Of Conquest

Chapter 16 addresses the most common historical justification for political authority that Locke had not yet directly confronted: conquest. Many of the kingdoms of Europe in 1689 could trace their ruling dynasties to military conquest. If conquest creates legitimate authority, then the consent theory is largely irrelevant to actual political life. Locke's argument is that conquest creates no legitimate authority at all — not even in the case of a just war.

Even if the war was just — even if the conqueror was defending against genuine aggression — the scope of the power won by victory is extremely limited. Over the individual aggressors who actually fought unjustly, the conqueror may hold power of life and death: they forfeited their rights by their aggression. But their wives, their children, and others who did not participate in the unjust war owe the conqueror nothing. They were not party to the aggression; they did not consent to the war; they retain all their natural rights. The conqueror cannot extend his authority over them without their consent.

Even more sharply, the conqueror cannot take the land and property of the conquered. The property of the family belongs not only to the aggressor but to his dependants, who have rights to it under natural law. Taking it to compensate for the costs of war violates their rights. Locke acknowledges that governments descended from conquest in fact claim these powers; his point is that the claim is illegitimate. Might does not make right. Conquest is force, not authority; the population brought under a conqueror's power owes submission to force, not obedience to legitimate government. The two are entirely different things, and no lapse of time converts one into the other.