Aaron Samson

Pol. 4 Section

Professor Scott

6 March 2007

Private Property vs. Social Utility

In John Locke’s Second Treatise of Government, he makes two arguments

concerning the ownership of private property. The first argument is simply an argument

for the right to own private property, while the second (called Social Utility) argues the

idea that an unequal dispersion of private property can benefit a society as a whole.

Though these arguments both coincide with each other, the right to private ownership is

much more important than the idea of social utility, for without the first the second cannot

exist.

Locke’s argument for private property consists of several parts: the idea that all

things originally start as community property, the idea that one’s labor takes that property

out of the communal realm and makes it ones own, and the idea that one cannot does not

harm a society by making something his private property. Lock’s first argument in his

Second Treatise is that we are all in a state of nature; that is to say that no man innately

has more than anyone else or has the right to more than anyone else (8); the only way a

person can have more than another person is through his own labor. This state of nature

establishes Locke’s first idea for individual property ownership which is that all property

begins communally, devoid of any ownership, and every man has as much right to it as

the next, or in Locke’s words: “God, who hath given the world to men in common, hath
also given them reason to make use of it to the best advantage of life, and convenience”

(18).

Locke states his second argument for private property in chapter five:

“yet every man has a property in his own person…The Labour of his body, and
the work of his hands, we may say are properly his. Whatsoever then he removes
out of the state that nature hath provided, and left it in he hath mixed his labour
with, and joined to it something that is his own, and thereby makes it his
property” (19).

Locke’s argument is that labor is the sole difference between private and public property.

He argues that everything is public in the state of nature until someone puts their own

labor into it, at which time it is taken out of the state of nature and is the property of an

individual. This is shown through apples being picked off trees, of wood being picked up

off the ground, or soil being tilled; before someone put their own labor into them, these

things were useless, but once the apple had been picked, the soil tilled, and the acorn

picked up, they have not only left the state of nature, but they are now of use and benefit

to the individual.

Locke’s final premise comes in his chapter on property also. He argues that a

person who takes as much from the state of nature as he can improve, cultivate, and use

the product of does not harm the rest of society in any way, and is in fact doing as much

harm to them as he would if he had not taken anything at all (21). Locke believes that

there is plenty of property for everyone, so long as people don’t take in excess of what

they can use and make beneficial, and because of this abundance, no one does wrong to

labor over private property and take something out of the state of nature.
 Locke’s second argument is for social utility, or the unequal distribution of private

property. He does not necessarily argue that social utility is necessary, but he does argue

for its usefulness. Locke argues that:

“Every man should have as much as he could make use of, would hold still in the
world, without straitening any body; since there is land enough in the world to
suffice double the inhabitants…” (23).

Here Locke does not argue for the unequal distribution of useless private property, i.e.

more than a man needs or can make good use of; he argues for the idea that all men

should have as much private property as they can use. This means that some can use more

than others for benefit, and therefore private property should not be limited to an equal

distribution.

Locke’s argument is that if everyone had an equal distribution of property, and

some had more than they could use while some have less, those who are not using all of

their property (such as land, cattle, clothing, etc.) are not benefiting from it at all. With an

unequal distribution of property, nothing is going to waste, for property is much more

useful and beneficial to society when it has some utility.

Locke uses the argument for land in this case. If a man has more land than he can

use, the land sits uncultivated, and though the distribution of property is equal, it does

society no good. Likewise, if the equal distribution of property requires that some land be

left in no one’s possession, the land again, is of no use to society. If a different person is

able to make use of that land and feed many people from it, at the expense of an equal

distribution, he should be able to do so, rather than let the land sit idle and useless.

When analyzing Locke’s two arguments for private property, one must realize that

without the first, the second cannot be. That is to say, without the initial right to private
property, there would be no reason for a person to even make an argument for the unequal

distribution of said private property. In Locke’s argument for the state of nature, he

begins with the idea that no person is inherently better than another. This leads to the idea

that if no one is inherently better then no person is entitled to property that they don’t

deserve or have not earned. The one measure Locke gives for the appropriation of

property is the labor that a person puts into the property to make it theirs. Without this

labor, they are not entitled to the property because labor is the only thing that

differentiates property from being in the state of nature to being in one’s possession.

Social utility is Locke’s argument for the distribution of private property, which

means that without private property, there is no reason to make an argument for its

distribution. Furthermore, private ownership of property is essential for survival in the

state of nature. Locke argues that humans have been given land and nature to use to their

benefit, and without private property, no one would be motivated to labor for the benefit

of themselves or society.

Because there can be no distribution of private property without the right to

property ownership, this right is much more important than the argument for social utility.

Social utility is an idea to make society more productive, but in order for social utility to

work the private property must be taken from the state of nature through labor. It is also

Locke’s belief that the right to property is one of the basest rights and believes that it is

inalienable from any human. Though social utility makes more sense than an equal

distribution, it is not an inalienable right and is therefore not as important than the right to

property.

Word Count: 1,240