Natural Rights in the Declaration of Independence

The American Declaration of Independence, adopted on July 4, 1776, is one of the most important documents in the history of natural rights theory. Drafted primarily by Thomas Jefferson, the Declaration is a manifesto of the natural-rights tradition, and it has remained a basic reference for the contemporary debate about the proper foundations of human rights. This article examines the natural-rights theory in the Declaration, its Lockean foundations, its universal claims, and its lasting influence on modern human rights.

The Lockean Foundations

The natural-rights theory in the Declaration of Independence is grounded in the political philosophy of John Locke. Locke’s Two Treatises of Government (1689) had developed a comprehensive theory of natural rights, of limited government, and of the right of resistance against tyranny, and the Declaration drew directly on this tradition.

The most important Lockean elements in the Declaration are the following:

The doctrine of natural rights, including the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, which Locke had described as the natural rights that all human beings possess by virtue of their nature as human beings.

The doctrine of the social contract, in which the people consent to be governed in order to protect their natural rights, and in which the government is established as the trustee of these rights.

The doctrine of the right of revolution, in which the people have the right to resist or to overthrow a government that violates the natural rights for which it was established.

These Lockean elements are the basic structure of the Declaration’s political argument, and they are the foundation of the American political tradition.

The Universal Claims

The most famous passage of the Declaration is the statement of the “self-evident truths”: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

The claim that these truths are “self-evident” is an important rhetorical move. The authors are not arguing for the truths; they are claiming that they are evident to anyone who is capable of rational thought. The truths are, in their view, accessible to all human beings, regardless of their particular circumstances or convictions.

The content of the self-evident truths is also significant. The claim that “all men are created equal” is a claim about the fundamental moral equality of all human beings. The claim that they are “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights” is a claim that the rights in question are not granted by governments or by human conventions; they inhere in the human person. The enumeration of the rights — “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness” — is an enumeration of the most fundamental human interests.

The universal claims of the Declaration have been a basic feature of the American political tradition, and they have been an important source of the contemporary human rights movement. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948), drafted in the aftermath of the Second World War, drew directly on the language and the structure of the Declaration, and the contemporary international human rights regime is, a continuation of the project that the Declaration began.

The Right of Revolution

The Declaration also develops the most radical implication of its argument: the right of revolution. “That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government.”

The right of revolution is a direct contradiction of the traditional doctrine of the divine right of kings, and it was one of the most radical claims in the political philosophy of the eighteenth century. The claim was justified by the appeal to the natural rights of the individuals, and it was an important foundation of the modern theory of popular sovereignty.

The right of revolution was not, in the Declaration, a right of rebellion against all authority. The Declaration is careful to qualify the right: the people should not “alter or abolish” their government for “light and transient causes”; they should do so only when “a long train of abuses and usurpations” shows that the government is determined to reduce them to “absolute Despotism.” The right of revolution, in other words, is not a right of anarchy; it is a right of resistance against a government that has become systematically destructive of the ends of government.

The Contradictions

The Declaration of Independence was a radical document, but it was also a document with significant contradictions. The most important contradiction was the existence of slavery in a nation that had proclaimed the equality of all human beings. The Declaration was signed by slaveholders, and the contradiction between its principles and the practice of slavery was one of the great moral problems of the new American republic.

The contradiction was eventually addressed, although only after a long and difficult struggle. The American Civil War, the abolition of slavery by the Thirteenth Amendment (1865), the Civil Rights movement of the twentieth century, and the various other struggles for the recognition of the rights of all human beings are all, attempts to bring the practice of American society into closer conformity with the principles of the Declaration.

The contemporary debate about the legacy of the Declaration is shaped by a recognition of both its achievements and its contradictions. The Declaration remains a basic reference for the American political tradition, and it has been an inspiration to democratic movements throughout the world. At the same time, the recognition of the contradictions has led to a more critical and more nuanced understanding of the document and its legacy.

The Lasting Influence

The Declaration of Independence has had a profound and lasting influence on the political life of the modern world. The document is a basic reference for the American political tradition, and it has been an inspiration to democratic movements throughout the world.

The basic principles of the Declaration — the equality of all persons, the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, the consent of the governed, the right of revolution against tyranny — have become the basic principles of modern democratic politics.

Further Reading

• The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (plato.stanford.edu), relevant entry
• Mark Goldie & Robert Wokler, eds., The Cambridge History of Eighteenth-Century Political Thought (2006)
• Terence Ball, Reappraising Political Theory (1995)