On Self-Ownership, Slavery, and the Limits of Law
“Every man has a property in his own person. This nobody has any right to but himself.”— John Locke, Second Treatise of Government
Lately, I’ve found myself circling the same question in conversation after conversation, especially as current events stir strong emotions on all sides. Rather than argue personalities or policies, I wanted to pause and write from a quieter place, about a principle that comes before all of it, and without which none of our debates make sense.
Even a slave has inalienable rights, because every man owns himself by nature. This is not granted by government, nor contingent on recognition. A man’s body, will, and labor belong to him alone. That fact precedes every constitution, statute, or court.
Slavery is therefore not the absence of rights, but the violent violation of them. A slave is not “rightless”; he is wronged. No law, no vote, no economic convenience can convert theft into legitimacy. If rights came from government, slavery would have been lawful when legal. The fact that it never was proves the opposite: rights come from nature, or from God, and law is bound to respect them—not redefine them.
“A human being is not a thing to be owned, but a person to be respected.”— paraphrase of classical Christian moral teaching
This principle does not expire with history. Any system that treats human beings as instruments rather than owners of themselves is walking the same moral ground, even if it uses cleaner language. When force replaces consent, when obedience is demanded without accountability, and when people are managed rather than governed, the violation is the same in kind, even if different in degree.
A just government does not create rights; it recognizes and protects them. The moment it claims exemption from the rules it enforces, or immunity from the standards it imposes, it ceases to be a servant and becomes a master. Power without accountability is not authority—it is domination.
Self-ownership is the line. Cross it, and no policy outcome, no emergency, no majority approval can make the act just. That is not radical. That is the oldest law there is. And when a man does not own himself, someone else inevitably will.
“Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.” — Jean-Jacques Rousseau
—Mrs Armstrong
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