John Stuart Mill Month

May marks both the birth (May 20, 1806) and death (May 8, 1873) of one of the leading advocates of liberalism in the 19th century: John Stuart Mill. Of his works, perhaps the most important was On Liberty, in 1859. It dealt with "the nature and limits of the power which can be legitimately exercised by society over the individual." Because we now live in an era when the limits he argued for in defense of individual freedom have been trampled beyond recognition, it is worth revisiting what Mill had to say about liberty. Despite much revisionism and worthy criticism, his libertarian core is unmistakable: Consider the following excerpts from On Liberty:

[In] the struggle between Liberty and Authority...The aim, therefore, of patriots, was to set limits to the power which the ruler should be suffered to exercise over the community; and this limitation was what they meant by liberty...to attain this, or when already in some degree possessed, to attain it more completely, became everywhere the principal object of the lovers of liberty.
...such phrases as “self government,” and ”the power of the people over themselves,” do not express the true state of the case. The “people” who exercise the power, are not always the same people with those over whom it is exercised, and the “self government” spoken of, is not the government of each by himself, but of each by all the rest.
There is, in fact, no recognized principle by which the propriety or impropriety of government interference is customarily tested. People decide according to their personal preferences...but very rarely on account of any opinion to which they consistently adhere, as to what things are fit to be done by a government.
The object of this Essay is to assert one very simple principle, as entitled to govern absolutely the dealings of society with the individual in the way of compulsion and control...that the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self protection. That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant...for compelling him...To justify that, the conduct from which it is desired to deter him must be calculated to produce evil to some one else. The only part of the conduct of any one, for which he is amenable to society, is that which concerns others. In the part which merely concerns himself, his independence is, of right, absolute. Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign.
...there is a sphere of action in which society, as distinguished from the individual, has, if any, only an indirect interest; comprehending all that portion of a person's life and conduct which affects only himself, or, if it also affects others, only with their free, voluntary, and undeceived consent and participation....This, then, is the appropriate region of human liberty...of framing the plan of our life to suit our own character; of doing as we like, subject to such consequences as may follow; without impediment from our fellow creatures, so long as what we do does not harm them even though they should think our conduct foolish, perverse, or wrong...
The only freedom which deserves the name, is that of pursuing our own good in our own way, so long as we do not attempt to deprive others of theirs, or impede their efforts to obtain it. Each is the proper guardian of his own...Mankind are greater gainers by suffering each other to live as seems good to themselves, than by compelling each to live as seems good to the rest...
I deny the right of the people to exercise such coercion, either by themselves or by their government. The power itself is illegitimate...If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.
...men should be free to act upon their opinions to carry these out in their lives, without hindrance, either physical or moral, from their fellow men, so long as it is at their own risk and peril...
The liberty of the individual must be thus far limited; he must not make himself a nuisance to other people. But if he refrains from molesting others in what concerns them, and merely acts according to his own inclination and judgment in things which concern himself...he should be allowed, without molestation, to carry his opinions into practice at his own cost.
...whatever crushes individuality is despotism...
The initiation of all wise or noble things, comes and must come from individuals; generally at first from some one individual...All he can claim is, freedom to point out the way. The power of compelling others into it, is not only inconsistent with the freedom and development of all the rest, but corrupting to the strong man himself.
If a person possesses any tolerable amount of common sense and experience, his own mode of laying out his existence is the best, not because it is the best in itself, but because it is his own mode.
...the only unfailing and permanent source of improvement is liberty, since by it there are as many possible independent centers of improvement as there are individuals.
...when a person's conduct affects the interests of no persons besides himself, or needs not affect them unless they like. In all such cases there should be perfect freedom, legal and social, to do the action and stand the consequences.
...neither one person, nor any number of persons, is warranted in saying to another human creature...that he shall not do with his life for his own benefit what he chooses to do with it...in each person's own concerns, his individual spontaneity is entitled to free exercise...he, himself, is the final judge. All errors which he is likely to commit against advice and warning, are far outweighed by the evil of allowing others to constrain him to what they deem his good.
...let not society pretend that it needs...the power to issue commands and enforce obedience in the personal concerns of individuals, in which, on all principles of justice and policy, the decision ought to rest with those who are to abide the consequences.
But the strongest of all the arguments against the interference of the public with purely personal conduct, is that when it does interfere, the odds are that it interferes wrongly...one of the most universal of all human propensities...[is] interfering with each other's liberty in things which do not concern the interests of others...
...there are, in our own day, gross usurpations upon the liberty of private life actually practiced, and still greater ones threatened...which assert an unlimited right in the public not only to prohibit by law everything which it thinks wrong, but in order to get at what it thinks wrong, to prohibit any number of things which it admits to be innocent.
A theory of "social rights" [is] nothing short of this--that it is the absolute social right of every individual, that every other individual shall act in every respect exactly as he ought; that whosoever fails thereof in the smallest particular, violates my social right, and entitles me to demand from the legislature the removal of the grievance. So monstrous a principle is far more dangerous than any single interference with liberty; there is no violation of liberty which it would not justify; it acknowledges no right to any freedom whatever...The doctrine ascribes to all mankind a vested interest in each other's moral, intellectual, and even physical perfection, to be defined by each claimant according to his own standard.
...the individual is not accountable to society for his actions, in so far as these concern the interests of no person but himself. Advice, instruction, persuasion, and avoidance by other people, if thought necessary by them for their own good, are the only measures by which society can justifiably express its dislike or disapprobation of his conduct...
...it must by no means be supposed, because damage, or probability of damage, to the interests of others, can alone justify the interference of society, that therefore it always does justify such interference...only when means...have been employed which it is contrary to the general interest to permit -- namely, fraud or treachery, and force.
The preventive function of government, however, is far more liable to be abused, to the prejudice of liberty, than the punitory function; for there is hardly any part of the legitimate freedom of action of a human being which would not admit of being represented, and fairly too, as increasing the facilities for some form or other of delinquency...when there is not a certainty, but only a danger of mischief, no one but the person himself can judge of the sufficiency of the motive which may prompt him to incur the risk...
...no person who sets due value on freedom will give his adhesion to their being so governed, unless after all efforts have been exhausted to educate them for freedom and govern them as freemen, and it has been definitively proved that they can only be governed as children...
The reason for not interfering, unless for the sake of others, with a person's voluntary acts, is consideration for his liberty. His voluntary choice is evidence that what he so chooses is desirable...to him, and his good is on the whole best provided for by allowing him to take his own means of pursuing it...
A person should be free to do as he likes in his own concerns; but he ought not to be free to do as he likes in acting for another under the pretext that the affairs of another are his own affairs. The State, while it respects the liberty of each in what specially regards himself, is bound to maintain a vigilant control over his exercise of any power which it allows him to possess over others...
...current ideas of liberty...bend so easily to real infringements of the freedom of the individual, in things which concern only himself...When we compare the strange respect of mankind for liberty, with their strange want of respect for it, we might imagine that a man had an indispensable right to do harm to others, and no right at all to please himself without giving pain to any one.
Speaking generally, there is no one so fit to conduct any business, or to determine how or by whom it shall be conducted, as those who are personally interested in it.
The...most cogent reason for restricting the interference of government, is the great evil of adding unnecessarily to its power. Every function superadded to those already exercised by the government, causes its influence over hopes and fears to be more widely diffused, and converts, more and more, the active and ambitious part of the public into hangers on of the government, or of some party which aims at becoming the government.
The worth of a State, in the long run, is the worth of the individuals composing it...a State, which dwarfs its men, in order that they may be more docile instruments in its hands even for beneficial purposes, will find that with small men no great thing can really be accomplished...

John Stuart Mill confronted what is still the central question of government: how much liberty should we have? And he answered that question with a ringing defense of far, far more liberty than people seem able to even dream about today. He even cited a real world illustration of liberty in action--America:

…Americans...let them be left without a government, every body of Americans is able to improvise one, and to carry on that or any other public business with a sufficient amount of intelligence, order and decision. This is what every free people ought to be: and a people capable of this is certain to be free; it will never let itself be enslaved by any man or body of men.

Unfortunately, Mill's description of America a century and a half ago contrasts sharply with the many ways our liberties have since been regulated away. But that shows how much we can benefit from paying renewed attention to his defense of them. Even the contrast with the America he knew reminds us of what is at stake:

No bureaucracy can hope to make such a people as this do or undergo anything that they do not like...But where everything is done through the bureaucracy, nothing to which the bureaucracy is really adverse can be done at all.