The despotical doctrine of Hobbes, part I: The liberalization of Leviathan

History of Political Thought

Volumn 24, Issue 4, 2001, Pages 587-617

  Tarlton, Charles D ^a  

^a STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK   (United States)

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EID: 0042406506     PISSN: 0143781X     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
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References (171)

1. There is a way of reading Hobbes's political theory that focuses almost exclusively on its logical form. No matter how outlandish or vicious Hobbes's actual statements might be, the circulatory logic of Leviathan is always discovered to have been there ahead of the critic, and to have already provided the necessary extenuation. The aspect of Hobbes's theory most frequently treated in this way, of course, has been his assertion that nothing the sovereign might do can be considered unjust, because the subjects have already agreed to consider the sovereign's actions as their own. Surely this all occurred to Hobbes the other way round. For a reading in this spirit, see Tom Sorell, Hobbes (London and New York, 1986, 1991), pp. 120-1.
2. A.E. Taylor, 'The Ethical Doctrine of Hobbes', Philosophy, XIII, 52 (1938), p. 410.
3. Sir Leslie Stephen, Hobbes (New York and London, 1904), p. 204.
4. Leo Strauss, 'On the Basis of Hobbes's Political Philosophy', reprinted in What is Political Philosophy? (Chicago, 1959), p. 171.
5. Bernard Willms, 'Tendencies of Recent Hobbes Research', in Thomas Hobbes: His Views of Man, ed. J.G. van der Bend (Amsterdam, 1982), p. 153.
6. For two of the most eccentric expressions of this view, see Frank M. Coleman, Hobbes and America: Exploring the Constitutional Foundations (Toronto, 1977); and George Mace, Locke, Hobbes, and the Federalist Papers (Carbondale, IL, 1977).
7. For two of the most eccentric expressions of this view, see Frank M. Coleman, Hobbes and America: Exploring the Constitutional Foundations (Toronto, 1977); and George Mace, Locke, Hobbes, and the Federalist Papers (Carbondale, IL, 1977).
8. Although to be fair, some, like Filmer, actually thought Hobbes's absolutism was too mild.
9. Edward, Earl of Clarendon, 'A survey of Mr. Hobbes His Leviathan', in Leviathan: Contemporary Responses to the Political Theory of Thomas Hobbes, ed. G.A.J. Rogers (Bristol, 1995), p. 205.
10. George Lawson, 'An Examination of the Political Part of Mr. Hobbs His Leviathan', in Leviathan: Contemporary Responses, ed. Rogers, n. 9, p. 63.
11. Leibniz, the Political Writings, ed. Patrick Riley (Cambridge, 1972), pp. 120, 199.
12. The Social Contract and Other Later Political Writings, ed. Victor Gourevitch (Cambridge, 1977), pp. 42-3, 46. In the so-called 'Geneva Manuscript', Rousseau referred to Hobbes's system as 'horrible' and derived from Hobbes's 'desire or rather fury to establish despotism and passive obedience', pp. 163, 164.
13. Voltaire, The Political Writings, ed. David Williams (Cambridge, 1994), p. 99.
14. John Dewey, 'The Motivation of Hobbes's Political Philosophy', Studies in the History of Ideas, I (1918), p. 19.
15. Ibid., p. 30.
16. The Works of Jeremy Bentham, ed. John Bowring (New York, 1962), Vol. X, 'Bentham's Commonplace Book', p. 73. Interestingly, the father of Utility did not agree; John Laird quotes David Hume from his History of England, to the effect that 'Hobbes's politics were fitted only to promote tyranny'. John Laird, Hobbes (New York, 1934), p. 248.
17. The Works of Jeremy Bentham, ed. John Bowring (New York, 1962), Vol. X, 'Bentham's Commonplace Book', p. 73. Interestingly, the father of Utility did not agree; John Laird quotes David Hume from his History of England, to the effect that 'Hobbes's politics were fitted only to promote tyranny'. John Laird, Hobbes (New York, 1934), p. 248.
18. The Minor Works of George Grote, ed. Alexander Bain (London, 1873), p. 61.
19. Ibid., p. 62.
20. In the nineteenth century this was the main aspect of Hobbes to come into focus. His theory of sovereignty was thought merely to be the most complete expression of political developments within the national state at the time. For a somewhat different version of some of the same material, see Mark Francis, 'The Nineteenth Century Theory of Sovereignty and Thomas Hobbes', History of Political Thought, I (1980), p. 515.
21. The Minor Works of George Grote, ed. Bain, p. 66.
22. Ibid.
23. John Austin, Lectures on Jurisprudence (London, 1873), pp. 275-6, n. 8.
24. Ibid.
25. Ibid., p. 287, n. 4.
26. Ibid., p. 288, n. 4.
27. Sir Henry Maine, Lectures of the Early History of Institutions (New York, 1875), p. 355.
28. James Fitzjames Stephen, Horae Sabbiticae (London, 1892), p. 6.
29. Ibid., p. 67.
30. Ibid., pp. 69-70.
31. See Michael Oakeshott, 'Thomas Hobbes', Scrutiny, IV (1935).
32. George Croom Robertson, Hobbes (Edinburgh, 1886), pp. 161, 234.
33. Ibid., p. 211.
34. Ibid., p. 235.
35. Taylor's liberalizing argument in this early book was hesitant indeed when we compare it to his later revisionist and moralizing arguments about Leviathan in the famous 1938 article 'The Ethical Doctrine of Hobbes'. For a discussion of some reservations about Taylor's argument, see C.D. Tarlton, 'Rehabilitating Hobbes: Obligation, Anti-Fascism, and the Myth of a "Taylor Thesis" ', History of Political Thought, XIX (1998) pp 407-38 The argument there, that Taylor sought to soften Hobbes's image as a wartime act of patriotism against charges that the 'greatest English political theorist' was a forerunner of Nazism, remains separate, for me, and apart from the one being made here. Taylor, in 1938, sought no great utility from the study of Hobbes, so much as he meant to repudiate the charge that Hobbes was without morals. Rigorous authoritarianism and claims of absolute sovereign power are perfectly consistent with Taylor's belief (or asserted belief) that Hobbes had a deontological theory of moral obligation.
36. A.E. Taylor, Thomas Hobbes (London, 1908), p. 91.
37. Ibid., p. 113.
38. Ibid., p. 91.
39. Ibid., p. 98.
40. Laird, Hobbes, p. 205.
41. Ibid.
42. Michael Oakeshott, 'Introduction' to Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, ed. Michael Oakeshott (Oxford, 1946), p. viii.
43. Ibid., p. xv.
44. Ibid., p. xxxvii.
45. Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, ed. Richard Tuck (Cambridge, 1991), p. 184.
46. Oakeshott, 'Introduction', p. xli.
47. Ibid., p. xlii.
48. Ibid.
49. See J.M. Brown, 'A Note on Professor Oakeshott's introduction to the Leviathan', Political Studies, 1 (1953), pp. 53-64. See also Dorothea Krook, 'Mr. Brown's Note Annotated', Political Studies, 1 (1953), pp. 216-27; and Brown's rejoinder, Political Studies, 2 (1954), pp. 168-72.
50. See J.M. Brown, 'A Note on Professor Oakeshott's introduction to the Leviathan', Political Studies, 1 (1953), pp. 53-64. See also Dorothea Krook, 'Mr. Brown's Note Annotated', Political Studies, 1 (1953), pp. 216-27; and Brown's rejoinder, Political Studies, 2 (1954), pp. 168-72.
51. See J.M. Brown, 'A Note on Professor Oakeshott's introduction to the Leviathan', Political Studies, 1 (1953), pp. 53-64. See also Dorothea Krook, 'Mr. Brown's Note Annotated', Political Studies, 1 (1953), pp. 216-27; and Brown's rejoinder, Political Studies, 2 (1954), pp. 168-72.
52. Oakeshott, 'Introduction', p. lvii.
53. Ibid.
54. Ibid., p. xlii.
55. Hobbes, Leviathan, p. 128.
56. Howard Warrender, The Political Philosophy of Hobbes: His Theory of Obligation (Oxford, 1957), p. 177.
57. Ibid., p. 322.
58. Ibid., p. 177.
59. Ibid., p. 261.
60. Ibid., p. 262.
61. Ibid., p. xxvii.
62. M.M. Goldsmith, Hobbes's Science of Politics (New York, 1966), p. 176.
63. Ibid., pp. 194-202.
64. Ibid., p. 242.
65. J.W.N. Watkins, Hobbes's System of Ideas (London, 1965), p. 13.
66. Ibid., p. 16.
67. Ibid.
68. Ibid., p. 168.
69. Ibid., p. 170.
70. Ibid.
71. Ibid., p. 179.
72. Ibid., p. 163.
73. David Gauthier, Logic of Leviathan (Oxford, 1979), p. v.
74. Jean Hampton, Hobbes and the Social Contract Tradition (New York, 1990), p. 189.
75. Ibid., p. 2.
76. Gregory Kavka, Hobbesian Moral and Political Theory (Princeton, 1986), p. xii.
77. Ibid.
78. Gauthier, Logic of Leviathan, p. 133.
79. Kavka, Moral and Political, p. 3.
80. Hampton, Social Contract, p. 3.
81. Ibid., p. 284.
82. Gauthier, Logic of Leviathan, p. 169.
83. Hampton, Social Contract, p. 3.
84. Kavka, Moral and Political, p. 231.
85. Max Weber, Political Writings, ed. Peter Lassman and Ronald Speirs (Cambridge, 1994), pp. 358, 365.
86. Gauthier, Logic of Leviathan, p. v.
87. Hampton, Social Contract, p. 208.
88. Ibid., p. 2.
89. Kavka, Moral and Political, p. 3.
90. Gauthier, Logic of Leviathan, pp. 168, 170-1.
91. Ibid., p. 169.
92. Ibid., p. 174.
93. Ibid.
94. Hampton, Social Contract, p. 189.
95. Ibid., p. 206.
96. Kavka, Moral and Political, p. 4.
97. Ibid., p. 168.
98. Ibid., pp. xii, 205.
99. Hampton, Social Contract, p. 208.
100. Ibid.
101. Ibid., p. 239.
102. Ibid., p. 247.
103. Gauthier, Logic of Leviathan, p. vi.
104. Gauthier 'Hobbes's Social Contract', in Perspectives on Hobbes, ed. G.A.J. Rogers and Alan Ryan (Oxford and New York, 1988), pp. 125-52, 148.
105. Ibid., p. 139.
106. Ibid.
107. See Richard Flathman, Thomas Hobbes: Skepticism, Individuality, and Chastened Politics (Newbury Park, CA, 1993), who refers to a 'jurally absolute but practically limited rule' in Hobbes, p. xiii, also pp. 7, 106-7, passim; Richard Tuck, Hobbes (Oxford, 1989), pp. 69-70, 75, passim; and Tom Sorell, Hobbes (London, 1986), especially Ch. IX, 'Absolute Submission, Undivided Sovereignty', pp. 111-26. I had argued something similar in 1977 and 1978: see Charles D. Tarlton, 'Levitating Leviathan: Glosses on a Theme in Hobbes', Ethics, 88 (1977), pp. 1-19; and C.D. Tarlton 'The Creation and Maintenance of Government: A Neglected Dimension of Hobbes's Leviathan', Political Studies, 26 (1978), pp. 307-27.
108. See Richard Flathman, Thomas Hobbes: Skepticism, Individuality, and Chastened Politics (Newbury Park, CA, 1993), who refers to a 'jurally absolute but practically limited rule' in Hobbes, p. xiii, also pp. 7, 106-7, passim; Richard Tuck, Hobbes (Oxford, 1989), pp. 69-70, 75, passim; and Tom Sorell, Hobbes (London, 1986), especially Ch. IX, 'Absolute Submission, Undivided Sovereignty', pp. 111-26. I had argued something similar in 1977 and 1978: see Charles D. Tarlton, 'Levitating Leviathan: Glosses on a Theme in Hobbes', Ethics, 88 (1977), pp. 1-19; and C.D. Tarlton 'The Creation and Maintenance of Government: A Neglected Dimension of Hobbes's Leviathan', Political Studies, 26 (1978), pp. 307-27.
109. See Richard Flathman, Thomas Hobbes: Skepticism, Individuality, and Chastened Politics (Newbury Park, CA, 1993), who refers to a 'jurally absolute but practically limited rule' in Hobbes, p. xiii, also pp. 7, 106-7, passim; Richard Tuck, Hobbes (Oxford, 1989), pp. 69-70, 75, passim; and Tom Sorell, Hobbes (London, 1986), especially Ch. IX, 'Absolute Submission, Undivided Sovereignty', pp. 111-26. I had argued something similar in 1977 and 1978: see Charles D. Tarlton, 'Levitating Leviathan: Glosses on a Theme in Hobbes', Ethics, 88 (1977), pp. 1-19; and C.D. Tarlton 'The Creation and Maintenance of Government: A Neglected Dimension of Hobbes's Leviathan', Political Studies, 26 (1978), pp. 307-27.
110. See Richard Flathman, Thomas Hobbes: Skepticism, Individuality, and Chastened Politics (Newbury Park, CA, 1993), who refers to a 'jurally absolute but practically limited rule' in Hobbes, p. xiii, also pp. 7, 106-7, passim; Richard Tuck, Hobbes (Oxford, 1989), pp. 69-70, 75, passim; and Tom Sorell, Hobbes (London, 1986), especially Ch. IX, 'Absolute Submission, Undivided Sovereignty', pp. 111-26. I had argued something similar in 1977 and 1978: see Charles D. Tarlton, 'Levitating Leviathan: Glosses on a Theme in Hobbes', Ethics, 88 (1977), pp. 1-19; and C.D. Tarlton 'The Creation and Maintenance of Government: A Neglected Dimension of Hobbes's Leviathan', Political Studies, 26 (1978), pp. 307-27.
111. See Richard Flathman, Thomas Hobbes: Skepticism, Individuality, and Chastened Politics (Newbury Park, CA, 1993), who refers to a 'jurally absolute but practically limited rule' in Hobbes, p. xiii, also pp. 7, 106-7, passim; Richard Tuck, Hobbes (Oxford, 1989), pp. 69-70, 75, passim; and Tom Sorell, Hobbes (London, 1986), especially Ch. IX, 'Absolute Submission, Undivided Sovereignty', pp. 111-26. I had argued something similar in 1977 and 1978: see Charles D. Tarlton, 'Levitating Leviathan: Glosses on a Theme in Hobbes', Ethics, 88 (1977), pp. 1-19; and C.D. Tarlton 'The Creation and Maintenance of Government: A Neglected Dimension of Hobbes's Leviathan', Political Studies, 26 (1978), pp. 307-27.
112. Deborah Baumgold, Hobbes's Political Theory (New York and Cambridge, 1988), p. 79.
113. Ibid.
114. Ibid., p. 134.
115. Ibid., p. 2.
116. Ibid., pp. 69-70.
117. Ibid., p. 135.
118. Ibid., p. 61.
119. Ibid., p. 114.
120. Ibid., p. 122, but see also p. 131.
121. See especially: Q. Skinner, 'History and Ideology in the English Revolution', Historical Journal, 8 (1965), pp. 151-78; Q. Skinner, 'The Ideological Context of Hobbes's Political Thought', Historical Journal, 9 (1966), pp. 286-317; and Q. Skinner, 'Conquest and Consent: Thomas Hobbes and the Engagement Controversy', in The Interregnum: The Quest for Settlement, 1646-1660, ed. G.E. Aylmer (London, 1972), pp. 79-98.
122. See especially: Q. Skinner, 'History and Ideology in the English Revolution', Historical Journal, 8 (1965), pp. 151-78; Q. Skinner, 'The Ideological Context of Hobbes's Political Thought', Historical Journal, 9 (1966), pp. 286-317; and Q. Skinner, 'Conquest and Consent: Thomas Hobbes and the Engagement Controversy', in The Interregnum: The Quest for Settlement, 1646-1660, ed. G.E. Aylmer (London, 1972), pp. 79-98.
123. See especially: Q. Skinner, 'History and Ideology in the English Revolution', Historical Journal, 8 (1965), pp. 151-78; Q. Skinner, 'The Ideological Context of Hobbes's Political Thought', Historical Journal, 9 (1966), pp. 286-317; and Q. Skinner, 'Conquest and Consent: Thomas Hobbes and the Engagement Controversy', in The Interregnum: The Quest for Settlement, 1646-1660, ed. G.E. Aylmer (London, 1972), pp. 79-98.
124. Quentin Skinner, Philosophy and Rhetoric in Hobbes's Leviathan (Cambridge, 1966), the 'Introduction', pp. 1-16.
125. Ibid, p. 429.
126. Ibid., p. 320.
127. Ibid., p. 1.
128. Ibid., p. 320.
129. Ibid., p. 313.
130. Ibid.
131. Ibid., pp. 312-13.
132. Ibid., p. 314.
133. Ibid., p. 315.
134. Ibid., pp. 320, 341.
135. Ibid., n. 158, where Skinner says he had before thought the opposite.
136. Ibid., p. 435.
137. Ibid., p. 437.
138. Charles D. Tarlton, 'Historicity, Meaning, and Revisionism in the Study of Political Thought', History and Theory, 12 (1973), pp. 307-28.
139. John Bowle, Hobbes and his Critics (New York, 1952), p. 199. See, too, the chapter on 'Hobbes' in John Bowle, Western Political Thought (London, 1974), pp. 316-32,
140. John Bowle, Hobbes and his Critics (New York, 1952), p. 199. See, too, the chapter on 'Hobbes' in John Bowle, Western Political Thought (London, 1974), pp. 316-32,
141. Hobbes provided theoretical justification, Bowle thought, for political sentiments that had been defined by Bodin, practised by Richelieu, and that formed the pattern of despotic government.
142. Bowle, Hobbes and his Critics, p. 195.
143. Ibid., p. 202.
144. Ibid., p. 203.
145. Ibid.
146. Basil Willey, The English Moralists (London, 1964), p. 164.
147. Ibid., p. 163.
148. Ibid., p. 166.
149. Ibid., p. 167.
150. C.E. Vaughan, Studies in the History of Political Philosophy (New York, 1925, 1960), Ch. II, 'The Social Contract: Hobbes', p. 1.
151. Ibid., p. 27.
152. Ibid., p. 31.
153. Ibid., p. 38.
154. Ibid., p. 39.
155. Ibid., p. 42.
156. See Michael Oakeshott, 'Thomas Hobbes', Scrunity, IV (1935), p. 263; but also his ' Dr. Leo Strauss on Hobbes', Politica (June 1937), p. 364.
157. See Michael Oakeshott, 'Thomas Hobbes', Scrunity, IV (1935), p. 263; but also his ' Dr. Leo Strauss on Hobbes', Politica (June 1937), p. 364.
158. Vaughan, Studies, p. 46.
159. Ibid., p. 52.
160. Ibid., pp. 53, 54.
161. Sheldon S. Wolin, Politics and Vision (Boston, 1960), p. 263.
162. Ibid., p. 273.
163. Ibid., p. 285.
164. Preston King, however, had seriously assessed the absolutism in Hobbes's political theory. See Preston King, Ideology of Order (London, 1974). 'Either Hobbes is an absolutist', he insisted, 'or no one is' (p. 271). Still, we had to wait for Wolin among contemporary interpreters to approach Hobbes's despotism with a full measure of moral and political outrage.
165. Wolin, 'Hobbes and the Culture of Despotism', in Thomas Hobbes and Political Theory, ed. Mary Dietz (Lawrence, KS, 1990), p. 33.
166. Ibid., p. 18.
167. Ibid.
168. Ibid., p. 22.
169. Ibid., p. 25.
170. Ibid., p. 26.
171. Ibid., p. 33.