between all these authorities? Kuyper says that they are all endowed on humans by God. The one real source of authority in life is God—the absolute authority. Then God gives specific authorities to the business owner, the parents in the family, the clergy in the church, and so on. Each one of these authorities is confined to the specific respect that the institution was created to promote and preserve. The authority of the church, for instance, pertains to faith. The church can make the rules for membership in the church, but it does not make the rules for what is legal or illegal in the state. It doesn't make the rules for businesses, families, hospitals, labor unions, political parties, and so on. Each of these authorities is limited to its own sphere. There is a specific economic sphere of authority, an educational one, a faith one, one in justice, health, art, and family life. Each of these kinds of authority is delimited and distinguished from the others.

What I’m going to do now is redraw the Kuyperian view. This view came to be called "sphere sovereignty," meaning that authority in each of these spheres of life is limited to its own sphere. Here again, we have the individual who lives in all of these spheres simultaneously. The authority in each sphere is limited to its own scope. For example, in matters of justice, the authority of the state—an institution created to promote and preserve justice—is limited to public justice. The state should not make laws that regulate people's faith, the economy, or how parents raise their children. It is not within the purview of the state to say when children should go to bed—that is the authority of the parents. When you understand these different authorities, they all coexist. Everyone lives in all these spheres at the same time, and each has a specific social domain in which it is the authority. None should overstep its prescribed bounds or usurp the authority in another sphere. That’s what the term "sphere sovereignty" represents—each one is sovereign and makes the rules for its own sphere.

So again, we have things like justice, the economic side of life, concern with educating the young, passing on knowledge, skills, and trades. We have an interest in health, and we have an interest in faith, as most people do. Let's say this other one is…

I’ve covered health already, so I won’t worry about that. Now take a look at this again. We have church, mosque, synagogue, and here we create the state, businesses, unions, programs, schools, hospitals, clinics, emergency services, and so on. Let me give you an example of what would violate sphere sovereignty.

I read a book not long ago about men whose parents were Greek immigrants to the United States, and they moved near Detroit, Michigan, where the father got a job with the Ford Motor Company. In this book, the author remembers how Ford treated his family. They were grateful to have work, good wages, and relatively good working conditions. However, representatives from the company came to their home. When they opened the door, the representatives said, "What's that smell? That's not American food, that smells strange. Stop eating that stuff and eat like an American." They told them that the way they decorated their living room wasn’t American and gave them a list of things they should replace. They went through and revamped their whole lives. I don't recall the author saying that Ford prohibited them from being members of the Orthodox Church, but that was about the only thing they didn’t interfere with. They dictated how they entertained visitors, what food they served, how the house was decorated, the clothes they wore, and they advised them to send their kids to public school to learn English instead of sending them to a Greek-speaking school, or else they would be "foreigners" all their lives.

That is an example of a business wildly overstepping its bounds. A business can tell its employees what they do while at work, what job they're being paid for. It’s true that some businesses require certain dress codes when meeting representatives from other companies. That's less common now, but still happens, and that's acceptable under company rules. But when I’m at home, what I wear, if anything, is none of their business—and that’s what sphere sovereignty says.

Take another example: child labor. This was something that was addressed by unions. My grandfather went to work at five years old in the coal mines in Pennsylvania. We established child labor laws, and many people supported these laws because they thought childhood should be a time for play and being carefree, not a time for earning the family's living. While I agree with child labor laws, it’s not for that reason. My reason is that child labor violates the sphere sovereignty of the family. That’s why we put family and human reproduction, including sexual nature and marriage, in its own sphere.

The state undertakes to protect children from exploitation, and that's the point. It's not just about kids being forced to work in coal mines. In many cases, companies would tell poor immigrants trying to support their families, "You want this job? It's yours, provided you bring your kids to work for nothing." That was common in the garment district in New York, where women were told, "You want this job? Bring your four kids. They’ll bring the cloth to your machine and handle the scraps, but they won’t get paid. You want the job? Bring them along." The job was often seven days a week.

That kind of business practice interferes with the family life of the children, their education, and their faith. They couldn't go to worship, no matter the day of rest. In Kuyper’s view, whose responsibility is it to make sure these different spheres are preserved against interference from others? It’s the duty of the state. I know, and Kuyper knew, that very often it’s the state that violates this the most, making laws about what you can or must wear, or where you can go, which has nothing to do with public justice. The state must exercise great restraint on itself and act as the policeman ensuring that no authority in one sphere interferes with another.

We’ll drop this for now and pick it up to finish next time.