Summary
Preface and political purpose
Locke presents the surviving treatises as a defence of legitimate government against the patriarchal theory of Sir Robert Filmer. The Second Treatise seeks another origin for political power: one capable of distinguishing government from mere superior force.
Chapters I–III: political power, nature and war
Political power is the right to make and enforce laws for preserving property and defending the community, always for the public good. Human beings are naturally free and equal under a law of nature forbidding harm to others. Each person may enforce that law. A state of war begins when someone declares a settled design upon another’s life or uses force without right.
Chapter IV: slavery
Natural liberty is freedom from arbitrary earthly power. No person can give another an unlimited power over his life because he does not possess such a power over himself. Locke limits legitimate slavery to the continuing state of war between a just conqueror and an aggressor who has forfeited life.
Chapter V: property
The earth is initially common, but individuals own their persons and labour. Labour joined to natural materials removes them from the common stock. Appropriation is limited by use, spoilage and the requirement to leave enough and as good. Money permits accumulation because durable value is accepted by consent.
Chapters VI–VII: families and political society
Parental authority is temporary care directed towards children’s preservation and education, not absolute dominion. Conjugal and household relationships have separate purposes. Political society exists only where people surrender private enforcement of natural law to a community possessing common law and judgement.
Chapters VIII–IX: consent and political ends
Individuals form one body through consent and accept majority rule. Express consent makes a person a full member; tacit consent binds those enjoying a government’s territory and protection while that enjoyment continues. People leave the state of nature because property is insecure without settled law, impartial judges and effective enforcement.
Chapters X–XIII: forms and powers
The location of legislative power determines the form of commonwealth. The legislature must govern through established laws for the people’s good, tax only with consent and retain its entrusted authority. Executive power applies domestic law; federative power manages foreign relations. Though legislative power is supreme, the people retain a superior power to replace a trust that has been violated.
Chapters XIV–XV: prerogative and distinct powers
Prerogative allows executive action for public benefit where law cannot foresee every circumstance. Its legitimacy depends upon its use, not merely the ruler’s claim. Locke distinguishes political, paternal and despotic power by their origins, ends and limits.
Chapters XVI–XVIII: conquest, usurpation and tyranny
Victory in an unjust war creates no right. Even a just conqueror gains power only over aggressors, not their innocent families or property beyond reparation. Usurpation is possession of authority to which one has no right; tyranny is the exercise of power beyond right for private advantage.
Chapter XIX: dissolution
Society and government are distinct. Foreign conquest may dissolve society, while government dissolves when authorised legislative arrangements are altered or public law ceases to operate. A ruler who subverts elections, abandons enforcement or delivers the people to another power breaks the trust. The community may resist and create a new legislature. Locke argues that this doctrine restrains rebellion by placing responsibility upon those who first replace law with force.