Mills Liberty Summary

Mills begins his essay on Liberty by voicing the “struggle between authority and liberty”. He explains how liberty changed overtime, from the protection of tyranny to the tyrants themselves becoming the servants to the people, rather than there masters. This progression was reached as man realised they wanted their leaders to serve instead of rule, and to reflect the interests of the majority of society instead of a select few. Mills divided this control of authority into two mechanisms- Rights that are necessary for individuals, and the "establishment of constitutional checks by which the consent of the community, or of a body of some sort, supposed to represent its interests, was made a necessary condition to some of the more important acts of the governing power". This change in liberty did generate new problems- a democratic majority can become tyrannical and force its will on the minority.

This tyrannical power exists both in the political sphere and outside it. Society itself can become oppressive by limiting individuals and rebellion. Mills writes that the only justification for manipulating an individual’s liberty should be for their self-protection. He argues that even if a law or public opinion is intended for an individual’s
welfare, it is not sufficient to force that law or public opinion onto an individual. Mills believed the only excuse for a law to be forced onto an individual is if the actions the law prohibits poses a threat to others.
It is fine to argue with a person about his actions, but not to compel him.

In his essay Mills divides liberty into three categories, asserting that to function as an effective free society, all three must be respected.
The first category involved the span of the conscience, and the liberty of an individual’s opinions and ideas. Second, the freedom one has in planning one’s own life, and the liberty one has in their choices and interests. Third, the liberty individuals have to connect with other complying individuals for any objective that will not harm others. With these categories, Mill was suggesting that true freedom is achieved by individuals pursuing ones existence in the way they intend, as long as it does generate harm to others and does not restrict other individuals from performing the
same.

Mills then explores the idea of expressing ones opinion and if, through the government or by themselves, people should be allowed to intimidate or limit anyone’s opinion. Mills ardently believes that the action of forcing or limiting someone’s opinion is an unlawful action. Those too with unpopular viewpoint should not be silenced either as, the popular viewpoint is not always necessarily the correct one. Mill suggest by silencing the opinions of any individual, we are robbing "the human race, posterity as well as the existing generation" If society silences different viewpoints and opinions there will be no transformation and no possibility of finding a better system of government or way of life. Mills, while defending the liberty of opinion is not stating that all opinions are uniformly valid, but that any one idea might be accurate and worth listening to, and for this reason no idea should be suppressed.

Mills then progresses to examine the idea that individuality and nonconformity are both valuable for the individual and society.