Mutual liberty is an idea first coined by Alexis de Tocqueville in his 1835 work Democracy in America. In effect, Tocqueville was referring to the general nature of American society during the 19th century. It appeared to him, at least on the surface, that every citizen in the United States had the opportunity to participate in the civic activities of the country. Another way to look at mutual liberty is by accounting for the collective free wills of every rational being in a community. Even though the notion of mutual liberty was introduced by Tocqueville, it was John Stuart Mill who greatly expanded it. Mill believed that the most proper occasion for mutual liberty was in a community governed by the consent of the governed, i.e., a republic. And according to Mill, it is only in a republi