Of the State of War

The state of war, Locke argues, is a state of enmity and destruction — entered not by passion or hasty design but by a settled, deliberate intention upon another's life. Whoever declares such an intention puts the other in a state where there is no rule but force, no appeal but to heaven. The critical point is that this state can be entered even by someone who uses force to take your goods without threatening your life. By using force without right, a thief implicitly declares himself outside the law and therefore implicitly threatens your freedom — which amounts to a threat to your life, since freedom is inseparable from life.

Locke draws the crucial distinction that Hobbes had collapsed: the state of nature and the state of war are as far apart as a state of peace, good will, and mutual assistance is from a state of enmity, malice, and destruction. The state of nature is peaceful when no one violates the law of nature. The state of war is entered when someone does. Within a political society, the state of war may be ended by appeal to the law and a common judge; without a political society, there is no such appeal, and the state of war continues until the aggressor offers peace and reparation.

The practical import of the distinction is the basis of resistance. If the state of war exists wherever there is force without right — and if even a thief using force has declared war — then resistance to such force is not rebellion but self-defense. This is the foundation on which Locke will later build the right of revolution: when a government uses force without right, it has declared war on its own people, and the people may resist it as they would any aggressor. Avoiding this state of war, which has no remedy but force, is one of the great reasons men form political societies.