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by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,

that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pur-

suit of Happiness--That to secure these Rights,

Governments are instituted among Men, deriving

their just Powers from the Consent of the Gov-

erned, that whenever any Form of Government be-

comes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right

of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to

institute new Government, laying its Foundation

on such Principles, and organizing its Powers in

such Form, as to them shall seem most likely to

effect their Safety and Happiness.

Those justly famous phrases reflect the essence of the

natural rights and social contract theories of John Locke,

whose Second Treatise of Government was widely read and

all but universally subscribed to by the founding genera-

tion.  To understand America's founding principles, there-

fore, one must understand how those theories fit together

to form the foundation of American constitutionalism.35

Notice first that the propositions set forth are said

to be "self-evident" truths--that is, truths of reason.

It is through ordinary reasoning, accessible to all, that

such truths were thought to be discoverable and justified,

not through religious conviction, much less through politi-

cal assertion, whether by a king or a parliament.  And

notice, too, that the Declaration speaks first about moral

truths--natural equality as defined by natural rights--and

only second about government.  Government is not a given;

it has to be justified.  Thus, we start not with govern-

ment but with free individuals, who have rights by nature;

we then show how government arises in a way that respects

the rights of those individuals.36

The heart of the matter is the idea of natural

equality: no one has rights superior to those of anyone

else; no one by nature has a right to rule anyone else.

Rather, every individual has a right, equal to that of

everyone else, to be free--which amounts to rights to

"life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."  And all of

that can be restated as, or reduced to, "property":37 for

the life and liberty of an individual "belong" to that

individual and to no one else; thus, individuals are

"entitled" to those goods, equally, and to the life and

liberty of no one else.  As they pursue happiness in vari-

ous ways, individuals may gain title to additional proper-

ty simply by taking possession of unowned things, thereby

making those things their things--their property.38   And

with their consent they may associate with others, either

to exchange their various goods, including their labor, or