QuestionsMust we always obey the law?The tyrant is no longer a king: killing him is not killing a sovereign
Must we always obey the law?The right to revolt

The tyrant is no longer a king: killing him is not killing a sovereign

"The fellow Zhou"; the right to overthrow the tyrant in China

Mencius c. 372 BC · c. 289 BCHuman nature is good: everyone carries the seed of benevolence.
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What it claims

In punishing Zhou, one did not put a sovereign to death: overthrowing a tyrant is not a crime against one's prince.

Why

A ruler who destroys benevolence and righteousness is only a mere fellow: one punishes a man, one does not kill a king.

The same idea through history
Mencius320 BCMencius answers King Xuan of Qi, who asks whether a minister may put his sovereign to death, as is said of King Wu and the last Shang king. He turns the question round: was this man still a king? The text also says the people weigh more than the ruler (7B.14).
Juan de Mariana1599In Europe, the Jesuit Juan de Mariana argues that the people may kill a tyrant. He does not know Mencius, but defends the neighbouring idea that a tyrannical prince loses his legitimacy.John Locke1689Locke likewise holds that a power which acts against those it should protect loses its right to obedience.
In short

"The tyrant is no longer a king: killing him is not killing a sovereign" is an argument by Mencius (Mencius 1B.8, 7B.14 and 4A.9 (4th century BC), 320 BC) on the question "Must we always obey the law?" (answer: the right to revolt). Its claim: In punishing Zhou, one did not put a sovereign to death: overthrowing a tyrant is not a crime against one's prince. According to AskPhilosophy's logic check (Z3 solver), the argument is valid only if one grants a premise the author leaves unstated (P4). AskPhilosophy presents 4 objections, 1 of them with a documented reply, and the original text behind each premise, checked word for word.

Mencius 1B.8, 7B.14 and 4A.9 (4th century BC)
Valid with an implicit premise

Around 320 BC, King Xuan of Qi asks Mencius about two old events: Tang banished Jie, the last Xia king, and Wu, founder of the Zhou dynasty, attacked and overthrew Zhou, the last Shang king, a tyrant (according to tradition, Zhou killed himself when his capital fell). Tang and Wu were their vassals. May a minister therefore put his sovereign to death? Mencius answers that, as he sees it, that is not what happened. A sovereign is not a sovereign because he sits on the throne, but because he protects his people. If he destroys benevolence and righteousness, he becomes "a mere fellow". The text does not set out the argument in premises: the P1 to P4 form is our reconstruction of 1B.8, with 7B.14 and 4A.9.

P1One who outrages benevolence and righteousness is a robber and a ruffian. Such a man is only a mere fellow.
P2In a state, the people count most, the altars of the land and grain next, the sovereign least. A prince who endangers the state is replaced.
P3The last Shang king, Zhou, destroyed benevolence and righteousness: he had lost his people.
P4 · implicit premiseKilling a sovereign is a grave crime; punishing a mere fellow who is no longer sovereign is not.
Therefore, in punishing Zhou, one did not put a sovereign to death: overthrowing a tyrant is not a crime against one's prince.

click a premise to reject it

If you accept every premise, logic forces you to accept the conclusion. So the debate is about the premises.
Checked by a logic solver: the premises cannot all be true while the conclusion is false.
Without the implicit premise: Without P4, the computer finds a case where the tyrant has become a mere fellow (P1, P2, P3) but remains a sovereign before the law: killing him is then regicide, and the conclusion falls.
With its four premises, the argument is valid. Without P4 it is not: even reduced to a mere fellow, the tyrant could remain a sovereign in the eyes of the law, and killing him would still be regicide. Mencius does not lay down P4 as a principle: it emerges from the king's question ("may a minister put his sovereign to death?") and from his answer. This is also where the critics strike: Han Fei refuses to let anyone decide when the prince is no longer a prince.
Analogy. A mayor elected to protect his town who plunders it openly: we say he is no longer anyone's mayor. Mencius says the same of the king.

Objections

4

Each objection is a conversation: click to see who replies and where the debate stands.

Hobbes 1651 · attacks premise 1

Hobbes writes that "tyranny" is not the name of another form of government but of the same form disliked: those discontented under monarchy call it tyranny. If everyone is the judge of what is tyrannical, any discontented subject can declare his king a "mere fellow" and kill him.

a defender replies
see the argument
No reply possible: objection raised in 1651, after the author's death (-289).
Locke defender of the argument · 1689
Locke answers by giving a criterion that does not depend on discontent: tyranny is the exercise of power beyond right, for the ruler's own advantage and not the good of those under it, when the governor's will takes the place of law. It is not a name given in spite, but a fact one can observe.
see the argument
Where the debate stands (our summary)Disagreement on who judges. Mencius and Locke give a criterion (benevolence and righteousness, the good of the governed); Hobbes replies that each subject will apply it as he pleases and that civil war is worse than tyranny. No widely accepted answer to the question "who decides?".
H
Han Fei 240 BC · attacks the conclusion

Han Fei writes that Tang and Wu, who were ministers, killed their master and mutilated his corpse, and that the world praised them: for him, this is why the world is still not well governed. His idea is that order rests on the rule "the minister serves the prince", with no exception for a prince judged unworthy.

no reply
No reply possible: objection raised in -240, after the author's death (-289).
The debate goes on (our summary) Han Fei writes after Mencius and targets the admirers of Tang and Wu, without naming him here. Mencius answers in advance on the substance: the throne does not protect one who has lost his people (4A.9, 7B.14). Both start from the same fear of disorder; Mencius sees a tyrant who must be removable, Han Fei the ambitious who will call themselves virtuous.
Where the debate stands (our summary)The disagreement is about the main risk: the tyrant who cannot be overthrown (Mencius) or the usurper who poses as a liberator (Han Fei). Han Fei also cites real cases of princely houses overthrown by their ministers. Open point: no rule protects against both at once.
Kant 1797 · attacks the conclusion

Kant writes that there is no lawful resistance of the people against the legislative head of the state, since only submission to his legislative will makes a lawful condition possible. A right to overthrow the tyrant would be a right the law itself cannot contain without destroying itself.

no reply
see the argument
No reply possible: objection raised in 1797, after the author's death (-289).
The debate goes on (our summary) Kant reasons about law: the people cannot have a legal right to revolt. Mencius reasons about what makes a sovereign: a man who has lost benevolence and righteousness is no longer sovereign, so there is no resistance to a sovereign. The two do not speak of the same right, which explains how they can remain in disagreement.
Where the debate stands (our summary)Basic disagreement: is a power measured by its legal title (Kant) or by what it does for those it governs (Mencius)? Kant moreover holds that the tyrant should be criticised in writing, not overthrown.
Mencius (qualification) 320 BC · attacks the conclusion

Mencius himself limits who may act. Asked about high ministers, he says that those of the prince's own family, if the prince has great faults, must remonstrate with him and, if he does not listen after repeated attempts, dethrone him; ministers of another family must remonstrate and, if he does not listen, leave the State.

no reply
We have not yet found a direct reply by Mencius in the texts.
Where the debate stands (our summary)Open point in the text: in 1B.8, Wu punishes Zhou without being of his family, whereas in 5B.9 only the prince's kin may dethrone him. Commentators have tried to reconcile the two; we have no answer from Mencius himself.