On Liberty

Barnes & Noble

Chapter One

The subject of this Essay is not the so-called Liberty of the Will, so unfortunatelyopposed to the misnamed doctrine of Philosophical Necessity; butCivil, or Social Liberty: the nature and limits of the power which can belegitimately exercised by society over the individual. A question seldomstated, and hardly ever discussed, in general terms, but which profoundlyinfluences the practical controversies of the age by its latent presence, and islikely soon to make itself recognised as the vital question of the future. It isso far from being new, that in a certain sense, it has divided mankind, almostfrom the remotest ages; but in the stage of progress into which the morecivilized portions of the species have now entered, it presents itself undernew conditions, and requires a different and more fundamental treatment.

The struggle between Liberty and Authority is the most conspicuousfeature in the portions of history with which we are earliest familiar, particularlyin that of Greece, Rome, and England. But in old times this contestwas between subjects, or some classes of subjects, and the government. Byliberty, was meant protection against the tyranny of the political rulers.The rulers were conceived (except in some of the popular governments ofGreece) as in a necessarily antagonistic position to the people whom theyruled. They consisted of a governing One, or a governing tribe or caste, whoderived their authority from inheritance or conquest, who, at all events, didnot hold it at the pleasure of the governed, and whose supremacy men didnot venture, perhaps did not desire, to contest, whatever precautions mightbe taken against its oppressive exercise. Their power was regarded as necessary,but also as highly dangerous; as a weapon which they would attemptto use against their subjects, no less than against external enemies. Toprevent the weaker members of the community from being preyed upon byinnumerable vultures, it was needful that there should be an animal of preystronger than the rest, commissioned to keep them down. But as the king ofthe vultures would be no less bent upon preying on the flock, than any of theminor harpies, it was indispensable to be in a perpetual attitude of defenceagainst his beak and claws. The aim, therefore, of patriots, was to set limitsto the power which the ruler should be suffered to exercise over the community;and this limitation was what they meant by liberty. It was attempted intwo ways. First, by obtaining a recognition of certain immunities, calledpolitical liberties or rights, which it was to be regarded as a breach of duty inthe ruler to infringe, and which if he did infringe, specific resistance, orgeneral rebellion, was held to be justifiable. A second, and generally a laterexpedient, was the establishment of constitutional checks; by which theconsent of the community, or of a body of some sort, supposed to representits interests, was made a necessary condition to some of the more importantacts of the governing power. To the first of these modes of limitation, theruling power, in most European countries, was compelled, more or less, tosubmit. It was not so with the second; and to attain this, or when already insome degree possessed, to attain it more completely, became everywherethe principal object of the lovers of liberty. And so long as mankind werecontent to combat one enemy by another, and to be ruled by a master, oncondition of being guaranteed more or less efficaciously against his tyranny,they did not carry their aspirations beyond this point.

A time, however, came, in the progress of human affairs, when menceased to think it a necessity of nature that their governors should be anindependent power, opposed in interest to themselves. It appeared to themmuch better that the various magistrates of the State should be their tenantsor delegates, revocable at their pleasure. In that way alone, it seemed, couldthey have complete security that the powers of government would never beabused to their disadvantage. By degrees, this new demand for elective andtemporary rules became the prominent object of the exertions of the popularparty, wherever any such party existed; and superseded, to a considerableextent, the previous efforts to limit the power of rulers. As the struggleproceeded for making the ruling power emanate from the periodical choiceof the ruled, some persons began to think that too much importance hadbeen attached to the limitation of the power itself. That (it might seem) wasa resource against rulers whose interests were habitually opposed to thoseof the people. What was now wanted was, that the rulers should be identified with the people; that their interest and will should be the interest andwill of the nation. The nation did not need to be protected against its ownwill. There was no fear of its tyrannizing over itself. Let the rulers beeffectually responsible to it, promptly removable by it, and it could afford totrust them with power of which it could itself dictate the use to be made.Their power was but the nation's own power, concentrated, and in a formconvenient for exercise. This mode of thought, or rather perhaps of feeling,was common among the last generation of European liberalism, in theContinental section of which, it still apparently predominates. Those whoadmit any limit to what a government may do, except in the case of suchgovernments as they think ought not to exist, stand out as brilliant exceptionsamong the political thinkers of the Continent. A similar tone of sentimentmight by this time have been prevalent in our own country, if thecircumstances which for a time encouraged it, had continued unaltered.

But, in political and philosophical theories, as well as in persons, successdiscloses faults and infirmities which failure might have concealed fromobservation. The notion, that the people have no need to limit their powerover themselves, might seem axiomatic, when popular government was athing only dreamed about, or read of as having existed at some distantperiod of the past. Neither was that notion necessarily disturbed by suchtemporary aberrations as those of the French Revolution, the worst ofwhich were the work of an usurping few, and which, in any case, belonged,not to the permanent working of popular institutions, but to a sudden andconvulsive outbreak against monarchical and aristocratic despotism. Intime, however, a democratic republic came to occupy a large portion of theearth's surface, and made itself felt as one of the most powerful members ofthe community of nations; and elective and responsible government becamesubject to the observations and criticisms which wait upon a greatexisting fact. It was now perceived that such phrases as "self-government,"and "the power of the people over themselves," do not express the true stateof the case. The "people" who exercise the power, are not always the samepeople 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 therest. The will of the people, moreover, practically means, the will of themost numerous or the most active part of the people; the majority, or thosewho succeed in making themselves accepted as the majority: the people,consequently, may desire to oppress a part of their number; and precautionsare as much needed against this, as against any other abuse of power. Thelimitation, therefore, of the power of government over individuals, losesnone of its importance when...