On September 11, 1960, Young Americans for Freedom (YAF)-a still-active conservative student organization-drafted a landmark document in Sharon, Connecticut, that still provides some of the best general ideas on which a broad conservative-libertarian movement ought to be based. The “eternal truths” therein indeed have deep roots in long-enduring ideas of liberty-most notably, the natural rights ...
This paper will explore the opening argument and first chapter of Leo Strauss’ Natural Right and History. His very opening statement explores both the conception of natural rights that are held by the majority of the people in the world, and how he feels that natural right exists. He makes his argument based on the ...
As a defender of slavery, John C. Calhoun made arguments explicitly opposed to the Founders’ conception of individual rights. Calhoun, in his Disquisition on Government, denied the existence of a state of nature in which people are born free and equal. For Calhoun, this state of nature never did nor can exist; all men are ...
In the beginning, independence rose to the forefront of philosophical inquiries into the “Natural Rights” of man. The theories of ‘Natural Rights’ came into fruition before Thomas Jefferson authored the ‘Declaration of Independence’. God’s creation of man is viewed by some as the starting point of man’s ‘Natural Rights‘. Not one of us can claim ...
It has been said that the farther a slave was from gang labor in the South, the closer he was to freedom. Thus a slave in the North had a far better chance of attaining freedom, and even as a slave had a greater understanding of what free life was like. An Abolitionist tone echoed ...
John Dewey was one of America’s major intellectual figures. The most comprehensive resource for Dewey scholars is the “Center for Dewey Studies” located at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, Carbondale, Illinois. Dewey was philosopher, social theorist, educator and public intellectual. His long life (1859 to 1952) allowed him to witness the United States evolution into ...
If you were to ask the people you know if they understand the phrase ‘separation of church and state’, most of them would say that they do. If you pressed them further, they would tell you it means that anything that is religious must be separate from that which is public, or owned or controlled ...
Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Discourse on the Origin and Foundations of Inequality among Men and Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Woman are a culmination of the Enlightenment thought on the natural rights of mankind, man’s place in society, and the Social Contract. Rousseau evaluated the works of Enlightenment philosophers before him like Thomas Hobbes ...
The new constitution was written in 1787 for several reasons. First off, the Articles of Confederation gave the states too much power. Secondly, there was no power for the federal government to tax. Lastly, the Articles of Confederation did not do what it was supposed to do, protect the rights of the people. So overall, ...