Utilitarianism: Bentham, Mill, and the Limits of Liberty

Introduction: Utilitarianism and the Rethinking of Liberalism

Utilitarianism, a philosophy first espoused by Jeremy Bentham, embodies an important set of concepts in that it coincided with the rethinking of what we know as liberalism. The liberalism of the early 19th century was a product of classical economics; it was the ideology of laissez-faire and the free market. However, utilitarianism offered an alternate set of opinions regarding the role of government in society. Utilitarians such as Bentham and Mill questioned some of the more libertarian principles espoused by British economists Adam Smith and David Ricardo. This set of principles called upon government to take a proactive role in providing a quality standard of living to the majority of people living within society. Unlike socialism and other contemporaneous ideas, however, utilitarianism had implicit constraints; it was to inspire the "progressive" liberalism of the 20th century and result in the modern concept of liberalism as an ideology that sometimes sacrificed individual liberty for a perceived common good.

Jeremy Bentham and the Principle of Utility

Born in 1748 to a wealthy British conservative family, Bentham was discovered to be a child prodigy. While studying law at Oxford, he became critical of the system of laws in place in Britain and instead advocated a system that would provide the greatest happiness to the greatest number of people. At the time, the legal process in Britain was characterized by a struggle between the Tory or Conservative Party and the Whig Party, or Liberals. Tories championed the interests of the country's landed aristocracy, whereas Whigs represented the interests of merchants and industrialists. Before the influence of the Chartists in the 1830s, the poor, unenfranchised residents of England's growing urban industrial centers had little or no political representation. The promise of immigration — or threat of expulsion — to the Americas acted as a safety valve that prevented political unrest in Britain.

Bentham published his first major work, An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation, in 1789. In this work, Bentham explores the principle of utility and its implications for legislatures. He contends that moral guidelines should dictate the principles employed in the formation of laws by a legislature. Bentham believed that laws providing the best life for the most people were morally defensible, whereas laws that protected partisan interests or reflected outdated, parochial principles were illogical or immoral.

Among the first institutions of public life to be affected in Britain by Bentham's work was the legal system, which had relied extensively on historical precedent. Bentham's writings on the nature of law placed many Enlightenment ideas in context and were applicable in the courts. Because courts in Britain — as in other English-speaking countries — were dominated by the application of common law, the methodologies Bentham used to explore the moral valence of political action were well received.

John Stuart Mill and On Liberty

John Stuart Mill, born in 1806, was another child prodigy and is considered Bentham's intellectual heir. His father raised Mill with Bentham's help, shielding him from the influence of other children and immersing him in an environment rich with political thought. By the time Mill was a young man, he was skilled in the classics and in the nuances of political economics. England at the time was a hotbed of political thought. The Anti-Corn Law League, comprised of advocates of the free-trade theory developed by Smith and Ricardo, was considered by many intellectuals to be a lone moral voice at a time when aristocratic English agricultural interests dominated the legislature. Their power was buttressed by an antiquated system of power distribution that failed to appoint Members of Parliament on the basis of population. These interests had severely restricted the import of grain to famine-stricken Ireland, at the cost of millions of lives.

It is in this context that John Stuart Mill wrote his seminal work, On Liberty. Mill begins On Liberty with a discussion of the political system, relating the concepts of enumerated political rights and constitutional limits through an analogy of vultures preying on the politically weak. Mill not only addresses the necessity of liberties but also the rational limits that should be placed on their application. This he describes as deciding "how to make the fitting adjustment between individual independence and social control" (Mill, On Liberty, Chapter 1) — in many respects, the perennial dilemma addressed by all legislatures in all democratic societies.

Mill argues that reason, objectivity, and circumspection should dictate the extent to which the liberties of individuals are limited by their government. These limits, he argues, should represent an appeal to the common good and to mutually held principles of justice. Mill defends freedom only to the extent that it does not lead people to harm one another:

"The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilised community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant." (Mill, Chapter 2)

It is notable that Mill expresses no objection to people who harm only themselves; The Economist invoked this very passage in arguing for the legalization of marijuana. Mill was most significant in that he provided a synthesis of Bentham's ideas and classical liberal thought — though his was a modified liberalism that sought to specify when and where there was a moral justification for placing limitations on liberty. It fell to others to carry this proposition further; thinkers such as Comte and Rawls extended Mill's compromise, deriving redistributionist principles from it.

Conclusion: The Legacy of Utilitarian Thought

Although Godwin and his wife cannot be seen as true utilitarians, Bentham and Mill are considered the foremost utilitarians and two of the leading thinkers of the 19th century. Mill's ideas regarding liberty and political thought continue to define the debate about the limits of political freedom. Sidgwick and Bentham provided a moral resonance to these ideas, and current political debates continue to revolve around questions of what is best for society as a whole.