ABSTRACT
A duty to support the poor is endorsed by the major religions. It is an individual moral duty of charity, not a duty the benefits of which the poor can claim as a matter of right. The idea that the members of society collectively, through their agents the government, have a political duty to support the poor is different. In Leviathan Hobbes says that “men . . . unable to maintain themselves by their labour . . . ought not to be left to the Charity of private persons; but to be provided for, (as far-forth as the necessities of Nature require,) by the Lawes of the Commonwealth.”1 The major historical representatives of the liberal tradition (Locke, Adam Smith, Kant, Mill, and so on) also accepted that one of the roles of government is to provide for the poorest members of society when they are unable to provide for themselves. But only a few of them saw this as a duty of justice (not simply public charity), the benefits of which the poor can claim as a right.
