government

Enlightenment

period of intellectual excitement that applied scientific reasoning to politics, science, and religion. It promoted radical ideas such as: religious tolerance, natural rights, consent of governed, and separation of powers that greatly impacted the Declaration of Independence of America from Great Britain.

Constitutionalism

Began with the Magna Carta in 1215, developing a tradition of written laws that limited the powers of the government. Continued with the early American colonies, who created charters (Mayflower Compact and The Fundamental Orders of Connecticut) and later constitutions that spelled out powers and rights of people.

Unalienable rights

found in the Preamble of the Declaration of Independence, described that all people have basic rights of: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness

Civil liberties

guarantee an explicit list of rights to the people based on an English tradition that began with the Charter of Liberties and crucial in the creation of Bill of Rights found in U.S. Constitution.

Laws of nature and nature's God

idea that certain laws are prescribed by nature, applied universally to all humans and cannot contradicted. First referenced by William Blackstone and later used in writing the Declaration of Independence.

Social Contract Theory

idea that individuals surrender to the state the power needed to maintain order and the state, in turn, agrees to protect its citizens.

Republicanism

idea, described in The Republic by Plato, that authority of government should reside with voting public not in hands of heredity monarch.

English Common Law

laws that were supported by precedents and statutes handed down in court cases. Most notable traditions were: right to a jury trial, free speech, and holding of elections. These traditions were recognized by early settlers and later claimed as a birthright by American colonist that impacted founding documents.

Divine Right of Kings

Idea that power to rule is derived from a god or gods. Early rulers believed that they were descendants of gods. (Egypt, China, Persia), later European monarchs would state that power came from God giving them unlimited authority.

Thomas Hobbes

in Leviathan, created dark view that individuals surrender freedoms to gain order and security through a contract with the state.

John Locke

in Second Treatise on Government, had light view that individuals have natural rights that the government is contracted to protect.

Judeo-Christian (biblical law)

many early colonialists belonged to various degrees of the Judeo-Christian traditions and were determined to worship in their own way. The Declaration of Independence stated that a Creator bestowed unalienable rights, however Creator was defined in various ways by the signers.

Rights of resistance to illegitimate government

principle that states that authority is derived from the consent of the governed and that the sole purpose of the government is to protect individual liberties. If the government can no longer do so than the people should change or abolish it. This principle is laid out in the Declaration of Independence.