HEL Civil Disobedience
Part 1
Most people remember Gandhi and Dr. Martin
Luther King. Jr. as reformers who practiced non-violent forms of protest and advocacy. Both
effectively changed the popular opinion about emotional issues for
their countries and brought in a wave of change that was long overdue.
But the practice of non-violent protest, or civil disobedience, started long before either Gandhi or King. It began with
quiet, shy poet who
best known for writing lot about pond.
Henry David Thoreau lived from 1817 until 1862, mainly in the
in the 1860s had already begun dividing the
area of Concord, Massachusetts. The issue that would tear the country apart
hanged. In his
nation. Thoreau was only 14 when Nat Turner led the slave rebellion in Virginia and was later
Hayden.
late 20s, Thoreau began speaking against slavery in public, echoing the voices of freedmen like Frederick Douglass and Lewis
Thoreau believed that a government that supported slavery was
corrupt and immoral. He was also deeply suspicious of government. For
these and other reasons, Thoreau refused to pay his poll tax for a number of years. The poll tax was a legal tax owed by every person. It was
basically a tax on one's body. After not paying for years, he was at last arrested. He spent only one night in jail, however, as a relative paid the
tax for him. He was reportedly furious that any tax was paid on his behalf.
It was this experience that Thoreau wrote about in an essay called *Civil Disobedience." In
this essay, he argued that being moral and just
came before allegiance to government. He wrote "If the machine of government is of such : nature that it requires you to be the agent of
to injustice to another, then, I say, break the law." He also felt that voting was not enough to ensure that the right thing be done. He wrote that
even voting for the right is doing nothing for it... A wise man will not leave the right to the mercy of chance..." He felt that one had a moral
responsibility to resist unjust laws.
What is the main idea of the bolded paragraph? (5 points)
O Thoreau lived in Massachusett
O Thoreau did not support
Thoreau led a slave i
Thoreau was born in 1917.