Civil Disobedience: Dr. King, Nelson Mandela, And Henry David Thoreau

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Civil Disobedience Essay Laws are sometimes weird and silly, people break laws all the time while they don’t even realize it. In Alabama it is illegal to have an ice cream cone in your back pocket at any time. Considering this, it is right to disobey the law when one’s conscience dictates him or her to do so as demonstrated by Dr. King, Nelson Mandela, and Henry David Thoreau. These historical men used the idea of unity, freedom, and peace to explain their messages across. MLK Jr. and Nelson Mandela relate back to Henry David Thoreau using the idea of unity.
Unity when explaining the idea on non-violence. Martin Luther King Jr. agreed with Henry David Thoreau on unity.“I have a dream that one day right there in Alabama …show more content…

MLK Jr. when to jail because he was protesting the treatments of African Americans in Birmingham. “Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred”(King). This quote demonstrates that King believed you should not get freedom by hurting someone for it, you should get freedom by being yourself and protesting non-violently. Henry David Thoreau also believed in freedom, but in a different way. “The only obligation which I have a right to assume, is to do at any time what I think right”(Thoreau). Henry believed that he should not have to pay taxes for things he did not believe in. Henry went to prison for a day because he didn’t pay his taxes. Henry believed that he should have the freedom to not pay for things he did not support or believe in. Henry went against the law for his freedom. Nelson Mandela believed in freedom also. Nelson Mandela went to jail for 27 years because he stranded up against a government that was abusive against black South Africans. Nelson broke the law, but for a reason. Once, he got out of jail Nelson lead the way to abolition of segregation in South

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