I. INTRODUCTION
In the 1860s, the Civil War divided American society and made slavery and the condition of Blacks in America the order of the day. As expected, these discussions crossed the Atlantic and gave rise to intense debates in England concerning the side of the conflict that deserved support. At first, the majority of the English sympathized with the Confederates—a fact that disgusted John Stuart Mill and led him to dedicate himself ardently to convincing his compatriots that this attitude amounted to supporting slavery. In his Autobiography Mill explains his devoted engagement in this episode by his feeling that this conflict “was destined to be a turning point, for good or evil, of the course of human affairs for an indefinite duration” (Mill [1873] Reference Mill1981, p. 266). As he stated in a letter sent in 1862 to his American correspondent John Lothrop Motley, his feeling was that if the North was victorious, “the whole futurity of mankind will assume a brighter aspect. If not, it will for some time to come be very much darkened” (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 797). There was, thus, a lot at stake.
The result of these efforts was a vast and diversified set of materials—articles, essays, talks, and a massive amount of personal correspondence—in which Mill discussed the causes of the war, slavery, the dynamics of the slave system in the South, and the requirements for obtaining racial equality in America, among other issues. This paper builds on Mill’s public and private war-related materials, and there are some differences between them. He is often more explicit in private letters about his disgust toward conservative journals, liberal politicians who supported the Confederates, and public opinion than in his published writings. However, much of the private material, especially letters to American correspondents, is also performative. He seeks to convince Americans that the English do not uphold slavery despite their sympathies for the Confederates and, later, offers advice on how to eliminate slavery in practice. Despite this, some private letters to close friends, such as John Elliott Cairnes, are more reflective, and they are of special interest because they reveal that the sense of moral responsibility and emotional intensity present in his public writings is not rhetorically staged; it appears with equal (or even greater) force in his private utterances.
This paper aims to situate Mill’s passionate engagement in the debates concerning the American conflict and its aftermath within the context of his broader views on race, his political concerns over the future of democracy, and his opinions about the role played by public opinion.
Given the Civil War’s importance to Mill, surprisingly few works address this theme in his writings. Georgios Varouxakis’s (Reference Varouxakis2013) work is comprehensive and offers a historically contextualized view of Mill’s stance regarding the war, comparing his position with that of important politicians and political economists of the time, and providing a careful analysis of Mill’s views on Reconstruction. However, he does not situate these writings in the context of Mill’s broader views on social philosophy. Robert Nelson (Reference Nelson2009) and John Compton (Reference Compton2013) focus on more specific issues concerning Mill’s stance in relation to the conflict. Nelson (Reference Nelson2009) aims to explain why Mill, despite his wholehearted defense of the Union, advocated neutrality on the part of the English government. Compton (Reference Compton2013) focuses on how Mill viewed the Civil War as an opportunity to “revive” the abstract principles of liberty and equality upon which the American nation was founded but which had degenerated into dogma. Other papers investigate the specific topics in Mill’s social philosophy that are analyzed in this paper: his views on race (Varouxakis Reference Varouxakis1998; Goldberg Reference Goldberg, Schultz and Varouxakis2005; Zlotnick Reference Zlotnick, Colander, Prasch and Sheth2007); his ideas on the role of public opinion (Baum Reference Baum2001); his views on American democracy (Prochaska Reference Prochaska2012); and his stance on England’s moral responsibility and Empire (Pitts Reference Pitts2005; Sullivan Reference Sullivan1983; Tunick Reference Tunick2006). However, it is not their focus to relate these discussions to Mill’s writings on the Civil War and Reconstruction. This paper intends to integrate these two levels and analyze Mill’s writings on the Civil War in the context of his broader social concerns.
The Civil War–related material lacks theoretical depth and has a somewhat fragmentary nature. It was written in the heat of the moment with the explicit aim of influencing the course of events, and analyzing these writings in a wider context sheds light upon it. This approach helps to explain why Mill gave so much importance to the conflict, why he believed it would be a “turning point” for humanity, and why he dedicated so much effort to convincing English public opinion to support the Union—for him, the possibility of eliminating slavery, the future of democracy, and England’s honor were on the line. It can also help to clarify his use of double standards when he advocated freedom and the right to vote for the Black population (and women) in America, on the one hand, while supporting British imperial rule in India, Jamaica, and other colonies, on the other.
In turn, this underexplored material sheds light upon some aspects of Mill’s philosophy. It offers an interesting example of Mill’s methodological approach to concrete economic phenomena—such as slavery—which is treated in its economic dimension but in conjunction with its philosophical, sociological, political, and moral aspects. Furthermore, his proposals concerning how to proceed after the war to ensure the effective emancipation of the Black population illustrate his pragmatic and context-dependent approach to policy.
The paper is structured as follows: Section II discusses the broader theoretical context in which Mill’s stand concerning the Civil War is located. Section III analyzes Mill’s efforts during the war to convince his compatriots to change their attitude and support the Union. Section IV deals with Mill’s thoughts and proposals regarding the integration of Black people into American society after the end of the war. Section V presents some final remarks.
II. BACKGROUND FOR MILL’S ANALYSIS OF THE CIVIL WAR
The prospect of civil war in America was seen as worrisome by most people, but that was not Mill’s stand. On the contrary, in a letter written to an unidentified correspondent at the dawn of the Civil War, he states: “[M]y hopes for the future welfare and greatness of the American Republic were never so high as in this, to superficial appearance, the darkest hour in its history” (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 842).
To understand Mill’s optimism in the face of a potentially violent, prolonged, and fratricidal conflict, it is important to acknowledge that he saw this war as a great opportunity to eliminate one of the most flagrant contradictions of the American democracy—the existence of slavery—and to strengthen democracy not only in the United States but also in England and Europe at large. To understand better what, for Mill, was at stake in this crucial episode of American history, it is worthwhile to briefly examine the philosophical, moral, and political background that informed Mill’s war-related writings.
Mill, Race, and His Moral Objection to Slavery
The American Civil War was not the first occasion in which Mill discussed questions related to the Black population. Approximately one decade before its outbreak, he debated with Thomas Carlyle—one of the most prestigious British thinkers of the time —over what became known as the “Negro Question.”
In 1849, Carlyle wrote the polemical essay “Occasional Discourse on the Negro Question.” This essay dealt with the current condition of the West Indies and attributed the alleged chaos that prevailed on the islands to the abolition of slavery. Carlyle—with a pronounced racist position—openly criticized the abolitionists and political economists, praised the Anglo-Saxons, and upheld a hierarchic view concerning race, the Black race being inferior to the White. Additionally, he argued that Blacks needed to be guided—if necessary with a “beneficial whip”—by their White superiors (Carlyle Reference Carlyle1849, pp. 535–536).
As a scientist, Mill believed that characterizing the existing differences between the races (or the sexes) as natural/biological (and, thus, immutable) was philosophically wrong (Mill [1843] Reference Mill1974, pp. 859, 873; [1871] Reference Mill1965, p. 319). Besides, as a social reformer, he was concerned with its harmful practical implications, as he regarded these views as great obstacles to social progress (Mill [1873] Reference Mill1981, p. 270). Among other things, those racial conceptions legitimized institutions such as slavery. Indeed, it was Mill’s fear of the perverse use that American enslavers could make of Carlyle’s views that led him to promptly respond to these ideas (Mill [1850] Reference Mill1984, p. 95)—and it turned out that Mill had reasons to worry. Carlyle’s essay was, in fact, reprinted and widely disseminated by the Southern press, which praised the British thinker for his anti-abolitionist stand (Park Reference Park1991, p. 96).Footnote 1
At the beginning of 1850, Mill published his response in the essay “The Negro Question,” in which he totally opposed the idea of a natural hierarchy of races. Mill firmly rejected the conceptions, predominant at the time, that committed the “vulgar error” of explaining human differences in terms of natural predispositions instead of relating them to existing external circumstances and social institutions (Mill [1850] Reference Mill1984, p. 93).Footnote 2 Thus, contrary to Carlyle, Mill embraced a view that presupposed the existence of a fundamental equality between human beings and gave primacy to social factors in determining their existing differences.
Despite discarding the idea of a hierarchy of races, Mill did work with a notion of a “scale of civilization” that ranged from savages and barbarians to civilized (Mill [1836b] Reference Mill1977). For him, some groups (and nations) were intellectually, socially, and morally less advanced than others. Because Mill mostly identified the “civilized” with English or European (White) societies, and upheld British colonial rule as a means to “civilize” allegedly less developed people, he has been characterized as embracing a racist stance (Pitts Reference Pitts2005, ch. 5; Goldberg Reference Goldberg, Schultz and Varouxakis2005; Zlotnik Reference Zlotnick, Colander, Prasch and Sheth2007). It is important to stress, however, that their alleged backwardness had little to do with biological or innate features (Robson Reference Robson and Skorupsky1998, p. 358; Varouxakis Reference Varouxakis1998, p. 22; Varouxakis Reference Varouxakis, Schultz and Varouxakis2005). Although his metric of civilization is obviously problematic and prejudiced, his “denaturalized’ understanding of differences in character created space for overcoming the”low levels of development" that Mill attributed to some groups (such as Black people, the Irish, and women) by altering prevailing institutions and social relations (Mattos Reference Mattos2020, pp. 47–50; Reference Mattos2022, pp. 33–44). Their traits were the results of history and could be remedied by history (Sullivan Reference Sullivan1983, p. 610). All human beings, regardless of race or sex, had similar potential for progress (Hall Reference Hall1989, p. 181).
Nevertheless, his lifelong support for the British Empire—which subjugated and ruled supposedly “backward” populations by force—seems at odds with his indignation toward slavery and the subjection of the Black race. From Mill’s perspective, however, the two situations were entirely different. He defended the British Empire only insofar as its rule led to the improvement of the subjected population and prepared them for self-government (Mill [1859] Reference Mill1977, p. 224; Harris [1964] Reference Harris and Wood1991, p. 212; Sullivan Reference Sullivan1983).Footnote 3 He (naively) believed it to be England’s moral duty to implement a “benevolent” (and temporary) despotism, exerted in the interest of the subjected population—and considered it “a dereliction of the highest moral trust which can devolve upon a nation” (Mill [1861] Reference Mill1977, p. 568) when that did not happen. The enslavement of the Black population in America and elsewhere had a very different nature and led to opposite results. It was founded on biological features, was intended solely to serve the interests of the slaveholders, deteriorated the intellectual and moral condition of the enslaved (Mill [1862b] Reference Mill1984; [1871] Reference Mill1965, p. 247), and certainly was not for the benefit of the subjected population. Besides depriving Blacks of their liberty, it also deprived them of the possibility of realizing their full potential as human beings. In this sense, it seemed to Mill unjust, wrong, illegitimate, and utterly unacceptable.
Thus, Mill’s scientific view of human nature and his philosophical conceptions of what individual and social betterment consisted of grounded his profound moral objection to slavery in America—so intense that he recurrently represented the fight against this institution as a battle of “good against evil.”Footnote 4
Mill’s Political Concerns with Democracy
Mill had good knowledge about what happened in the United States. He subscribed to several American newspapers and magazines, received from his friends an enormous amount of books, pamphlets, and essays, and corresponded with several Americans (Varouxakis Reference Varouxakis2013, p. 739).Footnote 5 This attention to what occurred across the Atlantic was greatly justified by the fact that this nation was, at the time, the greatest ongoing experiment of democracy in the world. Given that Mill was a supporter of the “democratic cause” in England and advocated the expansion of suffrage as to include groups at the time excluded, this experiment was very meaningful for him.Footnote 6 Since the mid-1830s, Mill had scrutinized the United States’s democracy to identify its virtues and shortcomings, in order to keep its benefits while avoiding the main risks that the American system posed to human and social progress (Mill [1835] Reference Mill1977; [1840] Reference Mill1977).Footnote 7 There was, in his view, a crucial flaw in their system, which brought discredit to America, to the nation’s democracy, and, in this measure, to the democratic cause at large: the existence of slavery in American soil (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 842).
Mill regarded the United States as the only nation founded upon the “abstract principles” of liberty, political equality, and equality before the law (Compton Reference Compton2013, p. 228)—principles that he admired. However, despite the Americans’ praise of these values, the existence of slavery, the fact that Blacks and their descendants did not have political rights and suffered discrimination even in the Free States, and the fact that women (of any race) were excluded from the right to vote seemed to Mill wholly incompatible with the democratic ideals that the country professed. These had ceased to be “living principles” and degenerated into dogma, since they did not inform political action (Compton Reference Compton2013, p. 228). The contradictory nature of American democracy is pointed out in a letter to John Jay written in 1848, where he refers to the United States as “a country where institutions profess to be founded on equality, and which yet maintains the slavery of black men and of all women” (Mill [1812–1848] Reference Mill1963, p. 741). Given this situation, Mill states: “In the American democracy, the aristocracy of skin, and the aristocracy of sex, retain their privileges” (Mill [1835] Reference Mill1977, p. 55).
This was a great problem, since, for Mill, the right to vote was “the line of separation between those who can protect themselves and those who are at the mercy of others” (Mill [1869] Reference Mill1988, p. 379). Only political representation could guarantee that interests of different groups would be adequately taken into account, and the lack of this representation tainted, in his view, American democracy.Footnote 8 Therefore, he was anxious to see all discriminations based on color or sex removed, and stayed well informed about the changes that were taking place in the different American states in the direction of eliminating these “anomalies.”Footnote 9
From the very start of the Civil War, Mill identified slavery as the central point of the conflict and the main cause of the Confederacy’s claim to separation. As Mill recollected in his Autobiography: “I knew that it was in all its stages an aggressive enterprise of the slave owners to extend the territory of slavery; under the combined influences of pecuniary interest, domineering temper, and the fanaticism of a class for its class privileges” (Mill [1873] Reference Mill1981, p. 266).
He believed that a triumph on the part of the Union, if complete, would eliminate this infamous institution from the whole country, and perceived the conflict as a great chance for “the removal not only of a stain but of a moral incubus” (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 993) from American democracy. He believed that the American mind would be emancipated as it would cease to be “corrupted by the supposed necessity of apologising to foreigners for the most flagrant of all possible violations of the free principles of their Constitution” (Mill [1873] Reference Mill1981, p. 267).Footnote 10 Mill also hoped that the “awakening” of the nation would lead to the elimination of the discrimination practiced against women (Compton Reference Compton2013, p. 242)—whose treatment, as seen, was considered also at odds with the principles of democracy.Footnote 11
His utter moral objection to slavery and his deep concern with American democracy, thus, merged in the episode of the Civil War (Varouxakis Reference Varouxakis2013, p. 730; Park Reference Park1991, p. 105). The outcome of the war would determine not only the future of slavery in the world—a result of the highest importance—but also the future of democracy (Mill [1873] Reference Mill1981, p. 266; Collini Reference Collini1984, p. xxii).Footnote 12
In this way, the conflict “touched several nerves in Mill’s moral physiology” (Collini Reference Collini1984, p. xxii). The possibility of simultaneously ending slavery and improving American democracy was, for Mill, well worth the sacrifices incurred in a war.
III. J. S. MILL AND ENGLISH PUBLIC OPINION: RESCUING ENGLAND’S HONOR
Mill never advocated the entry of England into the American Civil War on the side of the Union. His conviction was that England should remain neutral, as, in fact, it did (Nelson Reference Nelson2009; Varouxakis Reference Varouxakis2013).Footnote 13 However, he was very concerned with the reaction of his compatriots to the conflict.
Besides being a renowned political economist, Mill was a public moralist who frequently demanded from his contemporaries that they live up to their moral ideas, and used his reputation to advance the causes that he considered important to the progress of humankind (Collini Reference Collini1984, Reference Collini1991)—and few causes seemed to him more relevant than the extinction of slavery (Mill [1868] Reference Mill1991, p. 191). Given that Mill associated, from its very beginning, the Civil War with the issue of slavery, he considered the position adopted regarding the conflict as an essential criterion of moral rectitude (or lack thereof). In a letter to William Whewell, he states: “No question of our time has been such a touchstone of men & has so tested their sterling qualities of mind & heart—as this one” (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 1056).
Thus, the position of English public opinion in relation to the conflict was regarded as a good thermometer of the moral temperature of his fellow citizens (Collini Reference Collini1984, p. xxii). Hence, it is easy to understand his disillusionment in the first years of the war when the great majority of the English population sympathized with the Confederates (Lorimer Reference Lorimer1976; Collini Reference Collini1984; Nie Reference Nie, Wiener and Hampton2007), especially because this group included not only conservatives but also influential liberal politicians (such as William Gladstone), radicals, and even abolitionists (Hernon Jr. Reference Hernon and Joseph1967, p. 359).Footnote 14
He considered that this alignment with the Confederates dishonored the name of England, and was unworthy of a country that, a generation before, had led the fight for the abolition of slavery within its own territories (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, pp. 128–129). Although he knew it was an error to interpret this attitude as a sign of the approval of slavery, this did not prevent him from feeling profound frustration with the support of the English population (especially of liberals and radicals) for the side of the conflict that not only adopted slavery but also was proud of the institution (Mill [1873] Reference Mill1981, p. 267).Footnote 15 Therefore, it is not surprising that he passionately engaged in the current debates, and used his pen and his voice to influence English public opinion and to bring it to support the morally “correct” side of the conflict.Footnote 16
Indeed, Mill gave a lot of importance to the condition of public opinion, for he believed that political power related not to passive but to active social power, thus the importance he gave to “will” (Baum Reference Baum2001, pp. 505, 511). In this respect, he affirms that “opinion is itself one of the greatest active social forces. One person with a belief, is a social power equal to ninety nine who have only interests” (Mill [1861] Reference Mill1977, p. 381). Thus, Mill considered that the opinions of the average Englishman had significant social consequences. According to him, it was the (active) moral convictions of the English that determined the abolition of slavery in the British Empire in the 1830s—implemented at the expense of their economic interest (Mill [1861] Reference Mill1977, p. 382). As he was aware of the Cabinet’s sympathy with the South, he might have feared that the active support of public opinion for the Southerners could eventually strengthen those in the government who believed England should recognize the Confederacy.
Additionally, he believed it was the duty of better-informed people to influence and mold general opinion (Mill [1861] Reference Mill1977, p. 382), and thought that the newspapers were effective means of doing this (Baum Reference Baum2001, pp. 511, 515). Moreover, as he deemed his knowledge of the United States solid, he took on the responsibility of “educating” his compatriots about the causes and possible consequences of the Civil War in the English press. Mill was especially concerned in opposing the influence exerted by pro-Southern views of the Saturday Review and The Times that, in his view, tended to distort information and to misguide their readers.Footnote 17 Thus, he dedicated himself to disputing the various reasons used by the supporters of the South to justify their stand and to show that to be in favor of the Confederates meant, intentionally or not, to back slavery and its extension.Footnote 18
Mill’s Analysis Concerning the Reasons Used by the English to Back the Confederates
Mill identified in his public writings and private correspondence several causes for the rapid and significant support given by different portions of the English public to the South. However, he did not go through the trouble of repudiating some of them. For instance, he did not respond to intellectuals like Thomas Carlyle, John Ruskin, and Charles Kingsley, who believed in a hierarchy of races and embraced the idea that Blacks needed guidance from the “superior” White race (Zlotnick Reference Zlotnick, Colander, Prasch and Sheth2007, pp. 89–92). Although these authors did not think slavery was an ideal condition, they did argue that the condition of enslaved Blacks was better than that of freed Blacks (Bellows Reference Bellows1985, pp. 520–522). Mill also did not respond to some English conservative newspapers that, using similar arguments, advocated perpetual serfdom as more suitable to the capacities of Blacks and to the climate of the southern United States than liberty (Lorimer Reference Lorimer1976, p. 411), or went to the point of explicitly defending slavery (Bellows Reference Bellows1985, p. 506; Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 828).
Mill’s attitude might be explained by his conviction that, despite not showing the same level of zeal in combating slavery as the early generation displayed, the majority of the English population remained in the abolitionist field.Footnote 19 As he did not attribute the hasty enthusiasm of the upper and middle classes for the Confederate cause to anti-abolitionist feelings, he did not feel compelled to disqualify arguments in favor of slavery.Footnote 20
Another group that sided with the Confederates was the Tories. The hate and fear of democracy on the part of the upper and middle classes had a significant weight in determining the side of the American conflict they supported (Hernon Jr. Reference Hernon and Joseph1967, p. 359; Bellows Reference Bellows1985, pp. 506–507).Footnote 21 The Tories execrated democracy—especially after the expansion of suffrage occasioned by the 1832 Reform Bill—and feared this form of government would lead to all sorts of social disorders. Many even interpreted the American Civil War as a direct consequence of the fragmentation occasioned by this political regime (Bellows Reference Bellows1985, pp. 506, 526).
Mill was well aware of this political component in the public’s reaction to the conflict (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 801). Maybe thinking he would not succeed in converting them, Mill did not publicly respond to their arguments. He was more concerned with responding to the arguments that led radicals, liberal politicians, and the part of public opinion that was against slavery and did not identify with Tory conservatism to sympathize with the “wrong” side of the dispute.
Some circumstantial facts also explained part of this support. For instance, at the end of 1861, an incident provoked a zenith of anti-American feeling, which already explained part of the initial sympathy the English felt for those who wanted to separate from that country. A Union warship intercepted the English vessel Trent and arrested two Confederate diplomats traveling to Europe on it. This episode precipitated a political crisis that almost led to a war between England and the Union and that increased the antipathy towards the North (Nie Reference Nie, Wiener and Hampton2007, p. 131; Campbell Reference Campbell2003, ch. 2).Footnote 22
Despite taking sides with England on the episode, Mill was very relieved that war was avoided. He writes: “The world has been saved from this calamity and England from this disgrace” (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, p. 128). He believed that if his country had entered a war with the Union, the Confederates would defeat them, and the world would only remember that “at the moment of conflict between the good and the evil spirit … England stepped in, and … made Satan victorious” (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, p. 128). Once the incident was in the past, Mill insisted that his fellow citizens rethink their stand concerning the Civil War and favor the Union (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, pp. 129–130).
Another element that, in Mill’s understanding, led his compatriots to support the Confederates was the widespread impression that the Union was not able to win the war or to reconstitute itself as a nation even in the eventual case of a victory (Nie Reference Nie, Wiener and Hampton2007, p. 131; Bellows Reference Bellows1985, p. 512). Since the outcome would be unfavorable either way, many argued that accepting secession was a way to avoid unnecessary bloodshed. Mill believed this misconceived perception had driven many Liberals to defend this outcome (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, p. 138). However, he thought successive victories by the North would naturally alter the stand of these “sincere enemies of slavery,” who would start to support the side that was more compatible with their principles (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, pp. 797, 801).
Though these circumstances had some weight, Mill believed that misunderstandings about the Civil War’s roots and nature explained most of the favorable feelings towards the South. There was specifically one interpretation that Mill considered erroneous but very influential, one that represented the inhabitants of the South as a people fighting for liberty and who had the right to separate from the Union (Collini Reference Collini1984, pp. xxii–xxiii; Hernon Jr. Reference Hernon and Joseph1967, p. 364; Bellows Reference Bellows1985, pp. 517–518). This argument favoring the”sacred right to resurrection" found fertile soil in England and explained a great deal of the adherence of public opinion and of many liberal and radical politicians to the Confederate cause. William Gladstone, for instance, embraced this idea and, because of this, supported the South in the first years of the war (Hernon Jr. Reference Hernon and Joseph1967, p. 364);Footnote 23 this was also the case with Lord John Russell (at the time Foreign Secretary) (Collini Reference Collini1984, p. xxiii; Mill [1862b] Reference Mill1984, p. 159).
Perhaps perceiving the great weight of this argument among those politicians who usually were his allies, Mill dedicated his best effort to attacking this idea. In his very influential essay “Contest in America” ([1862a] Reference Mill1984),Footnote 24 he asked (provocatively) if those who at the time defended so ardently this “sacred right” of the Confederates to insurrection would also be willing to apply the same principle to the Irish and the Indians —who lived under England’s rule. Additionally, he brought slavery to the center of the discussion and questioned if, in evaluating the “will” of the people of the South to become independent, the opinion of enslaved persons—who had nothing to gain with secession—had been taken into account (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, p. 138). Inverting the Confederate rhetoric, Mill argued that the right to insurrection did not apply to the Southern states since their fight was not for their own liberty but for the power to oppress others (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, p. 137).
Different groups, thus, presented different reasons to justify their support for the South; however, almost all had in common a view that the Civil War had nothing to do with slavery and that the Union’s fight was only against secession (Lorimer Reference Lorimer1976, p. 406; Hernon Jr. Reference Hernon and Joseph1967, p. 361; Bellows Reference Bellows1985, p. 523).
The English were familiar with the prejudices existing in the North of the United States and had genuine doubts about the abolitionist intentions of the Union (Lorimer Reference Lorimer1976, p. 406; Hernon Jr. Reference Hernon and Joseph1967, p. 359). In their understanding, the Northern states rejected slavery not in principle but because they were not interested in using this kind of labor (Bellows Reference Bellows1985, p. 524), as it was not suitable for the economic activities they pursued. Some people even upheld that secession would be the fastest road to the abolition of slavery since, once separated from the Union, the new nation would be more susceptible to foreign pressure, including from England (Hernon Jr. Reference Hernon and Joseph1967, p. 360; Bellows Reference Bellows1985, p. 522).
Given this general skepticism, Mill used his prestige as a political economist and public man to clarify and educate the public about the roots of the conflict. His chief strategy was to convince the English that the cause of the war was indeed slavery and that a victory by the North would most probably lead to the extinction of this institution on American soil. By placing the fate of slavery at the center of the discussion, he intended to revive and mobilize the abolitionist feelings that he believed were still strong in his country (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 750) and alter the stand of public opinion concerning the conflict.
Slavery as the Leading Cause of the War of Secession—The Economic Dynamics of the Slave System
In Mill’s view, the main reason for the “inappropriate sympathies” of the English towards the Civil War was not the “bad nature” of his compatriots but their (profound) ignorance about what happened outside their own country (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, pp. 738, 828, 1051)—they genuinely believed that the war had nothing to do with slavery.Footnote 25 Furthermore, this ignorance was far-reaching and included ordinary citizens and high-level government representatives (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 885). Mill believed that this ignorance enhanced the influence of conservative newspapers like The Times and Saturday Review, which, in his view, misrepresented the facts, omitted events favorable to the Union, or blatantly lied about the war (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 893).Footnote 26
In light of this, he considered it urgent to undo this general impression. Already at the beginning of 1862, in his essay “Contest in America,” he states:
They [the Confederates] tell the world, and they told their own citizens when they wanted their votes, that the object of the fight was slavery.… The world knows what the question between the North and South has been for many years, and still is. Slavery alone was thought of, alone talked of. Slavery was battled for and against, on the floor of Congress and in the plains of Kansas: on the Slavery question exclusively was the party constituted which now rules the United States: on slavery Fremont was rejected, on slavery Lincoln was elected; the South separated on slavery, and proclaimed slavery as the one cause of separation. (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, pp. 131–132)
As part of this strategy, he published in the same year a review of the book The Slave Power, Its Character. Career, and Probable Design, Being an Attempt to Explain the Real Issues involved in the American Contest, written by his friend John E. Cairnes. This review, entitled “The Slave Power,” intended not only to give publicity to the book but, above all, to lend his prestige and authority to the ideas it contained in order to place slavery at the center of the debate about the war. Mill used this review to argue that, in the context of America, the survival of slavery depended upon its expansion beyond the frontiers of the slave states.
Underlying this dynamic was the low productivity of slave labor—a fact he had already explored in his Principles (Mill [1871] Reference Mill1965, p. 247).Footnote 27 Slave labor was characterized by being obtained by force, by being unskilled, and by lacking versatility (Mill [1862b] Reference Mill1984, p. 147)—and this made it suitable only for a very limited number of activities. Because it was obtained against the slave’s will, it had to be executed in a relatively small space—as was the case of the cultivation of cotton, tobacco, rice, and sugar—to reduce the costs of supervision. The low qualification prevented the use of more productive and sophisticated techniques, and because of their lack of versatility, enslaved persons learned to cultivate only one product—which made it unfeasible to use the rotation of cultures. This led to the soil’s rapid exhaustion and a constant need to expand to new lands (Mill [1862b] Reference Mill1984, pp. 147–149). Thus there would be an “unceasing struggle for the opening of fresh regions to slave-owners and their human property” (Mill [1862b] Reference Mill1984, p. 149) and a tendency to an incessant expansion of this institution toward the West (Mill [1862b] Reference Mill1984, p. 149).
Mill alerted those sympathetic to the South that the Confederates did not desire only their independence—they also wanted to annex at least half of the Territories so that they could expand their “peculiar institution” in the direction of Mexico and afterward to other countries (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, p. 139). He also argued that if the North accepted their conditions and recognized the rebellious states as a new nation, this would create a great problem for England, which in the future would have to choose between letting slavery expand to Mexico, Central America, Cuba, Haiti, and Puerto Rico and declaring war against these intentions (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, p. 140).
In Mill’s understanding, these were the dynamics at the root of the Civil War. The slave states wanted to expand their system into the Free Territories, and the North resisted this. In a letter to Cairnes in August 1861, he expressed both his views about the war and his indignation over the widespread belief among the English that the North should leave the South alone. He affirms:
[S]lavery will not let freedom alone. … American slavery depends upon a perpetual extension of its field; it must go on barbarizing the world more and more, and the Southern states will never consent to a peace without half the unoccupied country, and the power which it would give of unlimited conquest towards the south. Instead of calling on the North to subscribe to this, it would be a case for a crusade of all civilized humanity to prevent it. (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 738)
Mill had to face, however, the problematic fact that President Lincoln himself did not initially portray the war as a battle for the abolition of slavery in the slave states but as a fight for maintaining the Union—a fact that seemed to confirm the current English view on the issue. The strategy adopted by Mill was to admit that the intention of the Union in the war was not to eliminate slavery where it already existed. However, he tried to convince his compatriots that this was due not to Lincoln’s personal convictions but to the fact that the American Constitution, which allowed slavery in the slave states, prevented this course of action. Furthermore, he argued that the Republican Party (with which Lincoln was affiliated) was created to prevent this “peculiar institution” from advancing over Free Territories (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, p. 132). Mill summed things up when he affirmed: “though they are not an Abolitionist party, they are a Free-soil party” (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, p. 132). Additionally, he argued that the success in preventing the expansion of slavery would strike a blow that eventually would be fatal to this institution. Given its economic dynamics, “the day when slavery can no longer expand itself, is the day of its doom” (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, p. 134).
In this manner, even not being the declared aim of the North, this policy would eventually eliminate slavery. According to Mill, this fact had been clearly perceived by the South—so much so that the moment Lincoln was elected, the slave states decided to form an independent Confederacy, “professing as its fundamental principle not merely the perpetuation, but the indefinite extension of slavery” (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, p. 135).
Another factor that explained the North’s reluctance to declare itself openly against slavery was Lincoln’s fear that the Union could lose the support of the border slave states, which remained under the Union’s flag but would hardly accept a war that aimed at putting an end to slavery (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, p. 134).
Mill was not naive and had serious doubts if the Union would treat the extinction of slavery as a non-negotiable prerequisite for reunification if victory were obtained rapidly. Notwithstanding, given that the positions tended naturally to radicalize along the conflicts, he believed that if the war lasted long enough, it “would become distinctly an anti-slavery one” (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, p. 135).Footnote 28 Thus, his greatest fear was that the war would end before this moment arrived. He believed there were some things—such as the end of slavery—that were more important than peace, and because of this, he states: “Heaven forbid that the war should cease sooner” (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, p. 135). For him: “War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things, the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks nothing worth a war, is worse” (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, p. 141). The war did not end rapidly, and Mill’s assessment revealed itself to be correct. In time, the emancipation of enslaved persons became an explicit aim of the Union.
Gradually, English opinion concerning the conflict started to change. In a letter to John Lothrop Motley in January 1863, Mill already revealed some optimism concerning his fellow citizens who began to shift positions, given the higher probability of a military victory by the Union and an increased perception that the abolition of slavery would result from this outcome (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 828).
However, this change did not happen at once. Nine months later, Mill complained again about the attitude of his compatriots. He affirmed in this respect: “The general direction of the sympathies of nearly all classes here except the working, & the better part of the literary class, is disgraceful enough to this country” (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 885).Footnote 29 The secondary literature suggests that Mill might have been overly optimistic when he made an exception for the working class (Hernon Jr. Reference Hernon and Joseph1967, p. 362; Lorimer Reference Lorimer1976, p. 405; Campbell Reference Campbell2003, pp. 5, 225).Footnote 30 The fact is that, eventually, public opinion converged to the main point defended by Mill, i.e., that the right side of the conflict was the Union and that the fate of slavery was at stake. In July 1864, Mill wrote that “the sympathies of nearly all in Europe whose approbation is worth having, are resuming their natural course, and the cause of the North will soon have no enemies, on this side of the Atlantic, but those who prefer any tyranny, however odious, to a triumph of popular government” (Mill [1864] Reference Mill1986, pp. 1204–1205).
It is hard to measure Mill’s influence in changing the opinion of his compatriots. However, given the weight of his reputation at the time, it probably was significant. Additionally, Varouxakis (Reference Varouxakis2013) pointed out that his intense correspondence with the Americans was crucial in convincing them that not everyone in England supported the Confederates. Another consequence of his tireless militancy in favor of the Union was that his reputation, which was already significant on the other side of the Atlantic, increased even more—Mill won not only the respect but also the “ear” of America (Varouxakis Reference Varouxakis2013, p. 750).
Thus, after considering that England was safe from the dishonor of going down in history as sympathetic to enslavers, Mill’s concerns changed. His attention turned to the discussion of how the process of reunification of the country should be conducted, specifically, to the conditions that should be met so that the Black population would be effectively integrated into American society after the victory of the Union, which, at the time, seemed almost inevitable. His main considerations at this point related to the terms by which to reintegrate the rebellious states. His proposals aimed to eliminate slavery not only in the “letter of the law” but, in fact, guaranteeing the effective emancipation of the Black population.
IV. MILL’S PROPOSAL FOR THE RECONSTRUCTION OF AMERICA AFTER THE CIVIL WAR Footnote 31
With the war approaching its end, Mill started to fear that the Union would be too indulgent with the rebellious states and that reintegration would be done at the cost of the interests of Blacks (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 1118).Footnote 32 This fear appears clearly in a letter to his American correspondent Park Godwin, in which he states: “Every one is vaguely inculcating gentleness, and only gentleness.… I have always been afraid of one thing only, that you would be too gentle” (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 1052). He believed, however, that it would be viable to reintegrate these states without harming the interests of the Black population, provided the Union adopted a series of measures before accepting the insurgent states back. The moment these states decided to break with the Union, they lost all rights they had before the conflict. In this context, the Union could, and should, impose the conditions for their return to ensure that slavery would no longer taint American democracy (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 1100).
Mill judged it crucial to amend the federal Constitution to prohibit any form of slavery on national soil (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 974), and was very optimistic about the possibility of forming a majority to vote for this alteration. However, for him, it was not enough to prohibit by law the existence of slavery. Additional changes should be made to prevent slavery from returning in a disguised way (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 1052).
If normality was restored under strong state legislatures dominated by the Southern oligarchy, Mill feared it would implement laws that would leave Blacks with little control over their lives, actions, honor, and property (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, pp. 1098–1099)—remaining “in a state of dependence … approaching to slavery” ([1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 1066). Hence, he considered it necessary to break once and for all the power structure of the Southern oligarchy, even if this required—although he did not believe it did—the confiscation of their lands (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 1066).Footnote 33 Despite advocating in his Principles for full compensation for former slave owners upon the abolition of slavery—as England did in its colonies in 1833 (Mill [1871] Reference Mill1965, p. 233)—Mill upheld nothing of the sort in the case of the enslavers of the rebel states.Footnote 34 He probably believed that such payment was unwarranted since the South had declared war on the Union, and he certainly did not wish to sustain their power by compensating them for the loss of their “property.”
He believed that for the White population of the South, “the maintenance of slavery has become a matter of social pride and political ambition as much as pecuniary interest” (Mill [1862b] Reference Mill1984, p. 154). They loudly promoted it “as a moral, civilizing, and every way wholesome institution … as an ordinance of God, and a sacred deposit providentially entrusted to the keeping of the Southern Americans for preservation and extension” (Mill [1862b] Reference Mill1984, p. 154).Footnote 35 Furthermore, this mentality was so ingrained in the class of the enslavers that it would take time for it to change. Mill believed that the present generation, “like dethroned despots, will be always hankering after their lost power” (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 1066).Footnote 36
To break the power of the former enslavers, Mill proposed that incentives be given to the Northerners to migrate to the South by offering them land. As mentioned earlier, he knew this population was not free of prejudice. Still, his evaluation was that their feelings towards Blacks had changed for the better, mainly because of the courage with which they fought in the war.Footnote 37 He believed the war not only destroyed slavery but also eliminated the “antipathy and contempt of the white American towards the negroes” (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 910). Besides, this population did not share the values of the slaveholding aristocracy (or so he believed), and their migration to the South would introduce a different mentality to these states.
Mill was also in favor of providing land to the formerly enslaved to make them independent.Footnote 38 He reacted enthusiastically to the idea of a Homestead Law that allowed the formerly enslaved to occupy and cultivate the land (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 1165). His enthusiasm for this idea is not surprising. In several passages of the Principles, Mill emphasized the positive impact that peasant property had on the motivation to work and on the autonomy, the organization, the economic efficiency, and the reproductive responsibility of peasants (Mill [1871] Reference Mill1965, pp. 296–297, 327, 768).Footnote 39 Thus, the “educational” impacts of this institution could help to correct some of the most deleterious effects of slavery on the character of the Black population. However, he believed that providing land to the formerly enslaved was not enough; giving them political rights would also be essential.
In his Considerations on Representative Government ([1861] 1977), Mill argued that it would be wrong to give the right to vote to people who did not know how to read, write, and count, and advocated that “universal teaching must precede universal enfranchisement” (Mill [1861] Reference Mill1977, p. 470). However, he adopted a different stand when he discussed the situation of the Black population (especially the formerly enslaved) in America. Since teaching a slave to read or write was subject to severe punishment, very few Blacks acquired these abilities (Mill [1862b] Reference Mill1984, p. 153). In this context, he believed that requiring a minimum amount of literacy would exclude almost the whole Black population from suffrage, especially those from the South. Given the importance he attributed to the effective emancipation of this group, he advocated waiving this requirement to qualify to vote. He clearly revealed his priorities on this issue when he stated that “the securing of equal political rights to the negro is paramount to all other considerations respecting the suffrage” (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 1106).
This illustrates Mill’s “method of politics,” which consisted in upholding an “ideal” while “practicing the art of the possible” (Kinzer Reference Kinzer1997, p. 245). In this, as in other concrete situations, Mill sought to advance the ends he deemed important in the most effective way, given the social, political, economic, and moral circumstances (and constraints) at hand. Even though he firmly believed in the importance of education to suffrage (the “ideal”), in the concrete circumstances of the South, this requirement would perpetuate the subjection of Blacks, so he was willing to forgo this proviso to promote their emancipation.Footnote 40 Furthermore, as he did not believe this alternative would be politically viable, he accepted the literacy requirement to qualify to vote, as long as the same criteria were applied to the White population—most of which could not read, write, and count either (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, pp. 1100–1101, 1118).Footnote 41 However, as Varouxakis (Reference Varouxakis2013, p. 746) affirms, Mill refused qualifications to vote that involved property.
With the Morant Bay rebellion in October of 1865 (and the bloodshed that followed under Governor Eyre’s authority) in mind, Mill used the Jamaican example to illustrate what happened when the former enslavers retained political power after abolition. In a letter to Rowland G. Hazard of November 1865, he affirms: “What has just taken place in Jamaica might be used as a very strong argument against leaving the freedmen to be legislated for by their former masters. The legislation appears to have been just such as might have been expected, and the consequence is what we see” (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 1117).
What excluded most Blacks from political participation in Jamaica was not race (or illiteracy) but the requirement of property (Patterson Smith Reference Patterson Smith1994, p. 134). Regardless of the cause, the power remained with the former enslavers, and, as a consequence, Blacks could not attain equality with Whites.Footnote 42 This episode reinforced, according to Mill, the necessity of granting political equality—understood in a broad sense—to Blacks in America (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, pp. 1117–1118). It is noteworthy, however, that despite referring to Jamaica to defend the enfranchisement of Blacks in the United States, he believed the solution to the colony’s problem was not the increase of Black enfranchisement but rather an increase of England’s power in order to implement the “necessary reforms” (Pitts Reference Pitts2005, p. 157; Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 1117).
In the specific case of America, Mill feared that abolition would become only nominal if the whole administration of justice remained untouched (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 1098).Footnote 43 In his view, liberty would exist only when the judicial system was such that Blacks received equitable treatment. This would require a situation in which “Negroes can serve on juries, and, through the electoral suffrage, have an equal voice in choosing or controlling the judges, or those who appoint them” (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 1118).
Mill believed that, together, this set of measures—the migration of Northerners to the South, the concession of political rights to Blacks, and the distribution of land in order to give them independence—would alter the balance of power in Southern society, turning the old oligarchy into a minority among the voters (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, pp. 1100, 1052). He also thought it was necessary to modify the government’s formula for determining representation in Congress. In its current form, the slave states had a numerical advantage, given that, although enslaved persons did not vote, they still contributed to determine how many representatives these states were given (Mill [1862a] Reference Mill1984, p. 140).
However, he argued that these changes in the Southern states had to occur before their readmission to the Union. Otherwise, the Southern oligarchy would have the power to amend the federal Constitution to benefit their ends (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, pp. 1099–1101, 1165). Only by doing this “the cause of freedom is safe & the opening words of the Declaration of Independence will cease to be a reproach to the nation founded by its authors” (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 1052).
Although Mill was well aware of the risks that still existed and of the long road that lay ahead for America, he expressed immense satisfaction with the abolition of slavery in the country, an institution that he believed to be “the greatest and most corrupting of all social iniquities—which, more than all other causes together, lowered the tone of the national and especially the political mind of the United States” (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 1056). If the Americans were successful in this process, equality and liberty would cease to be mere words in the Constitution, and abolition would rescue not only enslaved persons but also American democracy itself—and this was a tremendous result. As he confided to his “brother in arms” Cairnes: “It will be worth a life, to have lived to see this done” (Mill [1849–1873] Reference Mill1972, p. 966).
V. FINAL REMARKS
Mill’s Civil War–related writings, especially when situated in the context of his broader social concerns, furnish thought-provoking material for those who are interested in his work. For one thing, the passionate tone adopted in these writings is striking, especially given Mill’s reputation as a “thinking machine” or a “saint of rationalism.” With the possible exception of his defense of women’s emancipation, there is hardly any other occasion in which he uses such highly emotional language. For him, as argued, there was a lot at stake: the possibility of eliminating slavery, the destiny of democracy, and the moral standing and the honor of his country, all of which he considered crucially important.
These writings also reveal tensions underlying Mill’s social thought. It is clear that he gives different treatment to the Black population in the United States as compared to the populations of Jamaica or India. Based on his very questionable “scale of civilization,” Mill defends British (paternalistic) rule over the Empire until the subjugated populations evolve from their “non-age” to “maturity” and become capable of governing themselves. However, when dealing with the formerly enslaved population in America, he advocates not only their freedom but also their immediate enfranchisement. Using his (problematic) metric, one could ask: In what sense were the populations of India or Jamaica less developed than the recently freed (illiterate) enslaved population of the United States?
The broader background that frames his war-related reflections can help to explain —although not necessarily to justify—his use of double standards when suggesting solutions for Blacks in America and when dealing with populations under British imperial rule (such as Jamaica). As seen, his optimism in the face of the Civil War was due to the hope of effectively eliminating slavery, an institution that had already been abolished in the English colonies. Given his moral outrage toward the South’s “peculiar” institution, his paramount aim was to eliminate it from American soil. In this country’s specific context, the immediate enfranchisement of Black people seemed the best way to break the political power of the Southern oligarchy and to put an end to the subjugation of this population. Furthermore, since, according to Mill’s metric, America was an advanced nation, recourse to an external power to implement the “adequate institutions”—as he demanded for “backward” Jamaica—was unavailable. He would have considered such a solution, besides being unfeasible, also inadequate and illegitimate.
The weight Mill believed the American experiment of democracy had in determining the destiny of the attempts of extending suffrage in England might also explain, in some measure, this special treatment. Mill believed, as seen, that the exclusion of Blacks (and women) from political rights tainted and corrupted the country’s system, and the granting of political rights to Blacks (and, he hoped, in the sequence, to women) would correct its main defect. The end of the “aristocracy” of color (and sex) that prevailed in the country would rehabilitate American democracy and, thereby, strengthen the progressive forces in England and Europe at large.
Mill’s writings on the Civil War furnish an interesting illustration of his methodological view that “[f]or practical purposes, Political Economy is inseparably intertwined with many other branches of social philosophy” (Mill [1871] Reference Mill1965, p. xci). While analyzing slavery in the Southern states and how to (effectively) eliminate it after the war, Mill, in fact, engages with the economic dimension of slavery but blends it with sociological, cultural, political, and moral considerations.Footnote 44 By proceeding in this way, he was able to provide a comprehensive interpretation of this complex social phenomenon and to bring to light some of the difficulties that stood in the way of the effective emancipation and integration of the Black population in America.
COMPETING INTERESTS
The author declares no competing interests exist.
