Mill’s Children

If conservatives and libertarians disagree about ends, but agree (sometimes) about means, the reverse might be said of libertarians and liberals. To see why, consider that libertarians often trace their intellectual lineage to J.S. Mill’s “On Liberty.”

For Mill, our proper ends are not given by religion or traditional morality. Rather, the proper end of each person is the cultivation and development of his own unique character and individuality:

“As it is useful that while mankind are imperfect there should be different opinions, so is it that there should be different experiments of living; that free scope should be given to varieties of character, short of injury to others; and that the worth of different modes of life should be proved practically, when any one thinks fit to try them. It is desirable, in short, that in things which do not primarily concern others, individuality should assert itself. Where, not the person’s own character, but the traditions of customs of other people are the rule of conduct, there is wanting one of the principal ingredients of human happiness, and quite the chief ingredient of individual and social progress.”



If the goal of social progress is the cultivation of individuality, then the means are primarily leaving each person to his own devices, as Mill enunciates in his famous “harm principle” (as it has come to be called):

“…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. He cannot rightfully be compelled to do or forbear because it will be better for him to do so, because it will make him happier, because, in the opinions of others, to do so would be wise, or even right. These are good reasons for remonstrating with him, or reasoning with him, or persuading him, or entreating him, but not for compelling him, or visiting him with any evil in case he do otherwise. 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.”

The sovereignty of the individual over himself is very much a bedrock principle of libertarian thought. But what does this have to do with liberalism?

Contrary to what conservatives sometimes say, the driving idea behind American liberalism has usually not been “equality of condition” or egalitarianism, per se. Rather, liberals have seen themselves as continuing the Millian project of liberating the individual. This is the basic goal modern-day liberals have in common with so-called classical liberals (i.e. libertarians).

Modern liberals differ from their libertarian cousins in giving the State a more positive role in facilitating the development of the individual. In Mill’s day, the State could plausibly be seen as the chief obstacle to individual flourishing, but later liberals have argued that concentrations of economic power, as well as oppressive social structures like racism and sexism are just as big of a problem. Liberals think that the State needs to do more in securing “positive liberty” – e.g. supplying basic economic goods which are prerequisites for any meaningful life. They see themselves as being truer to the spirit of Millian liberalism, while libertarians are more like fundamentalists who insist on sticking to the letter.

Arguably, though, libertarians and liberals have more in common with each other than either do with conservatives. Liberals and libertarians agree that the highest political end is liberation from arbitrary authority and power, and agreement about ends is presumably more important than agreement about means (since the means are employed for the sake of the ends).

Of course, libertarians and liberals will sometimes disagree on what counts as arbitrary and oppressive authority. The liberal may want to use the State to limit the influence of religion on society, whereas the libertarian may regard religion as much less of a threat to liberty because of its essentially voluntary nature. Still, one would expect to see libertarians and liberals aligned on a variety of issues in opposition to the more traditionalist brand of social conservative, Indeed, this seems to be what’s happening, for example, on issues like euthanasia, abortion and biotechnology.