Hobbes believed that a government’s covenant with the governed is unconditional to prevent devolving into what he depicts as the mercilessly difficult state of nature. Locke describes the relationship between citizens and the sovereign as a contract instead, proposing that both sides have core requirements to uphold, and the violation of either side’s terms demands core reform. Hobbes believed that, because justice is defined and created by and through government, rebellion is never justified. Locke on the other hand argued for the innate freedoms of man, granted by (in his view) God. If these freedoms and rights were to be violated, in Locke’s view, rebellion is necessary to reform the contract between a government and the people.

Hobbes describes the state of nature in the following passage: “where every man is enemy to every man, the same consequent to the time wherein men live without other security than what their own strength and their own invention shall furnish them withal... and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short” (Hobbes L.13) To Hobbes a covenant with the sovereign is the only remedy to avoid this difficult state of existence. He wrote that although man has absolute liberty to do whatever he wants and is capable of in the state of nature, he surrenders this to the sovereign in exchange for private ownership and the protection of civil life. Hobbes holds a positive law view by believing that rights exist solely as benefits of the state. Locke describes the state of nature differently, suggesting that although some do live in turmoil (as Hobbes argued), others thrived in it. Locke proposes that legitimate government is formed through the consent of individuals in a social contract. He does not believe an individual’s liberty can be surrendered to the state (as Hobbes does), rather that by surrendering certain natural freedoms to enable peaceful coexistence, it is the government’s responsibility to act on the pre existing laws and rights that govern man innately. This successful social contract gives way to the birth of justice, which cannot exist without government in Locke’s view. In Locke’s description of the social contract that citizens hold with the sovereign he emphasizes the image of a “contract”: when a party fails to uphold their end of the agreement the contract is broken and is either voided or reformed. When a tyrannical government fails to uphold the life, liberty, and property rights of the governed, individuals and the collective have the responsibility to rebel. In Hobbes’ writing his view is quite different. Once a group of individuals form a covenant with the sovereign, Hobbes proposes that citizens must follow the will of their government short of an immediate threat to their lives. In his view, because citizens’ rights are generated by the sovereign, no rebellion is reasonable outside of this individual circumstance. Even in this event, rebellion against the state can’t be “justified” because it is the state itself that creates and defines justice. Hobbes however recognizes that it is a human instinct to protect one’s life, and so a rebellion in this circumstance is “reasonable”.

Hobbes and Locke have competing views on many core political science ideas like the state of nature, and the legitimacy and evolution of the state, but they have some important commonalities. They both suggest that states are born of a social contract/covenant, and both argue for general forms of surrendering limited freedoms to a smaller body of people in the form of government. Although Hobbes' view of a covenant with the sovereign differs in detail from Locke’s description of the social contract, they both describe this communal agreement as the beginning of government. An important difference between the two is Locke’s vigorous traditional Christian foundation to his philosophy and reasoning. This is what justifies his argument for god-given liberties that can’t be surrendered to the state. This aligns with his description of necessary rebellion against tyranny and governments that strip this freedom. Hobbes’ writing goes against this, saying that liberty was sacrificed to exit the state of nature and invested entirely in the sovereign. For this reason, in Hobbes’ view, individuals submit their freedoms entirely to the will of their governments, and are never “justified” in rebelling (only “reasonable” to protect one’s self from immediate harm). He wrote: “the definition of Injustice, is no other than the not performance of covenant. And whatsoever is not unjust, is just.” (Hobbes 13.13). It is an important view in both’s writings that justice can only exist through government.

I am more persuaded by Hobbes’ description of the state of nature than Locke’s. I believe individuals in this state would inevitably work harder to produce less than they would comparatively in a productive society. I do not align entirely with his writing, though, as I don’t agree that man would inevitably devolve into an endless state of war and conflict. In this aspect I can agree with Locke’s argument that individuals could prosper to some degree under peaceful conditions. I also agree more with Locke’s description of the bond between sovereign and citizen as a contract with amenable responsibilities for both sides to uphold. In Locke’s view when the social contract is broken by a misguided government it is required of the citizens to act and change the foundation of their government. Hobbes’ harsh view of the purpose of government reflects his pre-enlightenment life, as he was never able to reflect on the political consequences of the major revolutions that followed him. He argued that a government only had to provide a better life for its citizens than the alternate state of nature would: “Therefore before the names of just, and unjust can have place, there must be some coercive power, to compel men equally to the performance of their covenants, by the terror of some punishment, greater than the benefit they expect by the breach of their covenant; and to make good that propriety, which by mutual contract men acquire, in recompense of the universal right they abandon: and such power there is none before the erection of a commonwealth.” (Hobbes 15.3). I agree more with Locke’s view that man has certain inalienable rights that must be upheld by the government, and his demand to reform or rebel from any government that doesn’t.

Although Locke and Hobbes proposed competing views on justified rebellion under their respective portrayals of government, their writings align in their description of a bond formed between the individuals of a society and the sovereign. They also agreed that the measured surrender of individual rights could result in the establishment of societal justice. Hobbes argued that because governments create and define justice, an individual is never justified in rebelling. Conversely Locke wrote that rebellion is necessary when the rights of individuals aren’t upheld. They also differed greatly in their views on the foundations of individual rights and forming laws. I agree with different areas of their arguments, and I believe a combination of their writing best describes these ideas. Hobbes’ depiction of a harsh state of nature creates the natural demand for communal government, and Locke’s writings on the social contract and the relationship between the sovereign and its citizens make the most sense to me together.