June 7, 2025

If the essential rights of sovereignty…be taken away, the Commonwealth is thereby dissolved, and every man returneth into the condition and calamity of war with every other man, which is the greatest evil which can happen in this life…

Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679), English political philosopher, Leviathan, II, 30

Are politicians then, as a group, the last best defense against anarchy? What about dictators? Do they not serve the same purpose? If they do, what’s the difference?

This is the most fundamental argument for government—without someone or something in charge (whether a dictator or a democratically-elected legislature) chaos follows, humans being constitutionally incapable of peaceful self-rule.