在欧洲，革命权的出现可以追溯到法律演讲人托尔尼（英语：Torgny the Lawspeaker）。1118年，托尔尼与瑞典国王发生激烈冲突，称国王应对人民负责，如果他继续进行不受人民欢迎的与挪威的战争，他将会被推翻。此外，1215年的英国大宪章也要求国王放弃部分权利，接受其意志应受法律制约。其中包括了一个“安全条款”，这个条款给予了男爵委员会如有必要可以强制否决国王意志的权利。大宪章直接影响了议会民主制和诸如美国宪法等众多宪制文件的发展。[3]
尽管洛克宣称他出书的目的是为了证明威廉三世登基是正当的，但是有观点认为他作品的大部分都完成于1679年至1680年排除危机期间，试图从一开始就阻止詹姆斯二世登基。洛克的导师、赞助者和朋友沙夫茨伯里伯爵提出了相关法案但最终未获成功。[7]取而代之的是，该作品与此后莱伊宫阴谋（英语：Rye House Plot）相关的革命密谋有更多联系。[8]
如波琳·迈尔（英语：Pauline Maier）在她的《从反抗到革命》（From Resistance to Revolution）中指出，“无论是因恶意还是私下的伤害，私人被禁止采取强制力反抗统治者”。[11]与之相对的是，“不是仅仅几个个人，而应涉及‘人民全体’时革命权才是正当的，对大多数作家来说‘全体人民就是公众’，或者是人民全体在‘公众权威’之下行动，这表示应在社会各阶层取得广泛共识，”[12]
弗里茨在《美国最高统治者：人民与内战前的美国宪法传统》（American Sovereigns: The People and America's Constitutional Tradition Before the Civil War）一书中描述了美国对革命权的前提条件所持有的观点存在两重性。由于要求有极端紧迫的前提条件才可以行使，“一些最早期的州宪法包含了呼应传统革命权的‘变更或废止’的条款”。[18]马里兰1776年宪法和新罕布什尔1784年宪法要求政府违反其宗旨或危及公众自由且其他一切补救手段都无济于事。[19]但是，与之相对的是，其他的一些州去掉了行使革命权的繁重前提。在1776年弗吉尼亚州宪法中该权利在政府“不够格”时即随之产生。1776年宾夕法尼亚州宪法只要求人民认为改变政府对公众福利“最有益”时即可。[20]
德克萨斯宪法（英语：Constitution of Texas）[35]在第一条第二款也包含类似说法：“一切权利在于人民，一切自由政府皆建立在他们的权威之上且为他们的福祉而设立。以德克萨斯人民之信仰起誓保障共和政体，且仅以此为限，他们永远都拥有不可剥夺的以他们认为合适的方式改变、改革或废除其政府之权利。”
^See Christian G. Fritz, American Sovereigns: The People and America’s Constitutional Tradition Before the Civil War (Cambridge Univ. Press, 2008), 14 (noting that under English constitutional law the right of revolution "belonged to the community as a whole, as one of the parties to the original constitutional contract"). See also John Phillip Reid, Constitutional History of the American Revolution (4 vols., University of Wisconsin Press, 1986–1993), I:111 (identifying the collective right of the people "to preserve their rights by force and even rebellion against constituted authority"), III:427n31 (quoting Viscount Bolingbroke that the "collective Body of the People" had the right to "break the Bargain between the King and the Nation").
^Pauline Maier, From Resistance to Revolution: Colonial Radicals and the Development of American Opposition to Britain, 1765–1776 (Alfred A. Knopf, 1972), 33.
^See Christian G. Fritz, American Sovereigns: The People and America's Constitutional Tradition Before the Civil War （页面存档备份，存于互联网档案馆） (In Chapter 2, entitled "Revolutionary Constitutionalism", Professor Fritz notes that after the Revolution, "[i]ncreasingly, as Americans included it in their constitutions, the right of revolution came to be seen as a constitutional principle permitting the people as the sovereign to control government and revise their constitutions without limit.")(Cambridge University Press, 2008) at p. 25 ISBN978-0-521-88188-3
^Massachusetts 1780 Constitution, Bill of Rights, Art. 7.
^Connecticut 1818 Constitution, Bill of Rights, Sec. 2.
^Christian G. Fritz, American Sovereigns: The People and America’s Constitutional Tradition Before the Civil War (Cambridge University Press, 2008), 24.
^See Maryland 1776 Constitution, Bill of Rights, Sec. 4; New Hampshire 1784 Constitution, Bill of Rights, Art. 10.
^Virginia 1776 Constitution, Bill of Rights, Sec. 3; Pennsylvania 1776 Constitution, Bill of Rights, Sec. 5.
^William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England (4 vols., Oxford, 1765–1769, Facsimile ed., repr., 1979), I:238.
^John Phillip Reid, "The Irrelevance of the Declaration", in Hendrik Hartog, ed., Law in the American Revolution and the Revolution in the Law (1981), 72.
^New Jersey 1776 Constitution, Preamble in Francis Newton Thorpe, ed., The Federal and State Constitutions Colonial Charters, and Other Organic Laws of the ... United States of America, V:2594 (noting that the King breached his contract with the people).
^John Phillip Reid, Constitutional History of the American Revolution (4 vols., 1986–1993), III:140.
^Alexander Hamilton, "The Farmer Refuted" (February 23, 1775), The Papers of Alexander Hamilton, I:88.
^See Reid, Constitutional History, I:111 (identifying the collective right of the people “to preserve their rights by force and even rebellion against constituted authority”), III:427n31 (quoting Viscount Bolingbroke that the "collective Body of the People" had the right to "break the Bargain between the King and the Nation"); Pauline Maier, From Resistance to Revolution: Colonial Radicals and the Development of American Opposition to Britain, 1765–1776, 33–34 ("Private individuals were forbidden to take force against their rulers either for malice or because of private injuries, even if no redress for their grievances were afforded by the regularly constituted government").
^See Aleksandar Marsavelski, The Crime of Terrorism and the Right of Revolution in International Law （页面存档备份，存于互联网档案馆） (In Chapter II.A.4., entitled "Criteria for the Use of Revolutionary Force" Marsavelski notes that there are certain limits to the right of revolution, guided by four principles: (1) principle of democracy, (2) principle of proportionality, (3) principle of just cause, and (4) principle of distinction), (Connecticut Journal of International Law, Vol. 28) at pp. 278–275.
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