Misuses of Civil Disobedience
Kurtz, Paul
CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE is often hailed as an eloquent method of protest, a way of arousing the moral conscience of society. But today it can also be used by some students and black militants as...
...Jehovah's Witnesses have refused to salute the flag because it is contrary to their religious principles...
...Such a distinction is not always easy to make...
...Third, we must distinguish acts of civil disobedience that are motivated by passion MISUSES OF CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE from those based upon reasoned analysis...
...But, GE wages have lagged far behind...
...GE's profits after taxes rose 78 1/x%—from $200.1 million in 1960 to $357.1 million in 1968...
...Those individuals who are being denied their elementary rights by such confrontations, as on the campuses today, must be protected by the law...
...The stakes are high...
...He can no longer claim civil disobedience as an "inalienable" right...
...And in the present context, we may argue that the Western democracies, however imperfect, are still functioning constitutional democracies in the sense that methods of persuasion and dissent operate as important instrumentalities of social change...
...It is founded in high moral intent, whose purpose is to arouse the conscience of the community in order to correct any injustice within the framework of (democratic) law...
...The civil disobedient here says: I have a keen and sensitive moral conscience...
...But these days it takes $9,800 for an urban family of four to enjoy what the government 'kalls "a modest but adequate" standard of living...
...One must be cautious in not selecting a course of action that may call into operation a "boomerang principle...
...In doing so, he undermines the whole moral basis of the democratic faith: toleration and respect for the rights of others in terms of which his own claim to civil disobedience is predicated...
...Civil disobedience applies rather to laws considered bad and needing to be repealed, or to those situations where it is thought that new laws should be enacted...
...No society— democratic or nondemocratic— could function unless there were some acquiescence and compliance with its laws...
...If one is totally against the political and legal democratic framework, then his acts are acts not of civil disobedience per se, but of resistance and revolution...
...It is civil, because it applies to the civil law...
...Yet, if we do not have an absolute duty to obey the law, we do have a prima facie obligation, and on moral grounds...
...at least, I would hope that their action may be considered a case of free speech, and that the Supreme Court will so rule...
...But who is to judge in a democracy when we can allow certain groups the privilege of becoming the arbiters of our fate and of deciding that events dictate physical force and violence...
...AS A GENERAL WORKING DEFINITION, I would suggest the following: Civil disobedience applies to the civil law...
...For example, opposition to the Vietnam war may be made on at least two grounds: one, that it is unconstitutional because the President did not request a declaration of war by the Congress, in which case those opposed to the war may be standing on their constitutional rights and hoping to provoke a legal test...
...In a similar plight most men might have exercised their option to escape, particularly when the clear and present danger of death confronted them...
...Conscientious objection also is permitted as a basis for an exemption from the draft...
...What would have been their fate if they had practiced civil disobedience as it has been practiced in the United States...
...actions, or to make an exception for himIn matters concerning moral judgment, self...
...GE says that higher wages would make the company uncompetitive...
...The crucial question is: under what conditions, within what limitations, and in what form...
...And the answer is that there are no universal or infallible principles we can apply automatically...
...Why is this immensely profitable corporation unwilling to share its prosperity with its workers...
...may be threatened with erosion...
...These are often effective methods of moral suasion, and in a democracy are essential liberties that must be preserved at all costs...
...A conscientious objector, then, is not a civil disobedient...
...Still, one must try to distinguish those acts that follow from a high moral purpose and those that do not...
...If, because you believe that you are clearly "right" and they "wrong," you are not prepared to extend the same method of opposition to your opponents, why then PAUL KURTZ should they tolerate you, if they find you It has a familiar clang in human history, "intolerable" and if the laws or policies that whether it emanates from so-called political, you advocate go contrary to their basic ecclesiastical, or intellectual authorities...
...Often there is impatience with the tempo of social change...
...In any case, the point is clear: law is not infallible and where an injustice is committed, particularly against an honorable person, one may make an exception in order to right a grievous wrong...
...It should apply not to those who simply preach and advocate or recommend violation, but only to those who have some complicity in or have actually committed an overt act of violation...
...It is its possible misuses that ought to disturb us...
...The point is: laws are not absolute...
...Yet some general considerations, I submit, are relevant...
...It involves a deliberate and open violation of the law...
...At present, conscientious objection (whether broadly or narrowly construed) may be legally used to exempt someone from the draft...
...But if one accidentally, mistakenly, or without forethought passes a stop sign, he cannot be considered civilly disobedient...
...As Hobbes pointed out, he has no right to expect anything but a "war of all against all," and civil disobedience is then debased to merely one tactic in the arsenal of weapons...
...a) For, as we have seen, civil disobedience does not include acts of violation that are involuntary or inadvertent...
...A draft dodger who secretly evades induction is also not a civil disobedient...
...We cannot make exceptions for ourselves without extending the same privilege to others, in which case chaos could ensue...
...Vivien Kellems's famous refusal to collect withholding taxes some years ago as an act of protest was a case of civil disobedience...
...he considers the issue to be momentous, not trivial...
...Moreover, Judge Charles Wyzanski's recent ruling in the Sisson case, which is likely to be heard by the Supreme Court, provides further arguments for the extension of conscientious objection to atheists...
...Under this interpretation, humanists and nontheists may qualify as conscientious objectors, as long as the grounds of their opposition function in their lives in the same way as those of orthodox theistic beliefs...
...but the mere failure to pay one's own income tax is not...
...a widespread misuse of civil disobedience by sincere though misguided democrats may inadvertently contribute to undermining democratic society...
...But the fact is that GE is far ahead of its competitors...
...It is one thing respectfully to tolerate a Henry David Thoreau as heretic and to be swayed by the integrity of his protest...
...There is a danger that he who is willing to use civil disobedience is apt to call forth reprisals more dreadful than the original grievance the act of civil disobedience intended to ameliorate...
...Similarly, one may be opposed in principle to laws against abortion, yet to evade the law by having an illegal abortion is not a case of civil disobedience...
...There may be an easy temptation for people in a democracy to stand on their moral consciences, but this may make subjective conscience the supreme arbiter of social policy with disastrous results...
...Nevertheless, one must insist that any acts of civil disobedience not merely accord with subjective intuitions or feelings, but that they be available to the scrutiny of critical intelligence...
...One must be prepared to ask if the immediate loss or gain will result in a more long-range loss or gain...
...Particularly in a democracy, we recognize at certain crucial moments in history the demands of the higher dictates of conscience...
...First, one may adopt the strategy of civil disobedience only if all other democratic methods of persuasion have failed...
...Some cases are hard to classify...
...Civil disobedience makes sense only in a society where we can freely appeal to public opinion...
...for what may be considered to be momentous for one person—compulsory vaccination for his MISUSES OF CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE children—may be insignificant for another...
...Advocacy of noncompliance with the draft laws by Spock, Coffin, et...
...Indeed in some cases where laws are unjust, one can make a case, not only for civil disobedience, but for outright evasion and deception...
...For example, are protesters against Dow-Chemical and other recruiters on campuses—especially those who obstruct and disrupt—prepared to allow members of the John Birch Society, the Young Americans for Freedom, or the Ku Klux Klan to disrupt those laws, policies, and programs that they most cherish...
...But this implies that the society in which civil disobedience is based actually is a functioning democracy...
...Generally the civil disobedient appeals to fundamental moral principles that he thinks are being flouted...
...But if there are no quick principles to apply, nevertheless there are some general guidelinesthat I think do assist us, in some sense, in rendering a reasonable evaluation of the merits of a proposed act of civil disobedience...
...Civil disobedience in a fascist or Stalinist state is not respected, tolerated, nor even permitted...
...This, one might think, would hardly qualify as a protest of a moral injustice—through a gourmet may think so...
...Before acting in a situation, one ought to generalize the principle governing his act of disobedience and ask: am I prepared to extend the same methods of civil disobedience to those with whom I disagree...
...But today it can also be used by some students and black militants as a weapon in an assault on democratic institutions...
...One must bring to bear the full weight of John Stuart Mill's principle here: an individual has (within the limits of prudence) the right to his individual liberty, so long as he does not prevent others from exercising their individual rights to liberty...
...and his plea that he was merely "following orders" (legal in the Third Reich) falls on deaf ears...
...At the crux of the matter here is a conflict between two kinds of obligation: a conflict between obligations to obey the law and to follow the dictates of individual conscience...
...and it is rare to principle of civil disobedience: its power find that certain individuals or groups have is that it helps to keep alive our moral sensia monopoly on virtue, truth, or wisdom...
...The technique of civil disobedience is essentially dramatic...
...Recently, students in a university blocked the entrance to the cafeteria because they protested the bad quality of the food...
...d) Civil disobedience must also be distinguished from deviations from normal duties and obligations, where they are legal...
...two, that the war is immoral and violates international law and basic human rights...
...To flout them without due process is to invalidate the legal structure of society...
...Civilized man needs some regularity in conduct, some order and stability...
...A paradox occurs when an individual demands the right to be heard yet denies the same right to others...
...Civil disobedience should be used not as a first response, but almost as a final act of desperation.* Civil disobedience is serious * I do not think it is a last resort, because it falls far short of acts of overt resistance and revolution —which are also acts reserved to individual conscience, as both John Locke and Thomas Jefferson recognized, and available as a last resort in a society where democracy has ceased to functionand there is no hope but to return power to the...
...In most cases, the aim was achieved...
...The key issue is, when and under what conditions...
...Yet to claim the role of both judge and accused is to attack the very foundation of law and make it dependent upon opinion or force...
...It is possible, then, for a person to break a law because he thinks it unconstitutional and then proceed to litigation —yet he is not a civil disobedient...
...Openly to break a law and then to demand immunity or amnesty, as some have, is to violate the whole spirit of civil disobedience...
...In the complex modem society in which we live, the abrogation of all laws would be unthinkable...
...We will consider this question later...
...C C IVIL DISOBEDIENCE cannot be equated with every act of breaking the law...
...One should always demand a probing analysis of the justifying grounds for one's acts...
...Not to afford them elementary protection is to deny them equal protection by the law...
...Patience must not be abandoned at the first whimper or sign of inaction, for if democratic institutions are to survive they require some confidence in their ability to solve social problems...
...In a democracy one may challenge a particular law by showing that it is inconsistent with the fundamental law (or common law) of the society...
...If one is opposed to all stop signs in principle and makes a deliberate display of his contempt, then one is civilly disobedient...
...Clearly, this discussion only applies to civil disobedience in a democracy...
...We must here distinguish the socioeconomic system from the political and legal system...
...in which case it no longer has the generality and stability law requires...
...A civil disobedient would be a person who does not legally qualify for conscientious objector status, yet openly and publicly refuses to be drafted in order to dramatize his opposition to war...
...for the law itself is invalid...
...One key point: If violence is used by the civil disobedient against other citizens, those so injured have a right to demand that their safety be ensured by the police...
...The most serious consideration is whether the widespread adoption of civil disobedience would lead to the breakdown of the fabric of law and order and make the peaceful functioning of a democracy impossible...
...6) Penalty and punishment: A civil disobedient should be willing to take upon himself in a responsible way the consequences of his act...
...Fourth, accordingly, in any appraisal of the tactics of social reform one consideration that is decisive, or at least should be, is a negative test...
...It is the dilemma that Socrates faced in the dialogue, Crito, when, unjustly con MISUSES OF CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE damned to death by the Athenians, he wrestled with his conscience and the entreaties of his friends to escape...
...Many students think that we have reached a similar situation in Vietnam...
...All methods of social change not based upon careful tactical consideration are no more than emotive ejaculations...
...Gandhi was effective in India, among other reasons, because he was dealing with the British, who were sensitive to democratic values and to the contradictions in having a democracy at home and an outdated colonial system abroad...
...The United States has historically permitted conscientious objectors to be excluded from combatant service, if the opposition was predicated on belief in a Supreme Being...
...Undoubtedly, this should also be an important consideration for those within the black community who today wish to go far beyond civil disobedience to the use of violent methods of protest...
...In other words, if I believe that I may, within a democracy, be civilly disobedient (or to go further, to seize buildings, disrupt, and obstruct) what would be my attitude to those who might wish to do the same, and with whom I most profoundly disagree...
...The grounds for conscientious objection have recently been liberally reinterpreted to apply to nontheists and humanists...
...An important change occurs in the concept of civil disobedience when it is transformed from the act of a free and independent moral agent to that of a group of people...
...If in the first case a civil challenge were made and the Supreme Court should rule that the war was constitutional (i.e., the Tonkin Bay Resolution), and if the litigants still continued to break the law —for example by open violation of the draft —then this would again be a case of civil disobedience...
...There are considerable difficulties with this criterion...
...c) The civil challenge of the legality of a law or policy should not be interpreted as an instance of civil disobedience...
...A civil disobedient within a democracy who is committed to the methods of democratic persuasion cannot maintain this commitment, itself the very basis on which he asks toleration for his act of civil disobedience, while at the same time refusing to abide by its penalties...
...I condemn this or that...
...Thus, all things being equal, we do have an obligation to obey the law and abide by the ground rules—unless there are overriding and extenuating circumstances...
...The tactic being employed is moral suasion...
...Although I submit that we have a prima facie obligation to obey the laws, there are some cases where the better part of wisdom is to evade them— as, for example, drinking whiskey in violation of prohibition...
...Second, in order for civil disobedience to be used there must be some urgency, some overriding and momentous moral issue at stake and some need for prompt redress...
...I am not arguing that there ought to be a harsh meting out of punishment...
...On the contrary, I would insist that civil disobedience has a valid use in a democracy—within certain carefully defined limits...
...does not seem to be civil disobedience...
...But if he is opposed to the whole system, believing it perversely corrupt and defective, then we must ask if his indictment also applies to the political and legal system, including the principles of democracy...
...Socrates accepted the death penalty, which was duly carried out, because he thought that his obligation to the laws of Athens, to which he had adhered all of his life, superseded his private conscience and his conviction that the sentence was unjust...
...In this definition, certain elements are essential: (I) Breaking the civil law: Civil disobedience should not be confused with academic disobedience (where students disobey the rules and regulations of the university), nor with corporate disobedience (where they disobey the internal procedures within the corporation), nor ecclesiastical disobedience (where civil disobedients violate the rules of their order or the commandments of their bishops...
...Is it not a betrayal of Thus, before one is entitled to use civil disdemocracy to insist that you have certain obedience, he should ask himself in all sinrights and privileges that you will not extend cerity, whether he is ready to generalize his to others...
...One cannot in principle oppose sit-ins, so long as those who engage in them will not knowingly resist arrest or physically obstruct others...
...The Supreme Court has ruled that in such cases individuals are exempt from the obligation—their deviant behavior is thus legally permissible...
...One must be prepared to calculate risks within the historical moment in which he acts and ask, "Would it be better or worse to the whole system of principles and values that I prize, if I were to commit this act...
...It makes much less sense in a closed, nondemocratic, or repressive society...
...b) It does not include covert evasions of the law...
...Some notice of the action should be given and the civil authorities forewarned...
...This applies, it seems to me, tothose restrictive abortion laws which place such an unfair burden on many individuals that in many cases the laws ought to be violated...
...7) A responsible act within the democratic framework of laws: This presupposes some commitment to the basic framework of laws in a democracy...
...Patience is an essential virtue in a democratic society, even though to the young it often seems a deception practiced by the old...
...In a sense, the civil disobedience employed by the weak has provided a lesson in reverse for the powerful...
...How should the civil disobedient appraise Governor Wallace's blocking the entrance to Attorney General Katzenbach, as the latter attempted to enforce desegregation at the University of Alabama...
...people...
...legal system that generally only an aggrieved party can test the constitutionality of a law or policy...
...For one may wish radically to restructure the former, yet still be committed to the democratic process as the chief method of social change...
...that is, if I oppose X, this may provoke a counterreaction Y in someone else...
...What would be one's attitude toward such devout Catholics who, considering abortion a moral crime and equivalent to the murder of a human being, may conceivably block operating rooms where abortions may be legally performed—or vigilante groups attempting to censor movie houses that exhibit films that they consider "offensive" to their deepest moral sensibilities...
...Granted that if a dictatorship is to maintain itself it needs at least passive acquiescence to its rule, and that massive disobedience may be effective...
...However, we have recently suffered from serious confusions about this matter...
...Matters that can be deferred to the deliberate processes within the free marketplace of ideas and of constitutional change ought to be deferred...
...There are exceptions to be made...
...I would defend the right of revolution— never in a functioning democracy or quasi-democracy where there are still methods of persuasion available—but only in a nondemocratic or totalitarian society where one wants to either restorethe liberties of the people or bring into being agenuine democracy where none existed before...
...His act is an eloquent testament to the careful consideration that democrats are willing to give to his individual moral convictions and not to limit him— save in extreme and compelling situations...
...And, how has the Company fared in these years...
...In other words, civil disobedience applies to those cases in which laws legally enacted and constitutionally valid are still opposed because they are thought to be immoral...
...If Marcuse is entitled to repress those with whom he disagrees, on what basis can he deny the right wing from demanding his repression...
...Similarly, in a sense, the freedom sit-ins in the South led by Martin Luther King and others were not pure cases of civil disobedience, but more often were efforts to strike down state segregation laws that violate the federal Constitution...
...But be that as it may, such lawbreaking is not civil disobedience...
...Appeals to patience, however, cannot be used to condone inequalities or to prevent social change...
...Support the GE Strikers...
...What is at issue are those forms of civilly disobedient acts that prevent other individuals, who may agree or disagree with the position of the civil disobedient, from entering or using buildings, and disruptions and confrontations that move beyond the level of dialogue to that of intimidation...
...Moreover, in some situations the time element is such that we cannot sit by when a momentous wrong has occurred or is about to occur...
...If not made in advance, at least the act should be open and public...
...e) Last, I think that we also should exclude from the heading of civil disobedience acts that are disruptive and obstructive and that prevent other people from exercising their rights...
...We have seen the fate of Litvinov and others who peacefully protested the Russian invasion of Czechoslovakia...
...One hopes that public attitudes may be redirected in order to influence leaders to modify policies...
...If the civil disobedient is to be protected, so are those who may be injured if and when his disobedience becomes violent...
...If one acts from impatience and passion, if his acts are uncivil and irresponsible toward the whole body of law, then he cannot command moral PAUL KURTZ approval...
...Declarations of intent made in advance most likely have the maximum effect upon public opinion to show that one is a civil disobedient, but for serious reasons...
...The civil disobedient wishes to change the law or policy, but until he does he must abide by the existing rules or the legal statutes, including the penalties required...
...This conflict between two competing claims has always been a vital question for political theory...
...Hobbes was right when he said that the long-range consequences of nonobedience to law would be a state of anarchy in which life would be "nasty, brutish, and short...
...GE stockholders receive a 3.8% higher return on their investment than stockholders of other electrical machinery, equipment, and supplies manufacturers...
...It involves an act of disobedience, a violation of the law...
...Civil disobedience is most meaningful in those contexts where there is some fundamental respect for individual differences of opinion and conscience and where it may help to sway both public opinion and induce a change in social policy...
...Possibly it is even an effort to change community attitudes rather MISUSES OF CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE than the law...
...There is ambiguity about the meaning of "civil disobedience...
...Only where there is a crisis of enormity (such as a war) has civil disobedience an appeal as a possible alternative...
...In the last analysis, whether civil disobedience may be justifiably employed depends upon the context at hand...
...The danger in a strategy of violence is that it tends to lead to repression, and to turn sympathy for a just cause into fear, hatred, and resentment...
...On the contrary, if the issue is a grave moral one, equity and justice ought to enter and full judicial due process be adhered to, so that the rights of the civil disobedient are protected...
...If there is a legal rule with stated penalties for infracture, then one must be prepared to suffer the punishment that may ensue...
...The equal protection of the laws and religious freedom clauses apply to both nontheists and theists...
...In 1961 Planned Parenthood in New Haven, Connecticut, made available birth control contraceptives and information as a deliberate test case of the constitutionality of the Connecticut AntiBirth Control Law...
...The following is from a public statement by a number of prominent personsin support of the striking General Electric workers: The average GE worker makes $3.25 an hour—that's $6,760 a year...
...Surely a democratic society can tolerate some disobedience, but no society can long endure epidemic conditions...
...Similarly, Eichmann was universally condemned for condoning bestial crimes against mankind...
...5) Openly declared: To have the maximum effect upon public opinion, civil disobedience should be openly declared in advance...
...Thus there is no absolute duty to obey the law...
...No general position can anticipate every possible situation, especially where ambiguities are inherent and we do not have a backlog of experience...
...presumably there should be grounds if the act is reasonable...
...3) High Moral purpose: To be civilly disobedient, the action should follow from a high moral purpose and have as its goal the remedy of a significant injustice...
...I hereby refuse to allow the right of dissent to those who may in equal moral fervor support a policy or law with which I disagree...
...In terms of purchasing power, GE workers are no better of} today than a decade ago—despite their increased productivity...
...His interest is serious, not whimsical...
...Similarly for the argument heard from the New Left that since one cannot change things through the system, any form of violence is justified...
...Where we disagree with these laws we should have, at least in principle, the opportunity for reform by correcting bad laws and creating new ones...
...and his goal is not to change a particular law or laws, but all law...
...I have here been concentrating upon the problems of civil disobedience in a democracy...
...In the last nine years, the productivity of GE workers has risen more than 40% faster than the national average...
...Therefore, acts that overtly deny other individuals the freedom to express their convictions in action are no longer simple acts of civil disobedience but become forms of violent resistance...
...If he asks that his point of view be respected, his rights scrupulously maintained, and his beliefs tolerated, this means that he himself is committed to the fundamental rules of democracy...
...To be told that kE those whom the civil disobedients oppose are "moral primitives," and that their higher moral claim can censor or limit the rights of others, is a demand not for moral conscience but for moral "privilege...
...It is a peculiar feature of the U.S...
...4) To influence public opinion: The strategy of civil disobedience within a democracy is to awaken the consciences of others to some grave moral crime or social inequity...
...In a democratic society, we are committed to the basic principles of fair play...
...In such an inquiry one must weigh consequences and ask whether a particular act of civil disobedience will do more long-range good to the community than any immediate gain or loss...
...Some students who have broken civil laws in their demonstrations (not simply academic regulations) have cried "foul" when civil proceedings were instituted...
...And those who believe in both democracy and civil disobedience must appreciate the reasons why...
...Many actions performed in the name of civil disobedience have been improperly designated as such...
...His dignity can easily be translated into arrogance when he flaunts the rights of others, is intolerant of their convictions, and seeks to obstruct them in the process...
...Individuals may be offended by any number of unjust laws and policies, but they ought to be willing to reserve civil disobedience for those issues considered most pernicious and those situations most extraordinary...
...that is, when he physically prevents or obstructs another person from his liberty...
...and he can achieve this, in part, only by the rule of law...
...We must thus call for prudence, balance, temperance, and caution in the individual's use of civil disobedience...
...it is another to deal with a crowd who exercises in unison active civil disobedience...
...The claim of the civil disobedient to be heard is that the state has transgressed the bounds of human decency and has offended the most fundamental human rights...
...But demonstrations and protests, let alone acts of civil disobedience, usually have been the signal for greater repression...
...For we are asked to tolerate an in PAUL KURTZ tolerant effort to limit or suppress the rights of other individuals...
...Civilly disobedient acts against the law which are called for at any time and in any place tend to disrupt the public order, and if generalized may lead to a complete breakdown in law...
...D D OES THIS MEAN that I am rejecting civil disobedience as a method of persuasion in a democracy...
...there is confusion about the proper use of the act and under what conditions it may be justifiably applied...
...Herbert Marcuse's critique of what he calls "repressive tolerance" in democracies, i.e., the willingness to suffer injustices in the name of toleration, and his defense of intolerance of the "intolerable" is a puzzling position for someone on the Left in the United States to assume, especially since the Left is basically in a position of weakness...
...and a qualified conscientious objector is not a civil disobedient...
...GE workers averaged gains of 2.8% a year while steelworkers gained 3.6%, rubberworkers 3.8%, autoworkers 4.9%, and aerospace workers 5.1 %. What's worse, while GE wages rose 25% since 1960, increased living costs just about wiped out that gain...
...The essence of law in a democracy is that laws should ultimately be based upon public sovereignty, and that such laws (which apply to everyone) must be legally enacted or judicially determined...
...CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE is often hailed as an eloquent method of protest, a way of arousing the moral conscience of society...
...In such a case, he has broken the implicit contractual obligation that he has to others or he expects from them...
...2) Deliberate and intentional: The act must be deliberate and intentional...
...its danger, that if used excessively demand aright as exclusively yours and to or carelessly the whole democratic order deny it others is an expression of conceit...
...Eventually the case made its way to the Supreme Court, where in 1965 the law was finally ruled unconstitutional...
...That is, it must follow from a conscious and voluntary purpose on the part of the agent involved...
...The responsible and orderly civil disobedient commands dignity and respect when he puts his body on the line in the name of a cause...
...PAUL KURTZ business, and it cannot be used lightly: if there remain open other avenues of social reform, of dissent and opposition, criticism, protest and demonstration, then we are usually not entitled to be civilly disobedient...
...One could argue that a law should not have to be broken first in order to test its constitutionality...
...To tivities...
...One cannot obey, and one hopes an act of indignation will stimulate sympathy for one's cause...
...Acts done specifically with the intent of challenging a law are authentic democratic procedures...
...The right to peacefully assemble, demonstrate, march, or protest is not at issue...
...Income tax evasion, blackmail, or homosexual acts performed in private cannot be construed as bona fide cases of civil disobedience...
...men of the highest intelligence and charac-There is both power and danger in the ter may honestly disagree...
...The second would be a case of civil disobedience...
...A strong case can be made for certain forms of civil disobedience, particularly in a democracy, when one is attempting to arouse public sympathy for a just cause...
...I am suggesting that the willingness to use civil disobedience for trivial and inconsequential issues is apt to debase it...
...a Supreme Court ruling overturned the state law as unconstitutional...
...for there is a natural temptation to consider one's own point of view "rational" and "reasonable," and another "subjective" and "unreasonable...
...Whether or not one may in a democracy at times evade the law is a serious question...
...One may dispute the wisdom of Socrates' decision...
Vol. 17 • January 1970 • No. 1
