'The ideas behind libertarianism are usually traced to John Locke, who argued that people have rights before government and that government exists to protect those rights.'

'When viewed through John Locke’s writings, libertarianism can be presented as a serious, historically grounded hypothesis about the moral limits of political authority. On this reading, libertarianism is the coherent extension of Lockean natural‑right theory into a political program: individuals are free and equal possessors of rights to life, liberty, and property; government is a limited, delegated trustee of those rights; and any expansion of state power beyond the protection of rights and enforcement of consent‑based agreements is a violation of the original moral contract. This does not make libertarianism the only permissible reading of Locke, but it does show that the core ideals of libertarian thought—minimal government, strong property rights, and a deep suspicion of centralized coercion—have their roots in one of the most influential liberal philosophers in the Western tradition.'*P