Political thought in England from Locke to BenthamLaski, Harold J. (Harold Joseph)
Philosophy
Political thought in England from Locke to Bentham
Laski, Harold J. (Harold Joseph)
Political science -- Great Britain -- History
But the limitation upon government is everywhere emphasized.
"Government," he says, "... is in the very nature of it a trust; and
all its powers a Delegation for particular ends." He rejects the theory
of parliamentary sovereignty as incompatible with self-government; if
the Parliament, for instance, prolonged its life, it would betray its
constituents and dissolve itself. "If omnipotence," he writes, "can with
any sense be ascribed to a legislature, it must be lodged where all
legislative authority originates; that is, in the People." Such a
system is alone compatible with the ends of government, since it cannot
be supposed that men "combine into communities and institute government"
for self-enslavement. Nor is any other political system "consistent with
the natural equality of mankind"; by which Price means that no man "is
constituted by the author of nature the vassal or subject of another, or
has any right to give law to him, or, without his consent, to take away
any part of his property or to abridge him of his liberty." From all of
which it is concluded that liberty is inalienable; and a people which
has lost it "must have a right to emancipate themselves as soon as they
can." The aptness of the argument to the American situation is obvious
enough; and nowhere is Price more happy or more formidable than when he
applies his precepts to phrases like "the unity of the empire" and the
"honor of the kingdom" which were so freely used to cover up the
inevitable results of George's obstinacy.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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