Does Mill think every long-term contract is invalid?

No. Life requires agreements that restrict action. His concern is permanent extinction of future liberty, not the existence of any constraint.

Is an exit always fair if a termination fee is available?

No. If the cost is impossible to bear, or dependence, coercion, and information control prevent use, a formal exit may not be practical freedom.

When does past consent stop proving present consent?

Where continuing participation matters and a person clearly withdraws, or where the arrangement makes withdrawal impossible, past consent cannot automatically substitute for present will. Legal consequences vary by jurisdiction.

On Liberty

Can freedom be used to give up freedom forever? Mill’s slavery-contract problem

Mill argues that liberty does not require enforcement of an agreement that permanently destroys future choice. His extreme example clarifies consent, exit, promises and duties to third parties.

The principle of freedom cannot require that he should be free not to be free.On Liberty, Chapter V · Liberty cannot require the surrender of future liberty

The direct answer: one choice cannot destroy the conditions of every later choice

Mill supports voluntary agreements about shared affairs and says promises should generally be kept. Selling oneself into permanent slavery is different. It uses one act of consent to cancel every future capacity to withdraw, judge, and act. Enforcing it would not respect continuing liberty; it would make a past choice master of the future person.

Read the Chapter V passage.

Why “but they chose it” is insufficient

Non-interference ordinarily rests on the thought that people know their own interests and can revise a course as experience changes. Permanent slavery removes that basis. The person can no longer leave or turn new understanding into action. Initial consent may have been genuine without becoming perpetual consent to forced obedience.

This does not mean every regret cancels a promise. It means enforcement cannot destroy the very agent whose freedom justifies respecting promises.

Ordinary contracts differ from alienating liberty

Loans, leases, and employment restrict future conduct, but they normally limit duration, subject, remedy, and exit cost. The parties retain broad legal and personal agency. Permanent dominion makes the person himself the controlled object. The question is not simply whether a commitment is burdensome, but whether it preserves a practical standing to reconsider and leave.

Examine duration, scope, exit, power imbalance, and whether the remedy for breach becomes ownership of a person.

Exit does not erase responsibility

Mill also notes that promises create reasonable expectations and may generate duties to children or other third parties. Freedom to leave a personal relationship need not erase debt, care, property, or transition duties. Legal freedom and moral responsibility can diverge: a relationship should not be forced to continue forever, while its consequences still require fair settlement.

“My mind changed” is therefore not a universal escape, and “you once agreed” is not a licence for unlimited control.

The modern limit of the analogy

Slavery is an extreme test, not a ready label for every subscription, job, or marriage dispute. Useful questions remain: is exit practically available? Is the penalty so large that leaving is fictional? Does one side control information, resources, and remedies? Can third-party interests be protected more narrowly? The harm-principle guide helps test necessity and proportionality.