John Locke Quotes on Justice
Locke's Second Treatise of Government grounds political justice in natural rights to life, liberty, and property — rights individuals possess in the state of nature prior to any political authority and which the legitimate state exists to protect. The labor theory of property — that mixing one's labor with previously unowned natural resources confers a just title — supplies the framework's most distinctive contribution. The Second Treatise's account of just political authority through the consent of the governed shaped the political vocabulary of the American Declaration and the constitutional tradition that followed.
Quotes
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“All mankind being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions.”
Second Treatise of Government , Ch. II, sec. 6 -
“The end of law is not to abolish or restrain, but to preserve and enlarge freedom.”
Second Treatise of Government , Ch. VI, sec. 57 -
“Where there is no law, there is no freedom.”
Second Treatise of Government , Ch. VI, sec. 57 -
“Government has no other end, but the preservation of property.”
Second Treatise of Government , Ch. VII. sec. 94 -
“Wit and good nature meeting in a fair young lady as they do in you make the best resemblance of an angel that we know; and he that is blessed with the conversation and friendship of a person so extraordinary enjoys all that remains of paradise in this world.”
Letter to Mary Clarke (7 May 1682), quoted in Maurice Cranston, John Locke: A Biography (1957; 1985), p. 221