Taking People as They Are?

My purpose is to consider if, in political society, there can be any legitimate and sure principle of government, taking men as they are and laws as they might be. —Jean‐Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract Following Rousseau's opening thought in The Social Contract …, I shall assume that his phrase “men as they are” refers to persons' moral and psychological natures and how that nature works within the framework of political and social institutions. —John Rawls, The Law of peoples