Note:

Historically, the arguments for democratic participation in the development of social norms and laws rest precisely on positions articulated by Locke, Rousseau, Kant, Jefferson, and others which begin with a conception of human beings as rationalities marked first of all by the capacity for self-rule - i.e., the capacity to determine one's own goals and ends, and thereby the norms and laws necessary as means to achieve these ends. On this view, to deny individuals participation in the establishment of the norms and laws which bind their behavior is to deny their humanity.

This is the thrust, for example, of Jefferson's argument in the Declaration of Independence, including his central claim that the legitimacy of governments rests on the consent of the governed - i.e., on their free choice and acceptance.  This argument, in turn, rests especially on the work of John Locke.

This argument is further developed - and set into the still larger context of the prophetic tradition and moral theology by Martin Luther King, Jr., in his Letter from the Birmingham Jail.

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