On Liberty and the Subjection of Women

Poignant thoughts on freedom of speech and the important role it plays in all aspects of society.

This collects two of John Stuart Mill's best-known and most influential essays: On Liberty and The Subjection of Women. The main topics are different, but the essays fit to a greater or lesser extent the ambitious philosophical system outlined in Mill's A System of Logic. His life project was essentially to adapt the utilitarian moral/political philosophy inherited from Jeremy Bentham via his father James Mill to mid-Victorian social problems. This involved significant changes and substantial liberalizing, making Mill a classical liberalism exponent and strong forerunner of all subsequent liberal ideals and practices. Together and individually, the essays have had an immense impact on political, moral, philosophical, and economic thought. Reading them together is instructive and interesting. The writings are also held together by Mill's consistently lucid, smooth, and articulate style. This is a pleasant surprise given his fearsomely learned reputation. He relies almost exclusively on words the average reader understands, and his prose is remarkably readable a century and a half later, lacking the overblown floweriness and excessive stiltedness that now make much Victorian writing, especially non-fiction, insufferably dull. On Liberty is a profound and engaging philosophical and practical defense of personal liberty, epitomized by the famous Harm Principle that all are free to do as they wish provided it does not harm others. It is the state's job to ensure the former right is upheld and the latter transgression punished. Mill's argument is very strong - convincing not only as an inherent right but also as a practical advantage to individuals and society. This is probably now his most famous work, and it is very easy to see why; his argument is not only compelling philosophically but widely applicable and, at about 140 pages, easily read by nearly all. Everyone from pure philosophers to political theorists to practical politicians to general readers can find something to like and learn. The Subjection deals exclusively with a subject Mill had often raised before - female oppression. This classic essay is the culmination of an issue Mill had been passionately involved in since youth, when he was arrested for distributing literature about contraception. It is the most important, famous, and influential feminist text between Mary Wollstonecraft's Vindication of the Rights of Woman and Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique, coming about halfway between them. That it was written by a man, one born to a substantial amount of privilege and who was around very few women until adulthood at that, is of course all the more incredible. Going well beyond his prior suffrage call, it pushes for nothing less than full equality, not even stopping at legal equality but valiantly trying to change thought and custom. Mill's suffrage arguments are numerous and near-irrefutable. He has the noble distinction of being the first MP to propose female suffrage - in the

John Stuart Mill, 1806-73, worked for the East India Co. helped run Colonial India from England. Minister of Parliament 1865-68 he served one term. Maiden speech was a disaster his second was great success. He was first MP to propose that women should be given the vote on equal footing with the men who could vote. He got 1/3 support, England gives franchise to women after U.S. He was a great Feminist, his essay "Subjection of Women" is written with great passion and prose. It was a brave position for him to take he was ridiculed for it. He favored democracy, and letting more men from lower classes the right to vote, but believed that people that are more educated should have more votes then less educated because they would make better decisions about what government should do. He would have wanted to extend education to the masses, so that all may have gotten 2-3 votes and so on. He didn't think it should be extended to where a small elite could carry the day on votes. The idea was that if the working class, and middle class, where divided on an issue, the people with more intelligence would have the power to tip the balance. Mill thought that people with more education would probably not only be better able to make political decisions, especially in terms of intellectually being able to see what would be best for the government to do, but that they would also be more concerned about the common good publicly then people in general. He was intensely educated by his father James. John could read Greek, and Latin at 6 yrs.; his Dad tutored him at home. Dad thought environment was everything. He was treated like an adult, never played games with kids; he had a very cerebral upbringing. He had a period of depression in his twenties, it changed his philosophy, and he recognized the importance of developing feelings along with the intellect, this is something that he stressed in his work. He read poetry to get out of depression; he became devoted to poetry and became a romantic. He fell in love with a married woman Harriet Taylor, was a platonic relationship, after her husband's death they married 3 years later and probably never consummated the marriage maybe due to his having syphilis. His dedication to "On Liberty" is to her, very devoted to each other. Both buried together in Avignon France where they used to vacation. Mill as a moral theorist subscribed to a theory we call Utilitarianism. It means---In some way morality is about the maximization of happiness. Whether actions are right or wrong depends on how happiness can be most effectively maximized. I say in some way, because there are allot of different kinds of Utilitarians. Allot of different ways of saying exactly how it is the maximization of happiness comes into morality. Therefore, happiness is clearly an important idea for Utilitarians. Mill has a hedonistic view of happiness, he thinks that happiness can be defined in terms of "pleasure in the absence of pai