Civil Disobedience By: Grace Reddick, Dylan Wright and Shawqi Musallam

What Is Civil Disobedience?

“If a thousand men were not to pay their tax bills this year, that would not be a violent and bloody measure, as it would be to pay them, and enable the State to commit violence and shed innocent blood. This is, in fact, the definition of a peaceable revolution, if any such is possible.” Thoreau is saying that even if we do not resist through blood and war, we are still shedding the blood of others by not resisting at all. Therefor the most just and logical way to resist is peaceably. If we resist through peaceful means then we are standing for what we believe in, saving those who we are fighting for, and sparing the blood of innocent men.

“In other words, when a sixth of the population of a nation which has undertaken to be the refuge of liberty are slaves, and a whole country is unjustly overrun and conquered by a foreign army, and subjected to military law, I think that it is not too soon for honest men to rebel and revolutionize. What makes this duty the more urgent is that fact that the country so overrun is not our own, but ours is the invading army.” Thoreau uses direct examples of the injustices of our country at the time in this quotation. He is showing that even if we ourselves are not being harmed or mistreated, that we are still obligated to rebel. We cannot sit idly by as our country over runs another or takes the freedoms of innocent men. It is our duty to rebel, and by not rebelling we are just as much to blame as our country for the injustices at hand.

“Under a government which imprisons unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison.” This quote gives insight to the theory of peaceful resistance. Even if you are not in violation of the law, if another man is in jail for the color of his skin or his heritage, that lived an honest life just as you did, than you should be jailed too, as long as this other man is unjustly jailed with you.

Civil Rights Movement

One example of how civil disobedience is portrayed through the Civil Rights Movement was in 1968 when the Memphis clergyman James Lawson made it clear to Martin Luther King that the sanitation workers in Memphis were losing pay and majority of them consisted of 90% black populated. They had bad sanitation where they worked, and the machines and equipment were worn. The dispute broke out when a malfunctioning machine killed two workers. There was no insurance plan provided plus the families receiving no help or pays for more than over a month. They were barely accompanied with the funeral costs. The Association of Federal, State, County and Municipal Employees menaced a strike to fight for better working conditions in Memphis. When it failed, the workers went on a legitimate strike and made a protest ending in violence when police forces showed up and put a stop to it all. James Lawson gained a higher role in the strike committee as chairman and got Martin Luther King to help the situation and speak at a meeting. What King spoke of caused concern among some as he connected the whole campaign against poverty, the civil rights battle, and the war in Vietnam. He threw out his opinion that all the money being spent on the war was what was standing in the way of the improvement in America’s system of welfare. The protest stated that they were going to shut down the nation’s capital through a civil disobedience until the government agreed to abolish poverty throughout America.

On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks, an African American, made one of the first movements leading to the Civil Rights Movement. After a hard days work, Rosa stepped onto a full city bus and sat down in a seat. A white passenger stepped on and the driver asked her to move to the back. However, Rosa protested and stood her ground; she would not give up her seat for a white person just because she was a different color. After refusing, she was arrested for violating an Alabama law that stated that black people were to give up their seat to a white person when the bus was full. This civil disobedience Rosa acted out started the Montgomery Bus Boycott where blacks boycotted buses until they were allowed to seat wherever they wanted to on a bus.

In the era of the 1960’s, four black students attending North Carolina A&T College sat down at a Woolworth lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina. They had purchased items and then sat down at the counter. A waiter came up and said these seats were reserved for white people and asked them to move. However, they politely refused. Shockingly they were not arrested and remained at the counter until closing time. The following morning there were more and more blacks coming to sit at the lunch counter and soon started a campaign called the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee establishing leadership to support the discrimination. After the establishing of the SNCC, there were students in more than 30 restaurants on 7 streets going up to lunch counters preforming sit-ins. They portrayed civil disobedience by going against laws including the Jim Crow Law, etc. and against discrimination.

The Abolitionist Movement: The abolitionist movement was to end slavery. The abolitionist movement started when slavery started, but was not organized or as powerful. Many people supported this cause such as John Brown, Henry D. Thoreau, Fredrick Douglass, and Garrison.

John Brown and the raid of Harpers Ferry On October 16, 1859, John Brown and his supporters went to the town of Harpers Ferry They headed for the arsenal, and they fought the local militia, and the US Marines lead by Robert E. Lee They lost a lot of supporters, and Brown was captured, charged with treason against the state of Virginia, murder, and slave insurrection He was sentenced to death, and was hanged on December 2, 1859

Henry David Thoreau Henry Thoreau did not support slavery so he took action He did not pay poll tax because he did not agree with the government for having slavery He had to stay in jail for one day and he wrote civil disobedience about his time in jail

Frederick Douglass Frederick Douglass was a big help to the Abolitionist movement, he He escaped from being held as a slave He made a book, newspaper, and helped in many organizations to end slavery

William Lloyd Garrison, in Boston: The newspaper “Liberator” written by Garrison gave views to how the abolitionist think. His newspaper was famous and read by most, it was supported by free African Americans He excited the abolitionist crowd by burning copies of the Constitution and Fugitive slave law

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