Thoreau's Civil Disobedience
...He believes it is more important to develop a respect for the right, rather than a respect for law. (P4) D. Thoreau criticizes that government should simply defend the political attributes we enjoy. The author feels people must do what justice requires regardless of cost. Thoreau writes, "If I have unjustly wrested a plank from a drowning man, I must restore it to him though I drown myself." The people of the United States must stop slavery and the war with Mexico. (P9) E. Thoreau feels that there are thousands of people who don’t want slavery and war with Mexico and don’t do anything. II. Second Section A. Thoreau points out, one sixth of the population in the United States lives in servitude. Thoreau also talks about William Paley, an English theologian and philosopher, who argues that any movement of resistance to government must balance the enormity of the grievance to be redressed and the "probability and expense" of redressing it. Thoreau again talks badly about those in his native state of Massachusetts who profess to be against slavery in the South while participating in the commerce and agricultural trade that supports it. B.Thoreau believes that the real obstacle to reform lies with those who disapprove of the measures of government. Thoreau states to his reader to "action from principle" but again weighs the proportionality of the "remedy" (the measures of civil disobedience taken in the name of resistance) to the "evil" (the injustice to be remedied). He concludes that if a specific law of a government makes a man into an "agent of injustice," that law should be rightfully transgressed and broken regardless of the individual repercussions. C. Money is a generally corrupting force because it binds men to the institutions and government responsible for unjust practices and policies, notably the enslavement of black Americans and the pursuit of the war with Mexico. Thoreau sees a paradoxically inverse relationship between money and freedom. The poor man has the greatest liberty to resist because he depends the least on the government for his own welfare and protection. For the "rich man," crudely speaking, the conse...