Civil disobedience is the active refusal to obey certain laws, demands, and commands of a government, or of an occupying international power. Civil disobedience is usually, but not always,^[1][2] defined as being nonviolent resistance. In its most nonviolent form (in India, known as ahinsa Ahimsa is a term meaning to do no harm (literally: the avoidance of violence - himsa). It is an important tenet of the Indian religions (Hinduism, Buddhism and especially Jainism). Ahimsa is a rule of conduct that bars the killing or injuring of living beings. It is closely connected with the notion that all kinds of violence entail negative or satyagraha Satyagraha is a philosophy and practice of nonviolent resistance developed by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (also known as "Mahatma" Gandhi). Gandhi deployed satyagraha in the Indian independence movement and also during his earlier struggles in South Africa. Satyagraha theory influenced Nelson Mandela's struggle in South Africa under) it could be said that it is compassion Compassion is a virtue —one in which the emotional capacities of empathy and sympathy (for the suffering of others) are regarded as a part of love itself, and a cornerstone of greater social interconnectedness and humanism —foundational to the highest principles in philosophy, society, and personhood in the form of respectful disagreement. One of its earliest massive implementations was brought about by Egyptians against the British occupation in the nonviolent 1919 Revolution The Egyptian Revolution of 1919 was a countrywide non-violent revolution against the British occupation of Egypt and Sudan. It was carried out by Egyptians and Sudanese from different walks of life in the wake of the British-ordered exile of revolutionary leader Saad Zaghlul and other members of the Wafd Party in 1919. The event led to Britain's^[3]. Civil disobedience is one of the many ways people have rebelled against what they deem to be unfair laws. It has been used in many well-documented nonviolent resistance Nonviolent resistance is the practice of achieving socio-political goals through symbolic protests, civil disobedience, economic or political noncooperation, and other methods, without using violence movements in India The British Raj is the name given to the period of British colonial rule in South Asia between 1858 and 1947; it can also refer to the dominion itself, and even the region under the rule. The region, commonly called India in contemporary usage, included areas directly administered by Britain, as well as the princely states ruled by individual (Gandhi's Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (Hindi: मोहनदास करमचंद गाँधी, Gujarati: મોહનદાસ કરમચંદ ગાંધી, pronounced [moːɦən̪d̪aːs kərəmʨən̪d̪ ɡaːn̪d̪ʱiː] ; 2 October 1869 – 30 January 1948) was the pre-eminent political and spiritual leader of India during the Indian campaigns for independence The term Indian independence movement encompasses a wide spectrum of political organizations, philosophies, and movements which had the common aim of ending British colonial authority in South Asia. The term incorporates various national and regional campaigns, agitations and efforts of both nonviolent and militant philosophy from the British Empire The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom, that had originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height it was the largest empire in history and, for over a), in Czechoslovakia Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992. From 1939 to 1945 the state did not have de facto existence, due to its forced division and partial incorporation into Nazi Germany, but the Czechoslovak's Velvet Revolution The Velvet Revolution or Gentle Revolution (Slovak: nežná revolúcia) (November 17 – December 29, 1989) was a non-violent revolution in Czechoslovakia that saw the overthrow of the authoritarian government and in East Germany The German Democratic Republic , informally called East Germany by the West, was the socialist state established in 1949 in the Soviet zone of occupied Germany and in the East Berlin portion of the Allied-occupied capital city. The German Democratic Republic, which consisted geographically of northeast Germany rather than all of eastern Germany, to oust their communist Communism is a sociopolitical structure that aims for a classless and stateless society with the communal ownership of property governments ^[4][5], in South Africa Coordinates: 29°02′46″S 25°03′47″E / 29.046°S 25.063°E The Republic of South Africa is a country located at the southern tip of Africa, with a 2,798 kilometres coastline on the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. To the north lie Namibia, Botswana and Zimbabwe; to the east are Mozambique and Swaziland; while Lesotho is an independent in the fight against apartheid Bantustan · District Six · Robben Island , in the American Civil Rights Movement The African-American Civil Rights Movement refers to the movements in the United States aimed at outlawing racial discrimination against African Americans and restoring Suffrage in Southern states. This article covers the phase of the movement between 1954 and 1968, particularly in the South. By 1966, the emergence of the Black Power Movement,, in the Singing Revolution The Singing Revolution is a commonly used name for events between 1987 and 1991 that led to the restoration of the independence of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, mainly in Estonia . The term was coined by an Estonian activist and artist, Heinz Valk, in an article published a week after the June 10–11, 1988 spontaneous mass night-singing to bring independence to the Baltic countries The Baltic states (Estonian: Balti riigid, Latvian: Baltijas valstis, Lithuanian: Baltijos valstybės, Russian: Прибалтика lit."At the Baltic Sea), Baltic Nations or Baltic countries are three countries in Northern Europe, all members of the European Union: Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. Between 1918 and 1920 in the aftermath of from the Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. The name is a translation of the Russian: Союз Советских Социалистических Республик (help·info), tr. Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik, IPA [sɐˈjʊs sɐˈvʲeʦkʲɪx səʦɪ, and recently in the 2004 Orange Revolution The Orange Revolution was a series of protests and political events that took place in Ukraine from late November 2004 to January 2005, in the immediate aftermath of the run-off vote of the 2004 Ukrainian presidential election which was claimed to be marred by massive corruption, voter intimidation and direct electoral fraud. Kiev, the Ukrainian^[6] and 2005 Rose Revolution The "Revolution of Roses" (Georgian: ვარდების რევოლუცია - vardebis revolutsia) was a change of power in Georgia in November 2003, which took place after widespread protests over the disputed parliamentary elections. As a result, President Eduard Shevardnadze was forced to resign on November 23, 2003, among other various movements worldwide.

Following the Peterloo massacre The Peterloo Massacre occurred at St Peter's Field, Manchester, England, on 16 August 1819, when cavalry charged into a crowd of 60,000–80,000 gathered at a meeting to demand the reform of parliamentary representation of 1819, poet Percy Shelley Percy Bysshe Shelley was one of the major English Romantic poets and is critically regarded among the finest lyric poets in the English language. Shelley was famous for his association with John Keats and Lord Byron. The novelist Mary Shelley was his second wife wrote the political poem The Mask of Anarchy The Mask of Anarchy is a political poem written in 1819 by Percy Bysshe Shelley following the Peterloo Massacre of that year. In his call for freedom, it is perhaps the first modern statement of the principle of nonviolent resistance later that year, that begins with the powerful images of the unjust forms of authority of his time—and then imagines the stirrings of a radically new form of social action. It is perhaps the first modern statement of the principle of nonviolent protest.^[7] A version was taken up by the author Henry David Thoreau Henry David Thoreau was an American author, poet, naturalist, tax resister, development critic, surveyor, historian, philosopher, and leading transcendentalist. He is best known for his book Walden, a reflection upon simple living in natural surroundings, and his essay, Civil Disobedience, an argument for individual resistance to civil government in his essay Civil Disobedience Civil Disobedience is an essay by Henry David Thoreau that was first published in 1849. It argues that people should not permit governments to overrule or atrophy their consciences, and that people have a duty to avoid allowing such acquiescence to enable the government to make them the agents of injustice. Thoreau was motivated in part by his, and later by Gandhi in his doctrine of Satyagraha Satyagraha is a philosophy and practice of nonviolent resistance developed by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (also known as "Mahatma" Gandhi). Gandhi deployed satyagraha in the Indian independence movement and also during his earlier struggles in South Africa. Satyagraha theory influenced Nelson Mandela's struggle in South Africa under.^[7] Gandhi's passive resistance was influenced and inspired by Shelley's nonviolence in protest and political action.^[8] In particular it is known that Gandhi would often quote Shelley's Masque of Anarchy to vast audiences during the campaign for a free India.^[7][9]

Thoreau's 1848 essay Civil Disobedience Civil Disobedience is an essay by Henry David Thoreau that was first published in 1849. It argues that people should not permit governments to overrule or atrophy their consciences, and that people have a duty to avoid allowing such acquiescence to enable the government to make them the agents of injustice. Thoreau was motivated in part by his, originally titled "Resistance to Civil Government", has had a wide influence on many later practitioners of civil disobedience. The driving idea behind the essay is that citizens are morally responsible for their support of aggressors, even when such support is required by law. In the essay, Thoreau explained his reasons for having refused to pay taxes Tax resistance can be a form of conscientious objection . Tax resistance can also be a variety of protest, or a technique of nonviolent resistance (for example, in India’s campaign for independence led by Mahatma Gandhi) as an act of protest A protest expresses a strong reaction of events or situations. The term protest usually now implies a reaction against something, while previously it could also mean a reaction for something. Protesters may organize a protest as a way of publicly and forcefully making their opinions heard in an attempt to influence public opinion or government against slavery Slavery is a system in which people are the property of others. Slaves can be held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase or birth, and deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to demand wages. In some societies it was legal for an owner to kill a slave; in others it was a crime to kill a slave and against the Mexican-American War The Mexican–American War was an armed conflict between the United States and Mexico from 1846 to 1848 in the wake of the 1845 U.S. annexation of Texas, which Mexico considered part of its territory despite the 1836 Texas Revolution. He writes, "If I devote myself to other pursuits and contemplations, I must first see, at least, that I do not pursue them sitting upon another man's shoulders. I must get off him first, that he may pursue his contemplations too. See what gross inconsistency is tolerated. I have heard some of my townsmen say, 'I should like to have them order me out to help put down an insurrection of the slaves, or to march to Mexico; — see if I would go'; and yet these very men have each, directly by their allegiance, and so indirectly, at least, by their money, furnished a substitute."

Usage of the term

Thoreau's 1849 essay "Resistance to Civil Government" was eventually renamed "civil disobedience." After his landmark lectures were published in 1866, the term began to appear in numerous sermons and lectures relating to slavery and the war in Mexico.^{[10][11][12][13]} Thus, by the time Thoreau's lectures were first published under the title "Civil Disobedience," in 1866, four years after his death, the term had achieved fairly widespread usage.

It has been argued that the term "civil disobedience" has always suffered from ambiguity and in modern times, become utterly debased. Marshall Cohen notes, "It has been used to describe everything from bringing a test-case in the federal courts to taking aim at a federal official. Indeed, for Vice President The Vice President of the United States is the holder of a public office created by the United States Constitution. The vice president, together with the President of the United States, is indirectly elected by the people through the Electoral College to a four-year term. The vice president is the first person in the presidential line of Agnew Spiro Theodore Agnew was the 39th Vice President of the United States, serving under President Richard Nixon, and the 55th Governor of Maryland. He was also the first Greek American to hold these offices it has become a code-word describing the activities of muggers, arsonists Arson is the crime of intentionally and maliciously setting fire to structures or wildland areas. It may be distinguished from other causes such as spontaneous combustion and natural wildfires. Arson usually describes fires deliberately set to the property of another or to one's own property as to collect insurance compensation, draft evaders, campaign hecklers, campus militants, anti-war demonstrators, juvenile delinquents Juvenile delinquency refers to children who act against the law. Most legal systems prescribe specific procedures for dealing with juveniles, such as juvenile detention centers. There are a multitude of different theories on the causes of crime, most if not all of which can be applied to the causes of youth crime. Youth crime is a major issue and and political assassins."^[14]

LeGrande writes that "the formulation if a single all-encompassing definition of the term is extremely difficult, if not impossible. In reviewing the voluminous literature on the subject, the student of civil disobedience rapidly finds himself surrounded by a maze of semantical Semantics is the study of meaning, usually in language. The word "semantics" itself denotes a range of ideas, from the popular to the highly technical. It is often used in ordinary language to denote a problem of understanding that comes down to word selection or connotation. This problem of understanding has been the subject of many problems and grammatical niceties. Like Alice in Wonderland Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is an 1865 novel written by English author Charles Lutwidge Dodgson under the pseudonym Lewis Carroll . It tells the story of a girl named Alice who falls down a rabbit hole into a fantasy world populated by peculiar and anthropomorphic creatures.The tale plays with logic in ways that have given the story lasting, he often finds that specific terminology has no more (or no less) meaning than the individual orator intends it to have." He encourages a distinction between lawful protest demonstration, nonviolent civil disobedience, and violent civil disobedience.^[15]

In a letter to P.K.Rao, dated September 10, 1935, Gandhi disputes that his idea of civil disobedience was derived from the writings of Thoreau:^[16]

Theories and techniques

In seeking an active form of civil disobedience, one may choose to deliberately break certain laws, such as by forming a peaceful blockade or occupying a facility illegally, though sometimes violence has been known to occur. Protesters practice this non-violent form of civil disorder Civil disorder, also known as civil unrest, is a broad term that is typically used by law enforcement to describe one or more forms of disturbance caused by a group of people. Civil disturbance is typically a symptom of, and a form of protest against, major socio-political problems; the severity of the action coincides with public expression of with the expectation that they will be arrested. Others also expect to be attacked or even beaten by the authorities. Protesters often undergo training in advance on how to react to arrest or to attack, so that they will do so in a manner that quietly or limply resists without threatening the authorities.

Mahatma Gandhi Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (Hindi: मोहनदास करमचंद गाँधी, Gujarati: મોહનદાસ કરમચંદ ગાંધી, pronounced [moːɦən̪d̪aːs kərəmʨən̪d̪ ɡaːn̪d̪ʱiː] ; 2 October 1869 – 30 January 1948) was the pre-eminent political and spiritual leader of India during the Indian outlined several rules for civil resisters (or satyagrahi Satyagraha is a philosophy and practice of nonviolent resistance developed by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (also known as "Mahatma" Gandhi). Gandhi deployed satyagraha in the Indian independence movement and also during his earlier struggles in South Africa. Satyagraha theory influenced Nelson Mandela's struggle in South Africa under) in the time when he was leading India in the struggle for Independence from the British Empire. For instance, they were to express no anger, never retaliate, submit to the opponent's orders and assaults, submit to arrest by the authorities, surrender personal property when confiscated by the authorities but refuse to surrender property held in trust, refrain from swearing and insults (which are contrary to ahimsa Ahimsa is a term meaning to do no harm (literally: the avoidance of violence - himsa). It is an important tenet of the Indian religions (Hinduism, Buddhism and especially Jainism). Ahimsa is a rule of conduct that bars the killing or injuring of living beings. It is closely connected with the notion that all kinds of violence entail negative), refrain from saluting the Union flag The Union Flag, also known as the Union Jack, is the flag of the United Kingdom. It retains an official or semi-official status in some Commonwealth Realms; for example, it is known as the Royal Union Flag in Canada. It is also used as an official flag in some of the smaller British overseas territories. The current design dates from the Union of, and protect officials from insults and assaults even at the risk of the resister's own life.

Civil disobedience is usually defined as pertaining to a citizen's relation to the state and its laws, as distinguished from a constitutional impasse in which two public agencies, especially two equally sovereign Sovereignty is the quality of having supreme, independent authority over a territory. It can be found in a power to rule and make law that rests on a political fact for which no purely legal explanation can be provided. The concept has been discussed, debated and questioned throughout history, from the time of the Romans through to the present day, branches of government The separation of powers, also known as trias politica, is a model for the governance of democratic states. The model was first developed in ancient Greece and came into widespread use by the Roman Republic as part of the uncodified Constitution of the Roman Republic. Under this model, the state is divided into branches or estates, each with, conflict. For instance, if the head of government Head of government is the chief officer of the executive branch of a government, often presiding over a cabinet. In a parliamentary system, the head of government is often styled Prime Minister, President of the Government, Premier, etc. In presidential republics or absolute monarchies, the head of government may be the same person as the head of of a country were to refuse to enforce a decision of that country's highest court, it would not be civil disobedience, since the head of government would be acting in his capacity as public official rather than private citizen.^[17]

Ronald Dworkin Ronald Dworkin, QC, FBA is an American philosopher of law and scholar of constitutional law. He is Jeremy Bentham Professor of Law and Philosophy at University College London, Frank Henry Sommer Professor of Law at New York University, and has taught previously at Yale Law School and the University of Oxford. An influential contributor to both held that there are three types of civil disobedience. "Integrity-based" civil disobedience occurs when a citizen disobeys a law he feels is immoral, as in the case of northerners disobeying the fugitive slave laws by refusing to turn over escaped slaves to authorities. "Justice-based" civil disobedience occurs when a citizen disobeys laws in order to lay claim to some right denied to him, as when blacks illegally protested during the Civil Rights Movement. And "policy-based" civil disobedience occurs when a person breaks the law in order to change a policy he believes is dangerously wrong.^[18]

Some theories of civil disobedience hold that civil disobedience is only justified against governmental entities. Brownlee argues that disobedience in opposition to the decisions of non-governmental agencies such as trade unions, banks, and private universities can be justified if it reflects "a larger challenge to the legal system that permits those decisions to be taken". The same principle, she argues, applies to breaches of law in protest against international organizations and foreign governments.^[19]

It is usually recognized that lawbreaking, if it is not done publicly, as least must be publicly announced in order to constitute civil disobedience.^[20] But Stephen Eilmann argues that if it is necessary to disobey rules that conflict with morality, we might ask why disobedience should take the form of public civil disobedience rather than simply covert lawbreaking. If a lawyer is going to wishes to help a client overcome legal obstacles to securing his natural rights, he might, for instance, find that assisting in fabricating evidence or committing perjury is more effective than open disobedience. This assumes that common morality does not have a prohibition on deceit in such situations.^[21] The Fully Informed Jury Association's publication "A Primer for Prospective Jurors" notes, "Think of the dilemma faced by German citizens when Hitler's secret police demanded to know if they were hiding a Jew in their house."^[22]

Violent vs. nonviolent

There has been some debate as to whether civil disobedience need be non-violent. Black's Law Dictionary includes nonviolence in its definition of civil disobedience. Christian Bay's encyclopedia article states that civil disobedience requires "carefully chosen and legitimate means," but holds that they do not have to be nonviolent.^[23] It has been argued that, while both civil disobedience and civil rebellion are justified by appeal to constitutional defects, rebellion is much more destructive; therefore, the defects justifying rebellion must be much more serious than those justifying disobedience, and if one cannot justify civil rebellion, then one cannot justify a civil disobedients' use of force and violence and refusal to submit to arrest. Civil disobedients' refraining from violence is also said to help preserve society's tolerance of civil disobedience.^[24] But McCloskey argues that "if violent, intimidatory, coercive disobedience is more effective, it is, other things being equal, more justified than less effective, nonviolent disobedience."^[25]

Revolutionary vs. nonrevolutionary

Non-revolutionary civil disobedience is a simple disobedience of laws on the grounds that they are judged "wrong" by an individual conscience, or as part of an effort to render certain laws ineffective, to cause their repeal, or to exert pressure to get one's political wishes on some other issue. Revolutionary civil disobedience is more of an active attempt to overthrow a government.^[26] Gandhi's acts have been described as revolutionary civil disobedience.^[17] It has been claimed that the Hungarians under Ferenc Deák directed revolutionary civil disobedience against the Austrian government.^[27] Thoreau also wrote of civil disobedience accomplishing "peaceable revolution."^[28]

Collective vs. solitary

The earliest recorded incidents of collective civil disobedience took place during the Roman Empire. Unarmed Jews gathered in the streets to prevent the installation of pagan images in the Temple in Jerusalem. In modern times, some activists who commit civil disobedience as a group collectively refuse to sign bail until certain demands are met, such as favorable bail conditions, or the release of all the activists. This is a form of jail solidarity.^[29] There have also been many instances of solitary civil disobedience, such as that committed by Thoreau, but these sometimes go unnoticed. Thoreau, at the time of his arrest, was not yet a well-known author, and his arrest was not covered in any newspapers in the days, weeks and months after it happened. The tax collector who arrested him rose to higher political office, and Thoreau's essay was not published until after the end of the Mexican War.^[30]

Choice of specific act

Civil disobedients have chosen a variety of different illegal acts. Bedau writes, "There is a whole class of acts, undertaken in the name of civil disobedience, which, even if they were widely practiced, would in themselves constitute hardly more than a nuisance (e.g. trespassing at a nuclear-missile installation)...[S]uch acts are often just a harassment and, at least to the bystander, somewhat inane...[T]he remoteness of the connection between the disobedient act and the objectionable law lays such acts open to the charge of ineffectiveness and absurdity." Bedau also notes, though, that the very harmlessness of such entirely symbolic illegal protests toward public policy goals may serve a propaganda purpose.^[27] Some civil disobedients, such as the proprietors of illegal medical cannabis dispensaries and Voice in the Wilderness, which brought medicine to Iraq without the permission of the U.S. Government, directly achieve a desired social goal (such as the provision of medication to the sick) while openly breaking the law. Julia Butterfly Hill lived in Luna, a 180-foot-tall, 600-year-old California Redwood tree for 738 days, successfully preventing it from being cut down.

In cases where the criminalized behavior is pure speech, civil disobedience can consist simply of engaging in the forbidden speech. An example would be WBAI's broadcasting the track "Filthy Words" from a George Carlin comedy album, which eventually led to the 1978 Supreme Court case of FCC v. Pacifica Foundation. Threatening government officials is another classic way of expressing defiance toward the government and unwillingness to stand for its policies. For example, Free State Project participant Joseph Haas was arrested for allegedly sending an email to the Lebanon, New Hampshire city councilors stating, "Wise up or die."^[31]

More generally, protestors of particular victimless crimes often see fit to openly commit that crime. Laws against public nudity, for instance, have been protested by going naked in public, and laws against cannabis consumption have been protested by openly possessing it and using it at cannabis rallies.^[32] Sometimes civil disobedients violate more than one such law at once, an example being a 2009 open carry topless protest in Keene, New Hampshire in which females illegally wore firearms but not upper body clothing.

Some forms of civil disobedience, such as illegal boycotts, refusals to pay taxes, draft dodging, and sit-ins, make it more difficult for a system to function. In this way, they might be considered coercive. Brownlee notes that "although civil disobedients are constrained in their use of coercion by their conscientious aim to engage in moral dialogue, nevertheless they may find it necessary to employ limited coercion in order to get their issue onto the table."^[19] The Plowshares organization temporarily closed GCSB Waihopai by padlocking the gates and using sickles to deflate one of the large domes covering two satellite dishes.

Electronic civil disobedience can include web site defacements, redirects, denial-of-service attacks, information theft, illegal web site parodies, virtual sit-ins, and virtual sabotage. It is distinct from other kinds of hacktivism in that the perpetrator openly reveals his identity. Virtual actions rarely succeed in completely shutting down their targets, but they often generate significant media attention.^[33]

Cooperation with authorities

Some theories of civil disobedience hold that the protestor must submit to arrest and cooperate with the authorities. Others advocate falling limp or otherwise resisting arrest, especially when it will hinder the police from effectively responding to a mass protest. A possible disadvantage of going limp, for those who wish to communicate with the arresting officer about their ideals, is that it may be difficult to do so while being dragged across the ground.^[34]

Many of the same decisions and principles that apply in other criminal investigations and arrests arise also in civil disobedience cases. For example, the suspect may need to decide whether or not to grant a consent search of his property, and whether or not to talk to police officers. It is generally agreed within the legal community,^[35] and is often believed within the activist community, that a suspect's talking to criminal investigators can serve no useful purpose, and may be harmful. However, some civil disobedients have nonetheless found it hard to resist responding to investigators' questions, sometimes due to a lack of understanding of the legal ramifications, or due to a fear of seeming rude.^[36] Also, some civil disobedients seek to use the arrest as an opportunity to make an impression on the officers. Thoreau wrote, "My civil neighbor, the tax-gatherer, is the very man I have to deal with--for it is, after all, with men and not with parchment that I quarrel--and he has voluntarily chosen to be an agent of the government. How shall he ever know well that he is and does as an officer of the government, or as a man, until he is obliged to consider whether he will treat me, his neighbor, for whom he has respect, as a neighbor and well-disposed man, or as a maniac and disturber of the peace, and see if he can get over this obstruction to his neighborlines without a ruder and more impetuous thought or speech corresponding with his action."^[28]

Some civil disobedients feel it is incumbent upon them to accept punishment because of their belief in the validity of the social contract, which is held to bind all to obey the laws that a government meeting certain standards of legitimacy has established, or else suffer the penalties set out in the law. Other civil disobedients who favor the existence of government still don't believe in the legitimacy of their particular government, or don't believe in the legitimacy of a particular law it has enacted. And still other civil disobedients, being anarchists, don't believe in the legitimacy of any government, and therefore see no need to accept punishment for a violation of criminal law that does not infringe the rights of others.

Choice of plea

An important decision for civil disobedients is whether or not to plead guilty. There is much debate on this point, as some believe that it is a civil disobedient's duty to submit to the punishment prescribed by law, while others believe that defending oneself in court will increase the possibility of changing the unjust law.^[37] It has also been argued that either choice is compatible with the spirit of civil disobedience. ACT-UP's Civil Disobedience Training handbook states that a civil disobedient who pleads guilty is essentially stating, "Yes, I committed the act of which you accuse me. I don't deny it; in fact, I am proud of it. I feel I did the right thing by violating this particular law; I am guilty as charged," but that pleading not guilty sends a message of, "Guilt implies wrong-doing. I feel I have done no wrong. I may have violated some specific laws, but I am guilty of doing no wrong. I therefore plead not guilty." A plea of no contest is sometimes regarded as a compromise between the two.^[38] One defendant accused of illegally protesting nuclear power, when asked to enter his plea, stated, "I plead for the beauty that surrounds us";^[39] this is known as a "creative plea," and will usually be interpreted as a plea of not guilty.^[40]

Paul Flower writes, "There may be many times when protestors choose to go to jail, as a way of continuing their protest, as a way of reminding their countrymen of injustice. But that is different than the notion that they must go to jail as part of a rule connected with civil disobedience. The key point is that the spirit of protest should be maintained all the way, whether it is done by remaining in jail, or by evading it. To accept jail penitently as an accession to 'the rules' is to switch suddenly to a spirit of subservience, to demean the seriousness of the protest...In particular, the neo-conservative insistence on a guilty plea should be eliminated."^[41]

Sometimes the prosecution proposes a plea bargain to civil disobedients, as in the case of the Camden 28, in which the defendants were offered an opportunity to plead guilty to one misdemeanor count and receive no jail time.^[42] In some mass arrest situations, the activists decide to use solidarity tactics to secure the same plea bargain for everyone.^[40] But some activists have opted to enter a blind plea, pleading guilty without any plea agreement in place. Mohandas Gandhi pleaded guilty and told the court, "I am here to . . . submit cheerfully to the highest penalty that can be inflicted upon me for what in law is a deliberate crime and what appears to me to be the highest duty of a citizen."^[43]

Legal implications of civil disobedience

Barkan writes that if defendants plead not guilty, "they must decide whether their primary goal will be to win an acquittal and avoid imprisonment or a fine, or to use the proceedings as a forum to inform the jury and the public of the political circumstances surrounding the case and their reasons for breaking the law via civil disobedience." A technical defense may enhance the chances for acquittal but make for more boring proceedings and reduced press coverage. During the Vietnam War era, the Chicago Eight used a political defense, while Benjamin Spock used a technical defense.^[44] In countries such as the United States whose laws guarantee the right to a jury trial but do not excuse lawbreaking for political purposes, some civil disobedients seek jury nullification. Over the years, this has been made more difficult by court decisions such as Sparf v. United States, which held that the judge need not inform jurors of their nullification prerogative, and United States v. Dougherty, which held that the judge need not allow defendants to openly seek jury nullification.

Governments have generally not recognized the legitimacy of civil disobedience or viewed political objectives as an excuse for breaking the law. Specifically, the law usually distinguishes between criminal motive and criminal intent; the offender's motives or purposes may be admirable and praiseworthy, but his intent may still be criminal.^[45] Hence the saying that "if there is any possible justification of civil disobedience it must come from outside the legal system."^[46]

One theory is that, while disobedience may be helpful, any great amount of it would undermine the law by encouraging general disobedience which is neither conscientious nor of social benefit. Therefore, conscientious lawbreakers must be punished.^[47] Michael Bayles argues that if a person violates a law in order to create a test case as to the constitutionality of a law, and then wins his case, then that act did not constitute civil disobedience.^[48] It has also been argued that breaking the law for self-gratification, as in the case of a homosexual or cannabis user who does not direct his act at securing the repeal of amendment of the law, is not civil disobedience.^[49] Likewise, a protestor who attempts to escape punishment by committing the crime covertly and avoiding attribution, or by denying having committed the crime, or by fleeing the jurisdiction, is generally viewed as not being a civil disobedient.

Courts have distinguished between two types of civil disobedience: "Indirect civil disobedience involves violating a law which is not, itself, the object of protest, whereas direct civil disobedience involves protesting the existence of a particular law by breaking that law."^[50] During the Vietnam War, courts typically refused to excuse the perpetrators of illegal protests from punishment on the basis of their challenging the legality of the Vietnam War; the courts ruled it was a political question.^[51] The necessity defense has sometimes been used as a shadow defense by civil disobedients to deny guilt without denouncing their politically motivated acts, and to present their political beliefs in the courtroom.^[52] However, court cases such as U.S. v. Schoon have greatly curtailed the availability of the political necessity defense.^[53] Likewise, when Carter Wentworth was charged for his role in the Clamshell Alliance's 1977 illegal occupation of the Seabrook Station Nuclear Power Plant, the judge instructed the jury to disregard his competing harms defense, and he was found guilty.^[54] Fully Informed Jury Association activists have sometimes handed out educational leaflets inside courthouses despite admonitions not to; according to FIJA, many of them have escaped prosecution because "prosecutors have reasoned (correctly) that if they arrest fully informed jury leafleters, the leaflets will have to be given to the leafleter's own jury as evidence."^[55]

Along with giving the offender his just desserts, achieving crime control via incapacitation and deterrence is a major goal of criminal punishment.^[56][57] Brownee argues, "Bringing in deterrence at the level of justification detracts from the law’s engagement in a moral dialogue with the offender as a rational person because it focuses attention on the threat of punishment and not the moral reasons to follow this law."^[19] Leonard Hubert Hoffmann writes, "In deciding whether or not to impose punishment, the most important consideration would be whether it would do more harm than good. This means that the objector has no right not to be punished. It is a matter for the state (including the judges) to decide on utilitarian grounds whether to do so or not."^[58]

It has been noted that the poor may have more to lose than the middle class from engagement in civil disobedience. The poor often receive government benefits that could be jeopardized by an arrest, and have prior criminal convictions that could result in harsher punishment. As a result, sometimes the participants in illegal demonstrations against government policies deemed to harm poverty-stricken minorities are predominantly white and middle class.^[59]

Bibliography

• Civil Disobedience, a book written by Henry David Thoreau
• May 68, Philosophy is in the Street!, a book written by Vincent Cespedes

See also

• Committee of 100 (United Kingdom)
• Mohandas Gandhi
  • Satyagraha
• Dr Martin Luther King, Jr
  • Letter from Birmingham Jail
• Rosa Parks, "mother of the civil rights movement"
• James Bevel, the Strategist of the 1960s Civil Rights Movement
• Dalai Lama
• Abalone Alliance and Clamshell Alliance, anti-nuclear power groups
• Christian anarchism
• Conscientious objection
• Direct action
• Draft resistance
• Examples of civil disobedience
• Righteous Among the Nations
  • Le Chambon-sur-Lignon, French bread town
• Insubordination
• Henry David Thoreau
• Hunt sabotage
• Lech Wałęsa
• Nonconformism
• Nonviolence
• Nonviolent resistance
• Dorothy Day co-founder of Catholic Worker Movement
• Philip Berrigan former Josephite priest and nonviolent activist
• Daniel Berrigan Jesuit priest and nonviolent activist

• Percy Shelley
  • The Masque of Anarchy
• Sousveillance, passive campaign against surveillance
• Tax resistance
• Tree sitting
• Trident Ploughshares, anti-nuclear weapons group
• Defiance Campaign, anti-apartheid campaign in South Africa.
• The White Rose
• Václav Havel

Notes

1. ^ Violent Civil Disobedience and Willingness to Accept Punishment, 8, Essays in Philosophy, June 2007, http://www.humboldt.edu/~essays/mararo.html
2. ^ J Morreall (1976), The justifiability of violent civil disobedience, Canadian Journal of Philosophy, http://www.jstor.org/stable/40230600
3. ^ Zunes, Stephen (1999). Nonviolent Social Movements: A Geographical Perspective. Blackwell Publishing.
4. ^ Michael Lerner. Tikkun reader.
5. ^ "Nonviolent Struggle and the Revolution in East Germany". http://www.aeinstein.org/organizations/org/NonviolentStruggleandtheRevolutioninEastGermany-Eng.pdf.
6. ^ "The Orange Revolution". Time Magazine. 12 December 2004. http://www.time.com/time/europe/html/041206/story.html. Retrieved 30 April 2010.
7. ^ ^{a b c} http://www.morrissociety.org/JWMS/SP94.10.4.Nichols.pdf
8. ^ Thomas Weber, "Gandhi as Disciple and Mentor," Cambridge University Press, 2004, pp. 28–29.
9. ^ Thomas Weber, "Gandhi as Disciple and Mentor," Cambridge University Press, 2004, pp. 28.
10. ^ The Gospel Applied to the Fugitive Slave Law [1850]: A Sermon, by mayur (1851)
11. ^ "The Higher Law," in Its Application to the Fugitive Slave Bill:... by John Newell and John Chase Lord (1851)
12. ^ The Limits of Civil Disobedience: A Sermon..., by Nathaniel Hall (1851)
13. ^ The Duty and Limitations of Civil Disobedience: A Discourse, by Samuel Colcord Bartlett (1853)
14. ^ Marshall Cohen (Spring, 1969), Civil Disobedience in a Constitutional Democracy, 10, The Massachusetts Review, pp. 211-226
15. ^ J. L. LeGrande (Sep., 1967), Nonviolent Civil Disobedience and Police Enforcement Policy, 58, Northwestern University, pp. 393-404, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1141639
16. ^ Letter to P.K. Rao, Servants of India Society, September 10, 1935, Letter quoted in Louis Fischer's, The Life of Mahatma Gandhi, Part I, Chapter 11, pp. 87-88.
17. ^ ^{a b} Rex Martin (Jan., 1970), Civil Disobedience, 80, Ethics, pp. 123-139
18. ^ Ken Kress and Scott W. Anderson (Spring, 1989), Dworkin in Transition, 37, The American Journal of Comparative Law, pp. 337-351
19. ^ ^{a b c} Kimberley Brownlee (9 November 2006), The communicative aspects of civil disobedience and lawful punishment, Criminal Law and Philosophy, doi:10.1007/s11572-006-9015-9
20. ^ http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Health/Civil_Disobedience.html
21. ^ Stephen Ellmann (Jan., 1990), Lawyering for Justice in a Flawed Democracy, 90, Columbia Law Review, pp. 116-190, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1122838
22. ^ A Primer for Prospective Jurors, Fully Informed Jury Association, http://fija.org/download/BR_2008_QandA_primer.pdf
23. ^ Bay, Christian, Civil Disobedience, II, International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, pp. 473-486
24. ^ Stuart M. Brown, Jr., Civil Disobedience, 58, The Journal of Philosophy
25. ^ H. J. McCloskey (Jun., 1980), Conscientious Disobedience of the Law: Its Necessity, Justification, and Problems to Which it Gives Rise, 40, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, pp. 536-557, http://www.jstor.org/stable/2106847
26. ^ Harry Prosch (Apr., 1967), Toward an Ethics of Civil Disobedience, 77, Ethics, pp. 176-192
27. ^ ^{a b} Hugo A. Bedau (Oct. 12, 1961), 58, The Journal of Philosophy, pp. 653-665, http://www.jstor.org/stable/2023542
28. ^ ^{a b} Thoreau, Henry David. Civil Disobedience.
29. ^ P Herngren (1993), Path of Resistance, The Practice of Civil Disobedience, http://taghier.org/books/english/path_e.pdf
30. ^ Gross, Robert A. (Oct. 2005), Quiet War With The State; Henry David Thoreau and Civil Disobedience., The Yale Review, pp. 1-17
31. ^ Brown case e-mails investigated, Union-Leader, Jun. 21, 2007, http://www.unionleader.com/article.aspx?headline=Brown+case+e-mails+investigated&articleId=083dd586-0d54-4650-a9ca-07f99d4d3914
32. ^ Clark, Dick (April 22, 2008), LewRockwell.com, http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig8/clark-d5.htmltitle=Civil Disobedience and the Libertarian Division of Labor
33. ^ Jeffrey S. Juris, The New Digital Media and Activist Networking within Anti-Corporate Globalization Movements, 597, Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, http://www.jstor.org/stable/25046069
34. ^ Kayla Starr, The Role of Civil Disobedience in Democracy, Civil Liberties, http://www.civilliberties.org/sum98role.html
35. ^ Watts v. Indiana, 338 U.S. 49 (1949)
36. ^ A Postscript to the Miranda Project: Interrogation of Draft Protestors, 77, The Yale Law Journal, Dec., 1967, pp. 300-319
37. ^ Rules for Engaging in Civil Disobedience, Free State Project, http://freestateproject.org/news/issues/civil_disobedience.php
38. ^ Civil Disobedience Training, ACT-UP, 2003, http://www.actupny.org/documents/CDdocuments/ACTUP_CivilDisobedience.pdf
39. ^ Hurst, John (August 10), A-plant protestors being freed, Los Angeles Times
40. ^ ^{a b} National Lawyers Guild, LA Chapter, Questions and Answers about Civil Disobedience and the Legal Process, http://www.nlg-la.org/index_files/cd_questions.pdf
41. ^ Paul F. Power (Mar., 1970), On Civil Disobedience in Recent American Democratic Thought, 64, The American Political Science Review, pp. 35-47
42. ^ Mirelle Cohen (Oct., 2007), 35, Teaching Sociology, pp. 391-392
43. ^ Nick Gier (January 15, 2006), Three Principles of Civil Disobedience: Thoreau, Gandhi, and King, Lewiston Morning Tribune
44. ^ Steven E. Barkan (Oct., 1979), Strategic, Tactical and Organizational Dilemmas of the Protest Movement against Nuclear Power, 27, Social Problems, pp. pp. 19-37
45. ^ Thomas Morawetz (Summer, 1986), Reconstructing the Criminal Defenses: The Significance of Justification, 77, The Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology (1973-), pp. 277-307
46. ^ Arthur W. Munk (Sep., 1971), Civil Disobedience: Conscience, Tactics, and the Law, 397, Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, pp. 211-212
47. ^ Robert T. Hall (Jan., 1971), Legal Toleration of Civil Disobedience, 81, Ethics, pp. 128-142
48. ^ Michael Bayles (Sep., 1970), The Justifiability of Civil Disobedience, 24, The Review of Metaphysics, pp. 3-20
49. ^ Leslie J. Macfarlane (Oct., 1968), Justifying Political Disobedience, 79, Ethics, pp. 24-55
50. ^ U.S. v. Schoon, 939 F2d 826 (July 29, 1991).
51. ^ Hughes, Graham (1968), Civil Disobedience and the Political Question Doctrine, 43, N.Y.U. L. Rev., pp. 1, http://heinonlinebackup.com/hol-cgi-bin/get_pdf.cgi?handle=hein.journals/nylr43&section=11
52. ^ Steven M. Bauer and Peter J. Eckerstrom (May, 1987), The State Made Me Do It: The Applicability of the Necessity Defense to Civil Disobedience, 39, Stanford Law Review, pp. 1173-1200
53. ^ James L. Cavallaro, Jr. (Jan., 1993), The Demise of the Political Necessity Defense: Indirect Civil Disobedience and United States v. Schoon, 81, California Law Review, pp. 351-385
54. ^ Robert Surbrug. Beyond Vietnam: The Politics of Protest in Massachusetts, 1974-1990.
55. ^ http://www.fija.org/docs/JG_If_You_are_Facing_Charges.pdf
56. ^ 18 U.S.C. § 3553
57. ^ 3. The Basic Approach (Policy Statement), 2009 Federal Sentencing Guidelines Manual, http://www.ussc.gov/2009guid/1a1.htm
58. ^ Judgments - Sepet (FC) and Another (FC) (Appellants) v. Secretary of State for the Home Department (Respondent), 20 March 2003, http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200203/ldjudgmt/jd030320/sepet-2.htm
59. ^ Eric Sheptock (July 09, 2010), Risky Business: The Harsh Punishments for Civil Disobedience, http://homelessness.change.org/blog/view/risky_business_the_harsh_punishments_for_civil_disobedience

External links

• "Civil Disobedience" article by Kimberley Brownlee in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• "Civil Disobedience" by Peter Suber, originally in Christopher B. Gray (ed.), Philosophy of Law: An Encyclopedia, Garland Pub. Co, 1999, II.110-113.

Categories: Civil disobedience | Community organizing | Nonviolence | Activism by method

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