No Treason · Question
How does No Treason develop the theme of Individual Natural Rights?
Answer
No Treason by Lysander Spooner develops Individual Natural Rights across the chapters the companion marks for this theme.
The work emphasizes that each person has natural rights against the whole world, including the right to resist taxation without consent, and that no collective body can legitimately override individual sovereignty.
Emphasizes that a man's natural rights are his own against the whole world, and infringement by any number is equally a crime.
Emphasizes that each individual is born with natural rights and cannot be stripped of them without consent.
Emphasizes that each person has a natural right to withdraw from government at their discretion, as exercised by the revolutionaries.
Evidence in the book
- II
Emphasizes that a man's natural rights are his own against the whole world, and infringement by any number is equally a crime.
- Chapter III
Emphasizes that each individual is born with natural rights and cannot be stripped of them without consent.
- IV
Emphasizes that each person has a natural right to withdraw from government at their discretion, as exercised by the revolutionaries.
- I
The chapter emphasizes that individuals have natural rights that government violates by forcing consent, taxation, and service without agreement.
- II
The chapter invokes the maxim that there can be no crime without criminal intent, defending the right to resist perceived usurpation.
- VII
The chapter asserts the natural right of every non-consenting individual to defend property against a tax-gatherer, equating it with defense against a highwayman.
- VIII
Argues that a man is under no involuntary allegiance to any government, affirming individual natural rights over governmental authority
- IX
Political liberty is defined as protection for the weaker party, rooted in natural rights against oppression.
