In Chapter IV of Second Treatise of Government, Locke discusses how slavery does not belong in society unless certain expectations are broken (17-18).
Locke starts with the assertion that man is inherently free and is only subject to himself and to the law of nature. He then rejects Filmer’s idea of freedom; that man can do whatever he wants in society, and instead argues that men are free to do what they want as long as they do not violate the laws of the government that they agreed to.
He later goes on to argue that slavery can not exist because it violates man’s right to self-preservation. His exception to this rule can be related to the “eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth” mantra. He asserts that if man breaks a law worthy of death then his life is then owed to the person he wronged by his crime. The person he wronged can, in effect, use him as a slave, but the “slave” can break the compact, by committing suicide, if he feels the punishment is far beyond worthy of the crime.
Locke shows through his argument that the perfect condition of slavery is a relationship between “conqueror and a captive” (17) because it is a legitimate, equal compact that ends the state of war.
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