This chapter addresses the relationship between rights and property and the role of each in determining the form of government. It begins by challenging J. G. A. Pocock’s division of the history of political thought into liberal and republican traditions, with the first based on a juridical conception of politics and the second focused on political participation to the exclusion of a concern with rights. David Hume, whose skepticism led him to deny that justice was a natural virtue, traced property rights to an appreciation of their social utility. In addition, like Montesquieu, Hume denied any necessary relation between the degree of political participation in government and the security of rights. Edmund Burke accepted that fundamental rights were ultimately derived from nature, but objected to how the French revolutionaries ignored the role of prescription in stabilizing justice. Ultimately, Hegel broke down the distinction between rights and welfare, drawing on Rousseau and Kant’s emphasis on freedom as the true source of justice and humanity.