"Any single man must judge for himself whether circumstances warrant
obedience or resistance to the commands of the civil magistrate; we are
all qualified, entitled, and morally obliged to evaluate the conduct of
our rulers. This political judgment, moreover, is not simply or
primarily a right, but like self-preservation, a duty to God. As such it
is a judgment that men cannot part with according to the God of Nature.
It is the first and foremost of our inalienable rights without which we
can preserve no other."

-- John Locke
(1632-1704) English philosopher and political theorist. Considered the
ideological progenitor of the American Revolution and who, by far, was the
most often non-biblical writer quoted by the Founding Fathers of the USA.