The Social Contract in the Ruins: Natural Law and Government by Consent

Scholars who write on the relationship of natural moral law to social contract theory view the principles of these theories as in conflict and unreconcilable.For example, if natural law creates the foundation for political governance, then the consent of the governed is not a necessary element.In contrast, social contract theory requires the implicit consent of the governed to establish and justify a government’s legitimacy.In his latest work, Paul DeHart argues that natural moral law and social contract theory are logically and metaphysically compatible and that the principle of consent embodied in the social contract depends upon classical natural law for its very intelligibility. According to the Declaration of Independence, governments derive “their just powers from the consent of the governed.” This statement embodies the theoretical commitment of Revolutionary Era Americans to government based on a social contract.They rejected traditional metaphysical and philosophical grounds o