norwegen
Diamond Member
The revolution and the social contract are two separate issues.What did they disagree with? The social compact or revolution?Over 60% of the British Colonists disagreed with the FF.
In the 1770s, the Americans were Whigs (the Tories were either emigrating or keeping silent). They were Enlightenment thinkers who were witnessing the erosion of liberties in England only decades after the Glorious Revolution (when much of the king's authority was stripped from him and bestowed on the Parliament). They were excited about establishing their own republics, and began seating their own legislatures in the 1770s. The federation seated its first legislature in 1774. IOW, they were dismissing the Parliament; overwhelmingly, they wanted to govern themselves.
They may not have been overwhelmingly in favor of war, but when they dismissed the king in 1776, they knew that the shots fired a year earlier in Lexington sent a very clear message: war was on.
So since 1776, being completely independent and students of the Scriptures, history, and the natural law, they changed the very definition of social compact. No longer was it an agreement between the magistracy and the people, or the rulers and the ruled. It was now an agreement among individuals. That is, constitutions are creations of the people.
The Articles of Confederation, and later, the Constitution, were created as results of conventions of the people. Not legislators or aristocratic heirs. And, on a national level, since we haven't had such a convention since the Philadelphia Convention, we have no agreement with each other regarding such issues as minimum wage, welfare, and other liberal policies. Our social compact doesn't include these things. These liberal laws are illegitimate.
Yada, yada, yada. None of that proves the so-called "social contract" is real.
It's a myth. The bottom line is that 2/3 of the population disagreed with the revolution. They didn't consent to any so-called "social contract."
And the people are the ones who sent delegates to the Philadelphia Convention.