Force without authority is a state of war justifying armed resistance

Evidence

What if the executive power, being possessed of the force of the commonwealth, shall make use of that force to hinder the meeting and acting of the legislative, when the original constitution, or the public exigencies require it? I say, using force upon the people without authority, and contrary to the trust put in him that does so, is a state of war with the people, who have a right to reinstate their legislative in the exercise of their power: for having erected a legislative, with an intent they should exercise the power of making laws, either at certain set times, or when there is need of it, when they are hindered by any force from what is so necessary to the society, and wherein the safety and preservation of the people consists, the people have a right to remove it by force. In all states and conditions, the true remedy of force without authority, is to oppose force to it. — John Locke, Second Treatise of Government, 192

Categorization

• XREF: Links directly to earlier state-of-war claims in ch.102 and grounds the Declaration’s resistance theory. — connects to: A ruler who acts by private will forfeits all right to obedience — John Locke, Second Treatise of Government, 188; Attempted enslavement is itself an act of war justifying resistance — John Locke, Second Treatise of Government, 25; Individual defensive resistance without shared institutions collapses into near-permanent civil war. — Philip Pettit, Republicanism: A Theory of Freedom and…, 460

Related

• Attempted enslavement is itself an act of war justifying resistance (similarity 0.82)