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TSR Wiki > Study Help > Subjects and Revision > Revision Notes > Politics > Chapter 5 - Applications

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• Chapter intended as an illustration of the principles, rather than an attempt to follow them out to their consequences. (Specimens of application)

• Mill states that his doctrine is based on two maxims: 1. ‘The individual is not accountable to society for his actions, in so far as these concern the interests of no person but himself’. The only measures by which society can express its disapprobation of the conduct in question is through advice/instruction/persuasion/avoidance if thought necessary for their own good. 2. ‘for such actions as are prejudicial to the interests of others, the individual is accountable, and may be subjected either to social or legal punishment, if society is of the opinion that the one or the other is requisite for its protection’. However, imp. to note that: ‘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. [So no interference for self-regarding, and not nec. interference for other-regarding actions] In many cases, an individual, in pursuing a legitimate object, necessarily and therefore legitimately causes pain or loss to others, or intercepts a good which they had a reasonable hope of obtaining’.

• Success in competitive examination or overcrowded profession: ‘it is, by common admission, better for the general interests of mankind, that persons should pursue their objects undeterred by this sort of consequences’ – soc. should only interfere when means of success employed contrary to the general interest to permit: fraud/ treachery/force.

• Trade: public control admissible to prevent fraud by adulteration, sanitary and safety precautions for employees should be enforced on employers. But some restrictions on trade are essentially questions of liberty (Maine Law; prohibition of opium imports into China, ban on poisons) – ‘objectionable, not as infringements on the liberty of the producer or seller, but on that of the buyer’.

• Sale of Poisons: question of how far liberty may legit be invaded for accident or crime prevention. The preventive function of gov. far more open to abuse than punitory function: hardly any part of legit freedom of action which might not fairly be represented as increasing the facilities for some form of delinquency. If poison bought for murder, OK to prohibit, as would be the case if poison were never bought/used for purposes other than murder. But can be used for innocent/useful purposes. So recommends precautionary measures like labelling/witnesses/signatures/name/address…– (same for other things which might be used for crime – vs medical practitioner certifs: expensive or imposs. to obtain.)

• Person going across a bridge ascertained to be unsafe: if no time to warn of danger, may seize him and ‘turn him back without any infringement on his liberty; for liberty consists in doing what one desires, and he does not desire to fall into the river.’ But when danger is’nt a certainty, ‘no one but the person himself can judge of the sufficiency of the motive which may prompt him to incur the risk: in this case… he ought… to be only warned of the danger; not forcibly prevented from exposing himself to it’. (except when kid/delirious, or ‘in some state of excitement or absorption incompatible with the full use of the reflecting faculty’.

• Drunkenness: in ordinary cases no legal interference, but if a person’s committed acts of violence when drunk: if found drunk, liable to a penalty.

• Man fails to perform legal duties like support kids: (idleness/other avoidable reason) OK to force him to fulfil obligations, & by compulsory labour, if no other means available.

• (Sex in public…): ‘there are many acts which, being directly injurious only to the agents themselves, ought not to be interdicted, but which, if done publicly, are a violation of good manners, and coming thus under the category of offences against others, may rightfully be prohibited…acts against decency’.

• Prostitution and Gambling: ‘Fornication… must be tolerated, & so must gambling’. But is it OK to be a pimp or keep a gambling house? Admits there are arguments for both sides & that the case is on the boundary between the two principles. For toleration: ‘following anything as an occupation, and… profiting by [its practice], cannot make that criminal which would otherwise be admissible; that the act should either be consistently permitted or… prohibited; … society has no business, as society, to decide anything to be wrong which concerns only the individual’. Against toleration: public/State ‘fully justified in assuming, if they regard it as bad, that its being so or not is at least a disputable question… they cannot be acting wrongly in endeavouring to exclude the influence of solicitations which are not disinterested… [people] promote it for personal objects only. … nothing lost that persons shall make their election… on their own prompting’. So Conclusion: people should be free to gamble in their own and others’ houses or other meeting places, but only open to members and their visitors – public gambling houses should not be permitted: admits that prohibition is never effectual but the resulting degree of ‘mystery and secrecy’ would only make them available to those actually seeking them and no more (?). Does not propose to venture to decide whether this is enough to justify the moral anomaly of punishing the principal but not the accessory.

• What about drink?: almost everything bought/sold may be used in excess, & though drink sellers may (‘a real evil’) encourage intemperance, they’re required for its sale.

• Should State, whilst permitting certain habits which it considers contrary to the best interests to the agent, nevertheless indirectly discourage them: e.g. make drunkenness more costly/restrict the number of pubs. To tax stimulants for the sole purpose of making them more difficult to obtain, only diff. by degree to prohibition, so only OK if that’s justifiable. But choice of pleasure and ways of spending income ‘are their own concern, and must rest with their own judgement’. But taxation to raise revenue OK, and since nec that much of it should be indirect, it’s OK for the gov. to consider what commodities consumers can best spare: if that’s the case, not only admissible, but to be approved of. It’s fit to confine the power of selling those commodities to persons ‘of known or vouched-for respectability of conduct’, to make regulations for opening hours requisite for public surveillance, & withdraw licence if repeated breaches of the peace or rendezvous for concocting illegal offences. In principle, further restrictions not justifiable (e.g. limits to numbers of pubs – would be treating the labouring classes like kids and this would only be admissible if ‘all efforts have been exhausted to educate them for freedom and govern them as freemen, and it has been definitely proved that they can only be governed as kids’. Says that, of course, no such effort has been made.

• People voluntarily selling themselves into slavery: in doing so one abdicates one’s liberty and forgoes any future use of it beyond that single act. ‘He therefore defeats… the very purpose which is the justification of allowing him to dispose of himself. The principle of freedom cannot require that he should be free not to be free. It is not freedom, to be allowed to alienate his freedom.’.

• Divorce: legally free, but ‘When a person, either by express promise or by conduct, has encouraged another to rely upon his continuing to act in a certain way – to build expectations and calculations, and stake any part of his plan of life upon that supposition – a new series of moral obligations arise… which may possibly be overruled, but cannot be ignored’. So, esp. if there are kids, the person ‘is bound to take all these circs into account before’ taking the step. So don’t have to follow the contract to the full.

• Wives should have same rights and protection of law as others.

• Compulsory Education: believes that notion of liberty can be misapplied: believes it’s self-evident that State should require & compel education, up to a certain standard of all its citizens. It’s a crime not only to bring up a child with inadequate food for body, but also mind too – ‘a moral crime’ – ‘if the parent does not fulfil this obligation, the State ought to see it fulfilled, at the charge, as far as possible, of the parent’. Suggests that a better way of dealing with the issue would be to require for every child to have a good education, yet not provide it itself (e.g. by paying all/part of school fees of those who can’t afford it). Vs state provision of educ: ‘A general state education is a mere contrivance for moulding people to be exactly like on another’, & as would be chosen by dominant power, which would establish a tyranny over mind. But could deal with a few institutions (e.g. some universities) as a stimulus to others…

• Believes that laws which forbid marriage unless parties show that they have the means of supporting kids ‘are not objectionable as violations of liberty’ (mentions the wretchedness and depravity to the offspring – and soc? when unable to pay)…

• Gov. Interference: objections, when not involving infringement of liberty, of 3 kinds:
  1. When things are likely to be done better by individuals than gov.
  2. Even if indivs. don’t do it so well, can be useful to strengthen their active faculties (q.of development – e.g. conduct of philanthropic enterprises by voluntary associations)
  3. The ‘great evil of adding unnecessarily to its power’. (e.g. ‘converts, more and more, the ambitious part of the public into hangers-on of the government’) + people expect state to do everything for them and blame the state for anything that goes wrong.

• Admiration for Americans: if left without a gov: ‘every body of Americans is able to improvise one, & to carry on… any other public business with a sufficient amount of intelligence, order & decision…What every free people ought to be: & a people capable of this is certain to be free’.

• Some Recommendations for Gov.: Vs the v best talent going to the state bureaucracy, cos it makes State too powerful: for want of practical experience, outside public would be ill-qualified to criticise/check the operation of gov, but (gives e.g. of Russia where bureauc, he feels, too powerful) no reform might be effected which is contrary to interests of bureauc. Believes that the system might, due to the great measure of fixed rules, degenerate into indolent routine – needs outside stimuli to keep its standard up, so imp that such bodies, comprised of men of equal ability, should exist. For the bureauc not to degenerate into a ‘pedantocracy, this body must not engross all the occupations which form and cultivate the faculties required for the government of mankind’.

• Says that powers of administrative coercion and secondary legislation (e.g. Poor Law Board) perfectly justifiable in a case of first-rate national interest, but wholly out of place in the superintendence of purely local interests.

• Mill believes that giving gov. too much power undermines initiative, which, in the long run, undermines its quality (likes facilitating rather than providing role): ‘A government cannot have too much of the kind of activity which does not impede, but aids and stimulates, individual exertion and development. The mischief begins when… it substitutes is own activities for theirs [individuals and bodies]; when, instead of informing, advising, and… denouncing, it makes them work in fetters, or…does their work instead of them.’ This undermines indiv enterprise, which will, in LR, damage quality of people working for & outside it. (encourages passivity, docility…)

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