English philosopher Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury is referred to as the founder of the “social contract tradition”, and his 1651 book “Leviathan Or The Matter, Form And Power Of A Commonwealth Ecclesiastical And Civil” [1] regarded as originating the social contract model. That said; Hobbes’ model is an Enlightenment example of unilineal sociocultural evolutionism as it envisions a progression from the state of nature to a social contract. Hobbes describes his view of the nature of human beings in what he describes, in Part 1, Chapter 13 of “Leviathan”, “On The Natural Condition Of Mankind As Concerning Their Felicity And Misery” [2], as the “state of nature”: “During the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that conditions called war; and such a war, as if of every man, against every man [3]…To this war of every man against every man, this is also consequent; that nothing can be unjust [4]…Where there is no common power, there is no law, where no law, no injustice [5]…Whatsoever therefore is consequent to a time of war, where every man is enemy to every man; the same is consequent to the time, wherein men live without other security, than what their own strength, and their own invention shall furnish them withal [6].” [7]
As Hobbes himself describes in articulating the progression out of the state of nature, the solution to resolving such universal mutual warfare is to follow, as best one is able to do so unilaterally, Prussian Immanuel Kant's categorical imperative. In Section 2, “Transition From Popular Moral Philosophy To A Metaphysics Of Morals” [8], of his 1785 “Foundations Of The Metaphysics Of Morals” [9], Kant explains what he means by categorical imperative: “Do not feel forced to act, as you’re only willing to act according to your own universal laws. And that’s good. For only willful acts are universal. And that’s your maxim.” Hobbes describes the beginning of his “social contract” as one willingly relinquishing one’s own right to everything and defense at all means, doing so under the presupposition that others will follow suit.
Since the ratification of the Bill of Rights on December 15, 1791, the United States of America has had a social contract very much like the one envisioned in “Leviathan”, which we refer to as our Constitution. However, since its formation on November 17, 1871, this nation has also had an organization whose explicitly self-declared purpose is the return of America to a disquietingly Hobbesian state of war. In a 2012 speech to the New York Rifle and Pistol Association, Nation Rifle Association President James Porter said that the purpose of the NRA is “To teach and train the civilian in the use of the standard military firearm, so that when they have to fight for their country, when they’re ready to fight tyranny, they have the wherewithal and the weapons to do it.”
In Part I Chapter 14 of his “Leviathan”, entitled “Of The First And Second Natural Laws. And Of Contracts” [10], Hobbes enumerates what he refers to as the “right of nature”: “The right of nature, which writers commonly call jus natural, is the liberty each man hath, to use his own power, as he will himself, for the preservation of his own nature; that is to say, of his own life; and consequently, of doing anything, which in his own judgment, and reason, he shall conceive to be the aptest means thereunto…The sum of the right of nature, which is by all means we can do to defend ourselves.” In Part 2 Chapter 21: “Of The Liberty Of Subjects” [11], Hobbes reiterates: “A covenant not to defend myself from force by force is always void. For no man can transfer, or lay down his right, to save himself from death, wounds, and imprisonment. For the right men have by nature to protect themselves, when no one else can protect them, can by no covenant be relinquished. The right to defend ourselves is the sum of the right of nature.” Indeed, Hobbes writes in Chapter 14, existence in the state of nature makes the right to self-preservation at all costs and by any means necessary bring along with it a right to anything and everything: “Because the condition of man is a condition of war of everyone against everyone; in which case everyone is governed by his own reason; and there is nothing he can make use of, that may not be a help unto him, in preserving his life against his enemies; it followeth that in such a condition every man has a right to everything, even to one another’s body [12].” The right of everyone to everything, Hobbes explains in Chapter 11, “Of The Difference Of Manners” [13], is the causus belli in the state of nature: “If any two men desire the same thing, which nevertheless they cannot both enjoy, they become enemies; and on the way to their end, which is principally their own conservation, and sometimes their dedication only, endeavor to destroy or subdue one another…Competition of riches, honor, command, or other power, inclineth to contention, enmity, and war: because the way of one competitor, to the attaining of his desire, is to kill, subdue, supplant, or repel the other.” This desire of every man to destroy every other man is what necessitates Hobbes’ right to self-defense being inalienable, as its result is universal mutual suspicion: “A man cannot lay down the right of resisting them, that assault him by force, to take away his life [14]. Because a man cannot tell, when he seeth men proceed against him by violence whether they intend his death or not [15].”[16]
However, Article I, Section VIII of the Constitution of the United States of America states: “The Congress shall have the power To declare war, To raise and support armies, To provide and maintain a navy; To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces; To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions; To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the militia, and for governing them as employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the appointment of officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress [17].”
At the January 15-18, 2013 Shooting, Hunting, Outdoor Trade Show in Las Vegas, Nevada, NRA Board of Directors member Theodore Nugent said, referring the April 19, 1775 battles in Middlesex County, Province of the Massachusetts Bay: “If you want another Concord Bridge, I got some buddies.”
On January 16th, then-President of the NRA David Keene told ABC News, referring to President of the United States of America Barack Obama, that “All bets are off when the President really wants to go to war with you”, and said of the NRA: “We’re going to be there and we’re going to fight it.” Article II, Section II, Clause I of the United States Constitution reads: “The President shall be commander-in-chief of the army and navy of the United States, and of the militia of the States, when called into service of the United States.”
In a January 30th United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary hearing, when asked by Senator Richard Durbin from Illinois if he agreed with the point of view that “We need the firepower and the ability to protect ourselves from our government, from the police, if they knock on your doors we need to fight back”, NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre answered: “Without a doubt.”
Article III, Section III of the Constitution states: “Treason against the United States shall consist in levying war against them.” In Chapter 13, Hobbes asserts that “War consisteth not in battle only, or the act of fighting; but in a tract of time, wherein the will to contend by battle is sufficiently known: and therefore the notion of time, is to be considered in the nature of war [18]…So the nature of war, consisteth not in the actual fighting; but in the known disposition thereto, during all the time there is no assurance to the contrary.”[19]
- Oregon State University: http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/hobbes/leviathan-contents.html
University of Adelaide: http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/h/hobbes/thomas/index.html - University of Adelaide: http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/h/hobbes/thomas/h68l/complete.html
- Oregon State University: http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/hobbes/leviathan-c.html
Columbia University: http://www.columbia.edu/cu/tat/core/hobbes.htm - University of Idaho: http://www.webpages.uidaho.edu/jcanders/Ethics/hobbesoverhead.htm
- University of Adelaide: http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/h/hobbes/thomas/h68l/chapter13.html
University of West Georgia: http://www.westga.edu/~rlane/law/lecture02_hobbes.html
Drexel University: http://www.pages.drexel.edu/~cp28/hobbes.htm
University of Wisconsin-Madison: http://faculty.history.wisc.edu/sommerville/367/367-092.htm - Texas Wesleyan University: http://faculty.txwes.edu/csmeller/human-prospect/ProData09/01ModCulMatrix/ModWRTs/Hobbes1651LevSEL.htm
University of South Alabama: http://www.southalabama.edu/history/faculty/faust/Hobbes.htm - Oregon State University: http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/hobbes/leviathan-c.html
Columbia University: http://www.columbia.edu/cu/tat/core/hobbes.htm - University of San Diego: http://ethics.sandiego.edu/Books/Kant/MM/Part2.html University of
Rhode Island: http://www.uri.edu/personal/szunjic/philos/grwork.htm
Rockhurst University: http://cte.rockhurst.edu/s/945/images/editor_documents/content/John%20F.%20Morris,%20Ph.D.%20%20%20%20%20%20%20Associate%20Professor%20of%20Philoso/Study%20Guide%20for%20Kant.pdf - Iowa State University: http://www.public.iastate.edu/~jwcwolf/Papers/KantExcerpt.htm
- Oregon State University: http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/hobbes/leviathan-c.html
University of Adelaide: http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/h/hobbes/thomas/h68l/chapter14.html
Florida International University: http://www2.fiu.edu/~hauptli/HobbesLeviathanForPHH2063.html
University of Central Florida: http://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~stanlick/equality3.html - University of Adelaide: http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/h/hobbes/thomas/h68l/chapter21.html
University of Notre Dame: http://ndpr.nd.edu/news/23649-hobbes-and-republican-liberty/
Temple University: http://astro.temple.edu/~dmg33/Art_files/hobbes_xxi.pdf
Hanover College: http://history.hanover.edu/courses/excerpts/111hob2.html - Iowa State University: http://www.public.iastate.edu/~jwcwolf/Papers/ROUSS.HTM
- University of Adelaide: http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/h/hobbes/thomas/h68l/chapter11.html
Oregon State University: http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/hobbes/leviathan-contents.html
University of Virginia: http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/toc/modeng/public/HobLev2.html - Hanover College: http://history.hanover.edu/courses/excerpts/111hob2.html
Oregon State University: http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/hobbes/leviathan-c.html - Oregon State University: http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/hobbes/leviathan-c.html
Hanover College: http://history.hanover.edu/courses/excerpts/111hob.html - Oregon State University: http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/hobbes/leviathan-c.html
- University of North Texas: http://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth47669/m1/2/
- Oregon State University: http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/hobbes/leviathan-c.html
Smithsonian American Art Museum: http://americanart.si.edu/collections/search/artwork/?id=13314
California State University Northbridge: http://www.csun.edu/~sk36711/WWW/456/RochesterBehnAstell.html
Gonzaga University: http://guweb2.gonzaga.edu/faculty/mcreynolds/phil463/informationalism/peace.html
Institute for Advanced Study: http://www.ias.edu/articles/reign-of-terror
Hanover College: http://history.hanover.edu/courses/excerpts/111hob.html - Oregon State University: http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/hobbes/leviathan-c.html
Smithsonian American Art Museum: http://americanart.si.edu/collections/search/artwork/?id=13314
California State University Northbridge: http://www.csun.edu/~sk36711/WWW/456/RochesterBehnAstell.html
Gonzaga University: http://guweb2.gonzaga.edu/faculty/mcreynolds/phil463/informationalism/peace.html
Institute for Advanced Study: http://www.ias.edu/articles/reign-of-terror
Hanover College: http://history.hanover.edu/courses/excerpts/111hob.html
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