http://www.philosophybasics.com/branch_libertarianism.html
History of Libertarianism
The history of Libertarianism is also the history of classical
Liberalism, and the two concepts are very closely related. The initial theory arose from
Enlightenment ideas in 18th Century Europe and America, especially the
political philosophies of
John Lockeand the
Baron de Montesquieu (1689 - 1755), and the
moral and
economic philosophy of
Adam Smith.
Locke believed that the role of any legislature was to
protect natural rights in the legal form of
civil rights. He proposed a
labour theory of property whereby each individual owns the fruits of his efforts by virtue of his
labour, and from this an economy emerges based on
private property and
trade, with money as the
medium of exchange.
At around the same time, the French philosopher
Montesquieu developed a distinction between
sovereign and
administrativepowers, and proposed a
separation of powers (usually into the Executive, the Legislative and the Judicial) to act as a counterweight to the
natural tendency of administrative power to grow at the
expense of individual rights. This became an important concept in both constitutional monarchies and republics.
Adam Smith's moral philosophy stressed
government non-intervention so that individuals could achieve whatever their "God-given talents" would allow without
interference from arbitrary forces. He also opposed
trade guilds (fore-runners to modern unions) and
joint stock companies (or corporations) for the same reasons.
The Founding Fathers of the
United States enshrined the
protection of liberty as the primary purpose of government in the
Declaration of Independence of 1776 and the United States Constitution, and
Thomas Jefferson (1743 - 1826) in particular was key in etablishing the
Law of Equal Liberty and the
Non-Aggression Principle as major tenets. Very similar ideas were also included in the French
Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen of 1789, a key document in the
French Revolution.
John Stuart Mill declared that his preferred doctrine of
Utilitarianism requires that political arrangements satisfy the
"liberty principle", whereby each person is guaranteed the
greatest possible liberty that would
not interfere with the liberty of others, in order maximize happiness.
In the late 19th Century and early 20th Century,
Progressivism in the United States and
Socialism in Europe increasingly focused on the advancement of
workers' rights and
social justice to counteract the increasing excesses of rampant
Capitalismand industrialism. It was only in the latter half of the
20th Century that the term "libertarian", which had earlier been associated with
Anarchism, came to be
adopted by those whose attitudes bore closer resemblance to
classical liberals.
