William S. Gee

Below is a free term papers summary of the paper "William S. Gee." If you sign up, you can be reading the rest of this term papers in under two minutes. Registered users should login to view this term paper.

Term Paper Title	William S. Gee
# of Words	2346
# of Pages (250 words per page double spaced)	9.38

William S. Gee
9/29/98
Government 20

     It is very rare that the hypothetical world of philosophy and the regulated, orderly world of politics unite.  However, a great attempt at uniting these two distant fields took place during the founding of the United States of America.  Whether successful or not, this grand, idealistic experiment was the most ambitious of not only its time, but of history.  The American founding fathers united the enlightenment philosophies of freedom, justice and equality, with the corresponding political theories of democracy.

The Philosophies of the Revolution
     The definitive philosophical treatise of the American Revolution was The Declaration of Independence, written by Thomas Jefferson in 1776:
     We hold these truths to be self evident: That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; that, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that 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, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its power in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.

This statement reflects many philosophical views.  The most important statement from this passage is that, “all men are created equal.”  He does not think that all men are gifted in the same right in all fields, that view would be ignorant.  However, he does think that there are certain properties of life that all men are given, which creates a basic foundation of equality for a just civilization.  The rights that he lists shadow John Locke’s views on natural rights.  Locke stated that a creator gave certain natural rights to all people at birth.  The first of these unalienable rights was life.  Through this statement Lock asserted that no person, government or thing could justly take life from another human.  The second right was liberty.  Liberty is the idea that all men could act and think as they chose to, and unless they infringed on another’s natural rights, could do so without fear of punishment.  The third and final right was that of the pursuit of happiness.  Men should be able to do what they felt should to further the cause of their happiness, again as long as they did not violate ...

This is not the end of the termpaper! Register below to see the complete version of this term paper.

Membership Plans	Credit Card	Check

1 month membership

3 month membership (You Save 50%)

6 month membership (You Save 67%)

Copyright © 2002-2007 Mid Term Papers. All rights reserved. This term papers website is used for research purposes only.
If you have forgotten your username or password, please click here.
If you like to cancel your account, please click here.

1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10 - 11 - 12 - 13 - 14 - 15 - 16 - 17 - 18 - 19 - 20 - 21 - 22