Word: mille
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...back to debating John Stuart Mill's essay On Liberty (1859). Not all the participants know it by that name, but Mill's idea of the free and sovereign individual may be, aside from the character of the presidential aspirants, the most compelling issue in this campaign. Every person Mill argued, should be given all possible liberty, provided it does not infringe on the liberty of others. This must be so, said Mill, even if some people insist on using that liberty to hurt or diminish themselves...
...Mill reached his conclusion after pondering "the nature and limits of the power which can be legitimately exercised by society over the individual." Defining the limits has always been at the heart of our political argument, though the debate is often overshadowed by more immediate issues. But because the world is calm and no great national crisis has so far intruded into or focused the campaign, there has been time to grow a bit more philosophical than usual...
...role of Government in the lives of the citizens of this country." Linking auto ignitions to seat belts went too far, Coleman noted, and so may laws requiring motorcycle helmets. After a great public cry, the maddening buzzer system was thrown out, and helmet laws are now being attacked. Mill might have nodded approval. Not Consumer Advocate Ralph Nader, who protested last week that by not making air bags mandatory, the Government was "condemning 10,000 people to death and hundreds of thousands of people to needless injury...
...Government failures, to protect families against mindless, heartless, insensitive bureaucratic intrusions so that people can preserve and nurture traditional American values in this accelerated and crowded society. "If we want less Government," said Carter, "we must have stronger families." The argument is so complex and subtle that even Mill might have been hard put to resolve...
That is John Stuart Mill's classic debate in a nutshell, or rather, a brown...