Revolution
Revolution is the overthrow of an existing government and is justified when government systematically violates natural rights and peaceful remedies are exhausted.
Government exists to secure the equal individual Natural Rights of citizens. But what happens when government becomes the violator of the very rights it was created to protect?
The American Founders answered that the people retain an ultimate natural right to change their government—and, under extreme circumstances, to abolish it altogether.
The Right to Alter or Abolish
The Declaration of Independence states that governments are instituted to secure natural rights and derive their just powers from the consent of the governed.
It then draws the consequence: whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, “it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government.”
Government therefore remains a means rather than an end. The people do not exist for government; government exists for the purposes for which the people created it. If government ceases to serve those purposes, the people retain the natural right to change it.
Alteration Is Not Revolution
The Declaration distinguishes, implicitly, between altering government and abolishing it.
Citizens living under constitutional government ordinarily possess peaceful means for alteration: elections, legislation, constitutional amendments, litigation, and other lawful political processes.
Revolution is something more radical. It occurs when an existing political order is overthrown and replaced. For that reason, revolution should not be confused with ordinary political disagreement or dissatisfaction with a particular law, election, or officeholder.
Revolution Is a Right of Last Resort
The Declaration immediately qualifies the right of revolution with an appeal to prudence.
Governments long established, it says, should not be changed for “light and transient causes.” Human beings ordinarily endure substantial political evils before taking the extraordinary step of abolishing an established government.
The standard described by the Declaration is far more serious: a “long train of abuses and usurpations” revealing a design to reduce the people under “absolute Despotism.”
Only then does the Declaration say that the people possess not merely a right but a duty to “throw off such Government” and establish new protections for their security.
Revolution, therefore, is not the first remedy for bad government. It is the ultimate remedy when lawful and peaceful remedies have ceased to offer meaningful protection against tyranny.
When Law Can No Longer Provide a Remedy
John Locke described the same problem as an “appeal to heaven.” Ordinarily, political society provides courts and laws through which disputes can be settled peacefully. But if those who possess government power themselves violate rights and leave the injured people with no earthly authority to which they can appeal, Locke argues that the people retain an ultimate judgment concerning whether resistance has become necessary.
This helps explain why revolution can involve force.
The natural right of revolution is not a general license for political violence. Rather, force becomes a possible last resort when government itself has become tyrannical and no peaceful legal remedy remains.
Revolution and Consent
The right of revolution follows from the principle of Consent.
If legitimate government derives its just powers from the consent of the governed, political power is ultimately a trust rather than the personal property of those who hold office.
A government that systematically destroys the purposes for which political authority was entrusted to it forfeits its claim to unquestioning obedience.
The people who authorized government retain the ultimate authority to withdraw their consent and establish a new political order.
The Danger of Revolution
Yet the right of revolution should never obscure the danger of revolution. A revolution destroys or disables existing political authority. Laws may cease to be enforced. Institutions can collapse. Rival groups may struggle for power. Violence begun against a tyrannical government can spread to private enemies, political opponents, or innocent people.
And overthrowing a bad government does not guarantee that something better will replace it. The French Revolution illustrates the danger. The destruction of the old regime was followed by intense political conflict, the Reign of Terror, and eventually the rise of Napoleon Bonaparte.
A revolution can therefore overthrow an existing regime without successfully establishing Rule of Law, Liberty, or Justice in its place. That is precisely why the Declaration combines the right of revolution with the virtue of prudence.
Why Revolution Matters
The natural right of revolution places an ultimate limit upon political Power.
Government officials may possess lawful authority, but they do not possess an unlimited right to rule regardless of what they do. Government remains answerable to the purposes for which it was instituted.
At the same time, revolution is an extraordinary and dangerous remedy. Constitutional government exists partly so that political wrongs can be corrected without repeatedly destroying the political order itself.
The right of revolution is therefore both an ultimate protection against tyranny and a remedy of last resort: when government systematically violates natural rights and peaceful remedies have failed, the people retain the natural right to abolish it and establish a new government better designed to secure those rights. In the natural-right tradition, revolution is the ultimate check on government power when a government systematically violates the natural rights it exists to protect.
