These days between America’s Independence Day of July 4 and France’s Bastille Day on July 14 should provoke reflection about liberty. Whiggery is the label I prefer for the Anglo-American tradition of ordered liberty. It originates in the Anglo Protestant political ferment of the 1600s but offers universal principles to all. These principles are especially important to remember now.

In 1705 the Anglo-Irish statesman Robert Molesworth, who had lived through much of this ferment, penned “Principles of a Real Whig.” These principles helped define America. Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and James Madison had copies of his works.

Molesworth’s Whiggery calls for three balanced branches of government, legal equality for all, economic liberty, policies for social harmony, freedom of religion and conscience, legislatures controlling government expenses, naturalization of immigrants into productive citizens, liberty of the press, and legitimate public works such as highways and public buildings, plus controls against monopolies, and a strong national defense.

Whiggery is chiefly about liberty and guarding against arbitrary power. It assumes a Christian anthropology about humanity’s fallen nature and also optimistically assumes humanity’s capacity for providential improvement. It is realistic and hopeful. It assumes that society will prosper most when free people, amid their differences, can exercise their creativity and pursue virtue.

“Whiggism is not circumscrib’d and confin’d to any one or two of the Religions now profess’d in the World, but diffuses itself among all,” Molesworth said. “Whosoever is against Liberty of Mind, is, in effect, against Liberty of Body too.”

He continued:

I profess myself to have always been a Member of the Church of England and am for supporting it in all its Honours, Privileges and Revenues: but as a Christian and a Whig, I must have Charity for those that differ from me in religious Opinions, whether Pagans, Turks, Jews, Papists, Quakers, Socinians, Presbyterians, or others. I look upon Bigotry to have always been the very Bane of human Society, and the Offspring of Interest and Ignorance, which has occasion’d most of the great Mischiefs that have afflicted Mankind.

And:

What just Reason can I have to be angry with, to endeavour to curb the natural Liberty, or to retrench the Civil Advantages of an honest Man (who follows the golden Rule, of doing to others, as he would have others do to him, and is willing and able to serve the Publick) only because he thinks his Way to Heaven surer or shorter than mine? No body can tell which of us is mistaken, till the Day of Judgment, or whether any of us be so (for there may be different Ways to the same End, and I am not for circumscribing God Almighty’s Mercy). 

Molesworth foreshadowed Thomas Jefferson, who said seventy years later: “The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.”

Molesworth insisted that liberty of conscience benefits all society:

The thriving of any one single Person by honest Means, is the thriving of the Commonwealth wherein he resides. And in what Place soever of the World such Encouragement is given, as that in it one may securely and peaceably enjoy Property and Liberty both of Mind and Body; ’tis impossible but that Place must flourish in Riches and in People, which are the truest Riches of any Country.

And:

But as, on the one hand, a true Whig thinks that all Opinions purely spiritual and notional ought to be indulg’d; so on the other, he is for severely punishing all Immoralities, Breach of Laws, Violence and Injustice.

Molesworth insisted that a “right Whig looks upon frequent Parliaments as such a fundamental Part of the Constitution, that even no Parliament can part with this Right,” as the legislature could not defer its powers to the monarch. He especially warned Parliament not to approve revenue for the monarch beyond the duration of its own term, so the next parliament, “in their turn, have it in their Power to oblige the Prince, or to streighten him, if they saw Occasion; and pare his Nails, if they were convinced he made ill Use of such a Revenue.”

Warning against coercing the nation into uneasy union by force, Molesworth instead urged:

Tis so much more desirable and secure to govern by Love and common Interest, than by Force; to expect Comfort and Assistance, in Times of Danger, from our next Neighbours, than to find them at such a time a heavy Clog upon the Wheels of our Government, and be in dread lest they should take that Occasion to shake off an uneasy Yoak: or to have as much need of entertaining a standing Army against our Brethren, as against our known and inveterate Enemies; that certainly whoever can oppose so publick and apparent Good, must be esteem’d either ignorant to a strange Degree, or to have other Designs in View, which he would willingly have brought to Light.

Molesworth urged a generous policy for immigrants to become citizens, so they have a stake in and contribute towards national prosperity:

A Genuine Whig is for promoting a general Naturalization, upon the firm Belief, that whoever comes to be incorporated into us, feels his Share of all our Advantages and Disadvantages, and consequently can have no Interest but that of the Publick; to which he will always be a Support to the best of his Power, by his Person, Substance and Advice.

He expected that that the “Security of Civil and Religious Liberty, and of Property, which through God’s great Mercy is firmly establish’d among us, will invite new Comers as fast as we can entertain them; that most of the rest of the World groans under the Weight of Tyranny, which will cause all that have Substance, and a Sense of Honour and Liberty, to fly to Places of Shelter; which consequently would thoroughly people us with useful and profitable Hands in a few Years.”

All people should be free to seek prosperity, Molesworth insisted, to the nation’s benefit:

The thriving of any one single Person by honest Means, is the thriving of the Commonwealth wherein he resides. And in what Place soever of the World such Encouragement is given, as that in it one may securely and peaceably enjoy Property and Liberty both of Mind and Body; ’tis impossible but that Place must flourish in Riches and in People, which are the truest Riches of any Country.

Whiggery chiefly arose against the arbitrary power of the Stuart kings in the 17^th century. Molesworth thought “no Prince fit to govern, whose Principle it must be to ruin the Constitution, as soon as he can acquire unjust Power to do so.”  The state’s powers must be restricted, but Molesworth did not minimize the state’s rightful public duties “supporting of Parliamentary Credit, promoting of all publick Buildings and Highways, the making all Rivers Navigable that are capable of it, employing the Poor, suppressing Idlers, restraining Monopolies upon Trade, maintaining the liberty of the Press, the just paying and encouraging of all in the publick Service, especially that best and use-fullest Sort of People.”

Molesworth preferred a militia summoned when needed over an expensive and potentially threatening permanent army. But he favored a firm military policy against Britain’s tyrannical enemy, saying “we ought not to hearken to any Terms of Peace with the French King, till it be quite out of his Power to hurt us, but rather to dye in Defence of our own and the Liberties of Europe.” He believed the virtue of liberty was universal: “No Man can be a sincere Lover of Liberty, that is not for increasing and communicating that Blessing to all People; and therefore the giving or restoring it not only to our Brethren of Scotland and Ireland, but even to France it self (were it in our Power) is one of the principal Articles of Whiggism.”

May we all strive to be a “sincere Lover of Liberty,” as Molesworth describes, for ourselves, and for all others.