December 7, 1941--Pearl Harbor--has since “lived in infamy.” But December 7 had been infamous in America before.  In 1683, Algernon Sydney, one of American colonists’ primary inspirations and sources of insight into political liberty, was executed for treason on that date, after a trial blatantly violating his rights (violations so egregious that Parliament overturned Sydney’s conviction in 1689), for opposing England’s King Charles II as overstepping his powers. The key evidence was nothing more than a private, unpublished manuscript arguing that the king was not above the law, which later was published as Discourses Concerning Government.

Sydney died for asserting that “the liberty...granted by God to all mankind” justified revolution for citizens to defend themselves against the tyranny of a king exceeding his legal authority.  As Murray Rothbard put it,”To Sidney, revolution and freedom were closely linked. Whenever people’s liberties were threatened or invaded, they had the right, nay the duty, to rebel…defending the rights of individuals against tyranny. Revolution to Sidney was not an evil but the people’s great weapon for the overthrow of tyranny…There was nothing sacred about governments, which on the contrary should be changed as required. “

Sydney helped inspire America’s revolutionaries who, according to Thomas West, “warmly admired Sydney’s principles and his fighting republican spirit. His death as a martyr to liberty inspired [colonists] with a model in their own risky enterprise against the force of English arms.” 

In Discourses Concerning Government, Sydney was engaged in “asserting the liberty...granted by God to all mankind,” and opposing government tyranny, because each person had “an equal liberty of providing for themselves...no one having any other right than was common to all.” He taught American colonists a greater understanding of liberty, the relationship between liberty and virtue, the rule of law, and the right to throw off tyranny. He wrote of men’s inalienable rights, sacrificed his life for them, and helped inspire the Revolutionary War almost a century later, to defend them.

Consider some of why America’s founders thought so highly of Sydney:

On Liberty

“God in goodness and mercy to mankind has with an equal hand given to all the benefit of liberty...”

“[O]ur rights and liberties are innate, inherent...”

“The liberties of nations are from God and nature, not from Kings.”

“[A]ll men saw...that man is naturally free, that he cannot justly be deprived of that liberty without cause, and that he does not resign it, or any part of it, unless it be in consideration of a greater good which he proposes for himself.”

“[O]ur natural liberty...is of so great importance that from thence only can we know whether we are freemen or slaves...”

“[T]his equality of right and exemption from the dominion of any other is called liberty…he who enjoys it cannot be deprived of it, unless by his own consent, or by force...”

“[I]n relation to my house, land, or estate; I may do what I please with them, if I bring no damage upon others... the state takes no other cognizance of what passes between me and [others], than to oblige me to perform the contracts I make, and not to do that to them which the law forbids...without prejudice to the society into which I enter, I may and do retain to myself the liberty of doing what I please in all things relating peculiarly to myself, or in which I am to seek my own convenience.”

“[I]f the liberty of one man cannot be limited or diminished by one or any number of men, and none can give away the right of another, ‘tis plain that the ambition of one...cannot give a right to any over the liberties of a whole nation.  Those who are so set up have their root in violence or fraud, and are rather to be accounted robbers and pirates than magistrates.”

“[Governments]...degenerate into a most unjust and despicable tyranny, so soon as the supreme lord begins to prefer his own interest or profit before the good of his subjects...such an extreme deviation from the end of their institution annuls it; and the wound thereby given to the natural and original rights of those nations cannot be cured, unless they resume the liberties of which they have been deprived...”

On Liberty and Virtue

“Liberty produces virtue, order and stability...”

“[V]irtue...has been found...in all nations that have enjoyed their liberty...”

“[A]ll that was ever desirable or worthy of praise and imitation in Rome did proceed from its liberty...if this virtue and the glorious effects of it did begin with liberty, it did also expire with the same...liberty...was no sooner overthrown than virtue was torn up by the roots...”

“[T]he best men, during the liberty of Rome, thrived best...so soon as liberty was subverted, the worst men thrived best...corruption, venality, and violence...were neither the effects of liberty, nor consistent with it.”

“[I]f vice and corruption prevail, liberty cannot subsist; but if virtue have the advantage, arbitrary power cannot be established.”

On Government and the Rule of Law

“[G]overnments...in which every man’s liberty is least restrained...would certainly prove to be the most just, rational and natural...”

“[G]overnments were instituted for the obtaining of justice and the preservation of liberty.”

“[P]rinces are obliged by the law of nature to preserve the lands, goods, lives and liberties of their subjects...”

“[M]agistracy is not instituted...but for the preservation of the whole people, and the defense of the liberty, life and estate of every private man...rights and liberties...which we have received from God and nature.”

“[C]onsider whether the wisest, best and bravest of men are not naturally led to be pleased with a government that protects them from receiving any wrong, when they have not the least inclination to do any.”

“[I]f the safety of the people be the supreme law, and this safety extend to, and consist in the preservation of their liberties, goods, lands and lives, that law must necessarily be the root and beginning, as well as the end and limit…all laws must be subservient and subordinate to it...”

“[Governors] are by the law of nature bound… to preserve the lives, lands, liberties and goods of every one of their subjects; and he that...exercises a power of disposing of them according to his will, violates the laws of nature in the highest degree…This is the ground of all just governments; for violence or fraud can create no right...”

“[I]f there be no other law in a kingdom than the will of a prince, there is no such thing as liberty.  Property is also an appendage to liberty; and ‘tis...impossible for a man to have a right to lands or goods, if he has no liberty, and enjoys his life only at the pleasure of another...”

“[L]aws...are under God the best defense of our lives, liberties, and estates.”

On Tyranny and the Right of Revolution

“[I]s it possible that any one man can make himself lord of a people...to whom God had given the liberty of governing themselves, by any other means than violence or fraud...is not the invasion of it the most outrageous injury that can be done to all mankind, and most particularly to the nation that is enslaved by it?”

“[One] could not imagine that a free nation...did intend to give up their persons, liberties and estates...we are free-men...no man has a power over us, which is not given...and conducing to the ends for which they are given, which can be no other than to defend us from all manner of arbitrary power...”

“[T]he king neither has nor can have any prerogative which is not for the good of the people, and the preservation of their liberties.”

“[N]othing can be more absurd than to say that one man has an absolute power above law to govern according to his will, for the people’s good, and the preservation of their liberty: For no liberty can subsist where there is such a power...He is a free man who lives as best pleases himself, under laws made by his own consent...”

“[D]etract nothing from the public liberty, which the law principally intends to preserve...the people…cannot but have a right to preserve their liberty, or avenge the violation.”

“[T]he rights and liberties of a nation must be utterly subverted and abolished, if the power of the whole may not be employed to assert them, or punish the violation of them…if we do not, the fault is owing to ourselves...”

“Shall it be lawful for [rulers] to usurp a power over the liberty of others, and shall it not be lawful for an injured people to resume their own?”

“[I]mposters...endeavor to persuade the people they ought not to defend their liberties, by giving the name of rebellion to the most just and honorable actions that have been performed for the preservation of them...”

“[E]ncourage those who defend, or endeavor to recover their violated liberties, to act vigorously in a cause that God does evidently patronize.”

“[H]ands and swords are given to men, that they only may be slaves who have no courage...when liberty is overthrown by those, who of all men ought with the utmost industry and vigor to have defended it.”

“[W]e ought not to...think God has so far abandoned us into the hands of our enemies, as not to leave us the liberty of using the same arms in our defense as they do to offend and injure us.”

“[S]laves by nature...have no comprehension of liberty...But some nations...know how to preserve their liberty...he is a fool who knows not that swords were given to men, that none might be slaves, but such as know not how to use them.”

In Discourses Concerning Government, Algernon Sydney set out to “establish the natural liberty of all mankind in its utmost extent.”  His devotion to liberty helped inspire the American Revolution, because “a people from all ages in love with liberty and desirous to maintain their own privileges could never be brought to resign them.”  However, it is unclear that Americans retain such beliefs, judging by the extent our rights have been resigned to government overstepping.  That is why revisiting Sydney’s commitment would help reclaim our heritage of liberty.

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Gary M. Galles is a professor of economics at Pepperdine University. His research focuses on public finance and public choice (better termed the economics of government), the theory of the firm, the organization of industry and liberty­. He regularly contributes the "Quotable" column, featuring timeless excerpts from classical liberals.