Morality for an Atomic Age

...Mill tried to analyze Britain's motives and the reasons for the genersl distrust of them...

...He realized England's leadership in liberty, but even there he conceded America's primacy...

...He thought the speech which he delivered at that occasion the beet of his speeches in the House...

...I Britain was often accused of acting only Or her own narrow interests and interfering only to satisfy her own insatiable freed...

...Did not the North, in resisting the separation of th* South, commit the same wrong which England committed in opposing the original separation of the thirteen colonies...

...A* long as justice and injustice have not terminated their ever-renewing fight for ascendancy in th* affairs of mankind, human being* must be willing, when need is, to do battle for th* on* against th* other...

...He found the English prone "to look unfavorably upon every act by which territory or revenue are acquired from foreign states and to take part with any government, however unworthy, which can make out the merest semblance of a case of injustice against our own country...

...as a nation which thinks of nothing but of outwitting its neighbors...

...Many people in England sided with the South, some out of sympathy for its resistance to the powerful North, which tried to force the South against its will into imperial union...

...He took sharp issue with Carlyle, who had been his friend, whin the latter invoked human and divine laws in behalf of Negro slavery...

...Eighty years ago he wrote that "there are few questions which more require to be taken in hand by ethical and political philosophers, with a view to establish some criterion whereby th* justiflableness of intervening in tha affairs of other countries, and the justiflableness of refraining from intervention, may be brought to a definite and shtional test...

...He considered for all countries individual liberty and human progress more important than the "rights" of nations and governments...

...When in 1865 Edward John Eyre, a distinguished explorer and administrator, suppressed with undue severity a Negro insurrection in Jamaica, where he w?s then governor, Mill took the leadership of liberal public opinion in England to demand the criminal prosecution of Eyre, who had been recalled by the government...

...Events have justified Mill's confidence...

...He was con-vinred that as a result of his efforts lasting for more than two years, colonial governors would in future have a considerable motive to stop short of such extremities...

...At the helm of an alliance of free peoples, England could defy even a league of autocracier...

...Mill understood the urgency of the problems of intervention which have so much occupied the attention of the world lately...

...The readers of Mill's articles on some of the questions of his day will be struck by the realization, how much his problems are still with us...

...He was accused of inconsistency by English liberals...

...Mill not only declared emphatically for the right of the North to oppose th* •elf-determination of the South...

...England is thus exhibited ss s country whose most distinguished men are not ashamed to profess that they will not move a finger for others" except for England's private advantage...

...War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things: the decayed and degraded atate of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks nothing worth a war it worse...

...and the most far-fetched suggestion of a selfish purpose appears to them better entitled to credence than anything so absolutely incredible as our disinterestedness...

...On the contrary, he pointed out that though "I he Romans were not the most' cleanhanded of conquerors, yet would it hsve been better for Gaul and Spain, Namidia and Dacia, never to have formed part of the Roman Empire...

...He reminded, those Englishmen who were ? concerned about American imperialism and the sacred right of self-determination, of Ireland or India or th* Ionian Islands —not foreseeing that on* year later England would voluntarily cede th* Ionian Islands to Greece, an unprecedented step in the attitude of nations, setting the example which she applied later in Egypt and Iraq and which the United States is trying to follow in th* Philippine Islands...

...He warned against all the proposals for a negotiated peace, which increased in number* and urgency as this greatest and most savage of all nineteenth century wars demanded aver greater aacil-fices...

...He opposed demands for an English crusade on behalf of liberty on the continent...

...Mill explained this general distrust by English shortcomings, their shyness and fear of appearing "good," above all the habit of English statesmen to declare publicly that England would not interfere in Europe as long as no English interests were involved...

...War, in a good cause, i* not th* greatest «vii which · nation can suffer," he wrote in regard to America...

...J. S. Mill and the World of Nations British Liberalism and Non-intervention By Hans Kohn I JOHN STUART MILL applied the same regard far liberty and standard* of morality to the domestic Held and to International relations...

...united against her and at the same time against the cause of freedom...

...th* freedom of man was of higher importance tha* th* rights and independence of states...

...He saw, like most English liberals, England's conspicuous iniquities rather than her not often manifest goodness...

...Knowing British-Indian history and living in the period of the great imperial expansion of the United States through Mexican and Indian wars, he never deluded himself into thinking that national independence in itself would lessen injustice or tyranny, or that every acquisition of territory by a free nation would be disastrous for the cause of humanity...

...The prize is too glorious not to be snatched aooner or later by some free country: and the time may not be distant when England, if she docs not take this heroic part because of its heroism, will be compelled to take it from consideration for her own safety...

...Mill strongly protested against the widespread sympathy for the South...

...TilE question of intervention was soon after discussed in England in connection with the American civil war...

...Those most friendly to us think they make a great concession in admitting that the fault may possibly be less with the English people than with the English government and aristocracy...

...A nation adopting this policy is a novelty, so much so that many are unable to believe it when they aee it...

...he never attributed to England * manifest destiny or a world-embracing mission...

...Then she should consider the liberals in all European countries as her natural allies, and regard the war for her national security also aa a war of ideas...

...The southern states, declaring for independence, invoked the right of self-determination so dear to liberals...

...What England really meant, Mill thought, was that she would act only when her national safety was threatened, but instead of invoking the common right of self-defense, English atatesmen phrased their position in such a way as to imply that England would act only for interest and aggrandizement...

...But even without fighting for liberty, England, Mill realized, on account of her freedom, remained a stsnding reproach to despotism everywhere...

...They believe that we have always other objects than those we avow...

...English intei-vention . in the Continental struggles for liberty was widely discussed then...

...Paradoxically, "it is thia nation which find* itself, in th* respect of its foreign policy, held up to obloquy as a type of egoism and selfishness...

...An aTer wsUhful critical sense, common sens* in th* fall meaning of the word, preserved htm from ever expressing hatred or unfair criticism of another nation...

...For that reason she might find herself menaced some day, directly or indirectly, by continental despotism...

...The victory of th* North seemed to him essential for th* cause of individual Inerty...

...If the smaller nationality, supposed to be the mora advanced in improvement, is able to overcome the greater, as the Macedonians, reinforced by the Greeks, did Asia, and the English India, there i* often a gain to civilization.'' But wherever he found human dignity threatened or justice denied, he protested...

...In his article "A Few Word* on Non-Intervention" he found the Britain of his time "desiring no benefit to itself" st th* expense of other European nations...

...He admired France and never claimed intellectual preeminence for England...

...At the same time, his objectivity did not allow him to share "the predisposition of the English public opinion" to be hypercritical of their own government and it* actions...

...Mill answered those liberals who favored dissolution of other people'a empires, that it is wonderful "how easy and liberal, and complying, people can be in other people's concerns...

...he thought it as little justifiable to force ideas upon other people as to compel them to submit in other respects...