Natural Rights: Henry George and the Economic Fruits of a Good Society

• Date: 01 January 2015
• Published date: 01 January 2015
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/ajes.12087
• Author: James M. Dawsey

Natural Rights: Henry George and the

Economic Fruits of a Good Society

By JAMES M. DAWSEY*

ABSTRACT. This article examines Henry George’s understanding of

how natural rights grow out of a just society. His views were influ-

enced by the 17th-century proponents of natural rights, but cannot be

subsumed under them. The connection of freedom to obligation

affirmed by George’s classical Protestantism allowed him to overcome

tension between theories of natural law and natural rights. Rights and

responsibilities were not abstractions for George. His practical solution

for restructuring society offers a modern path to a more just society in

which rights would abound.

Introduction. The Foundation of Economy

Our word economy comes from the Greek verb oikonomeo¯ meaning

to plan, manage, arrange, order. This word joined two nouns: oikos,

meaning house, habitation, dwelling, household, property, posses-

sions; and nomos, designating law, rule, principle. In early Christian

literature, oikonomia often indicated God’s arrangements for human

redemption and salvation (Arndt and Gingrich, 1979: 55). Sometimes,

oikonomia signified God’s design in nature (e.g., Epistle of Mathetes

to Diognetus).

Natural Law

The 19th-century social philosopher Henry George drew on these root

meanings when he opened his study of The Science of Political

Economy ([1898] 1981) not with a description of how goods and

services are produced and distributed, but with a discussion of man’s

place in the universe. Creation shows design, the hand of a beneficent

*James M. Dawsey is Wolfe Chair and Professor of Religious Studies, Department of

Religion, Emory & Henry College, Emory, VA 24327-0947. E-mail: jmdawsey@ehc.edu

American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Vol. 74, No. 1 (January, 2015).

DOI: 10.1111/ajes.12087

© 2015 American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Inc.

Creator. When we look at the universe, we see something wondrous.

Although amazingly ordered, the universe continuously changes in

ways similar to a living organism. The complexity of organization can

be observed through telescope and microscope.

Men and women are tenants on the earth’s surface, scarcely able to

understand the environs each occupies. While seemingly fixed in

space, we are in constant motion traveling on “a globe large to us, yet

only as a grain of sand on the seashore compared with the bodies and

spaces of the universe” (George [1898] 1981: 12, 13). And not only is

our world moving, but we too are in constant change. Our bodies are

“like the flame of a gas burner, which has continuous and defined

form, but only as the manifestation of changes in a stream of suc-

ceeding particles.” Human bodies, like everything else in the universe,

are passing manifestations of matter and energy.

But even in this sea of motion, and even when glimpsed from our

limited perspectives, George ([1898] 1981: 14–16) believed the Cre-

ator’s design is everywhere evident. Squirrels store nuts, birds con-

struct nests, beavers dam creeks, bees extract honey from flowers, and

spiders spin webs. Instincts guide the animal world. Animals act in

specific ways because that is how they were designed to act. “Nature

provides for all living things beneath man by implanting in them blind,

strong impulses which at proper times and seasons prompt them to do

what it is necessary they should do.” And people, too, are similar to

other animals—for instance, in the strong impulses that prompt the

mother “to press the new-born babe to her breast and the babe to

suckle.” Except that humans are not as strongly guided by instincts. In

fact, if measured by strictly physical terms, we are inferior animals, not

only because of our restricted instincts, but in that we have not been

provided by nature with fur or thick hides as a natural covering from

the weather nor with exceptional powers to procure food and defend

ourselves. Yet, humans stand a rung higher than other animals. For

“man is created in the likeness of the All-Maker.”

What distinguishes humans from other animals? Henry George

viewed human nature as rich and many-faceted (Dawsey 2012).

George ([1898] 1981: 9) focused on the human mind especially as our

rational abilities enable us to become makers and producers. By

“mind” he meant also spirit or soul—“that which feels, perceives,

64 The American Journal of Economics and Sociology