Like Tocqueville, Mill was also concerned about the tyranny that a majority can form. But unlike the others, his concern was not just limited to the wrong exercise of the power by law makers over minorities but he was also apprehensive about the prevailing social opinion of the majority class over minority. In his view, the second type of tyranny is even more dangerous than first one. This is because exercising of power by majority in society or wrong use of power by them is usually upheld by extreme penalties. On the other hand, social opinions of the majority is considered a little more acceptable in society and it is sometimes considered as freedom of expression but in reality this type of tyranny is much more deep rooted in
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The middle classes were predominant in America and were about to achieve predominance in England. This was problematic because ‘whenever any variety of human nature becomes preponderant in a community, it imposes upon all the rest of society its own type; forcing all, either to submit to or to imitate it’ Hence, it was necessary to have a power to rival that of the middle classes, which would otherwise rule unopposed, causing uniformity and, eventually, stagnation. In relation to the social group that Mill judged best able to oppose the masses, he stated that, ‘there can be no doubt about the elements which must compose it: they are, an agricultural class, a leisured class, and a learned class’. Besides this, Tocqueville failed to specify that the greatest threat to liberty in France came from the government, whereas in America it came from public opinion, is also correct. Tocqueville’s deficiency in this respect contrasts with Mill’s insight that the enlargement of the ‘province of government’ prevailed in the Continental nations, while in England and America restraints on mental freedom proceeded much more from public opinion. Tocqueville was certainly aware that public opinion was the main source of the threat to liberty in America, but he did not use his comparative method of sociological analysis to come to a precise assessment of the roles of both state and public opinion in threatening liberty in America and in
The middle classes were predominant in America and were about to achieve predominance in England. This was problematic because ‘whenever any variety of human nature becomes preponderant in a community, it imposes upon all the rest of society its own type; forcing all, either to submit to or to imitate it’ Hence, it was necessary to have a power to rival that of the middle classes, which would otherwise rule unopposed, causing uniformity and, eventually, stagnation. In relation to the social group that Mill judged best able to oppose the masses, he stated that, ‘there can be no doubt about the elements which must compose it: they are, an agricultural class, a leisured class, and a learned class’. Besides this, Tocqueville failed to specify that the greatest threat to liberty in France came from the government, whereas in America it came from public opinion, is also correct. Tocqueville’s deficiency in this respect contrasts with Mill’s insight that the enlargement of the ‘province of government’ prevailed in the Continental nations, while in England and America restraints on mental freedom proceeded much more from public opinion. Tocqueville was certainly aware that public opinion was the main source of the threat to liberty in America, but he did not use his comparative method of sociological analysis to come to a precise assessment of the roles of both state and public opinion in threatening liberty in America and in