1. Major Political Philosophers

2. Enlightenment Thinkers In terms of the American political system the most significant of the theories is that of the “social contract,” developed by seventeenth and eighteenth century philosophers. It challenged the idea of divine right.

3. Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679 ) in Leviathan (1651) wrote that in a “state of nature” no government existed, making life “cruel, brutish, and short.” By contract people would surrender power to the state to maintain order and the state would protect its citizens. The contract could not be broken.

5. John Locke (1632-1704) in Two Treatises on Civil Government (1690) wrote that the social contract creates a limited government which relies on the “consent of the governed.” Government’s job is to secure people’s natural rights (life, liberty, and property) which all people have simply because they are human beings. If government fails to preserve the rights of the people, the people could justly break the contract ideas used by Thomas Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence state should protect individual rights citizens should rebel against unjust governments believed in religious freedom supported women's rights

6. Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) French philosopher who wrote in The Social Contract (1762) that people alone had the right to determine how they should be governed and that the main duty of government should be to maintain as much freedom as possible in a civilized society. believed politics and morality are not separate believed people should rely more on instinct and emotion state is created to preserve freedom government is a contract between the ruler and citizens

7. Charles de Secondat, the Baron de Montesquieu (1689-1755) French philosopher who wrote in The Spirit of the Laws (1748) that no one person should make, enforce, and interpret the laws, proposing a division of government powers into three separate branches with different duties (separation of powers) and the ability to check on each other’s powers (checks and balances) U.S. government based on his suggested structure Believed in the rights of the individual influenced the writing of constitutions of many countries including the United States

8. Major Political Philosophers Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679)- in Leviathan (1651) wrote that in a “state of nature” no government existed, making life “cruel, brutish, and short.” By contract people would surrender power to the state to maintain order and the state would protect its citizens. The contract could not be broken. John Locke (1632-1704)- in Two Treatises on Civil Government (1690) wrote that the social contract creates a limited government which relies on the “consent of the governed.” Government’s job is to secure people’s natural rights (life, liberty, and property) which all people have simply because they are human beings. If government fails to preserve the rights of the people, the people could justly break the contract Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778)- French philosopher who wrote in The Social Contract (1762) that people alone had the right to determine how they should be governed and that the main duty of government should be to maintain as much freedom as possible in a civilized society. Charles de Secondat, the Baron de Montesquieu (1689-1755)- French philosopher who wrote in The Spirit of the Laws (1748) that no one person should make, enforce, and interpret the laws, proposing a division of government powers into three separate branches with different duties (separation of powers) and the ability to check on each other’s powers (checks and balances) In terms of the American political system the most significant of the theories is that of the “social contract,” developed by seventeenth and eighteenth century philosophers. It challenged the idea of divine right.