Recent decades have seen a renaissance of interest in the idea of natural law, as well as in the idea of natural rights, an early modern concept that has served as a conceptual lightning rod either connecting or separating traditional natural law theory and the contemporary idea of human rights. Is the concept of natural rights built on the foundations of natural law? Or is it instead rooted in the modern idea of human autonomy that is in fact a rejection of natural law? Adam Seagraves ambitious book proposes to resolve this controversy by offering an entirely new account of natural morality that compellingly unites the concepts of natural rights and natural law. He agrees with Leo Strauss (and many, more liberal, theorists) that the idea of natural rights is a distinctly modern one and the idea of the natural law, a distinctly classical and medieval one. However, contra Strauss (and others), he argues that despite their distinctness in terms of historical origin and logical derivation, these two ideas are profoundly compatible with one another. For Seagrave, the thought of John Locke and St. Thomas Aquinas provide the keys to reconciling these two approaches, so that they form a coherent concept of natural morality. Not only does this concept provide a new way to understand the political philosophical tradition, it also, as Seagrave demonstrates in the final chapter, illuminates how we should approach contemporary issues such as universal health care, same sex marriage, and the death penalty as well.
Recent years have seen a renaissance of interest in the relationship between natural law and natural rights. During this time, the concept of natural rights has served as a conceptual lightning rod, either strengthening or severing the bond between traditional natural law and contemporary human rights. Does the concept of natural rights have the natural law as its foundation or are the two ideas, as Leo Strauss argued, profoundly incompatible?
With The Foundations of Natural Morality, S. Adam Seagrave addresses this controversy, offering an entirely new account of natural morality that compellingly unites the concepts of natural law and natural rights. Seagrave agrees with Strauss that the idea of natural rights is distinctly modern and does not derive from traditional natural law. Despite their historical distinctness, however, he argues that the two ideas are profoundly compatible and that the thought of John Locke and Thomas Aquinas provides the key to reconciling the two sides of this long-standing debate. In doing so, he lays out a coherent concept of natural morality that brings together thinkers from Plato and Aristotle to Hobbes and Locke, revealing the insights contained within these disparate accounts as well as their incompleteness when considered in isolation. Finally, he turns to an examination of contemporary issues, including health care, same-sex marriage, and the death penalty, showing how this new account of morality can open up a more fruitful debate.
