They don't have almost nothing to do with one another. Modern American liberalism is based pretty heavily on universal suffrage and human rights. The Rawlsian

They don't have almost nothing to do with one another. Modern American liberalism is based pretty heavily on universal suffrage and human rights. The Rawlsian veil of ignorance[1] that the modern American left is pretty much based on is largely an extension of Locke. Sure, there are some economic ideas that the early liberals had that most modern liberals (and modern conservatives for that matter) would eschew, but to reduce their thinking to being purely libertarian does a disservice to the modern left, which needs all the historical support it can muster. 1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veil_of_ignorance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veil_of_ignorance