“Civil Disobedience” (Resistance to Civil Government)

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“Civil Disobedience” (Resistance to Civil Government)

THE LITERARY WORK

An essay set in Concord, Massachusetts, in 1846; published in 1849.

SYNOPSIS

Upon being jailed for refusing to pay his poll tax—a stance taken to register his protest of the government’s support of slavery and the Mexican War—Henry David Thoreau urges Americans to peacefully protest misguided and immoral government policies through various forms of civil disobedience.

Events in History at the Time of the Essay

The Essay in Focus

For More Information

Born in 1817, Henry David Thoreau retreated to Walden Pond at the age of twenty-eight to escape a life of “quiet desperation,” which he felt that most people led (Knoebel, p. 300). Defying social convention, Thoreau lived at Waiden for two years in contemplative solitude. During that time he refused to pay his poll tax in protest of the government’s support of slavery and the Mexican War. He was arrested for tax evasion, and the experience prompted lectures and an essay on the subject of civil disobedience, in which he urged Americans to peacefully protest unjust government policies as he had done. Living during the tumultuous era that culminated in the Civil War, he spoke out against what he regarded as misguided and immoral government policies and warned of the imminent dangers they posed to the nation if citizens did not take individual action.

Events in History at the Time of the Essay

American democracy under a microscope

With the adoption of the Constitution in 1788, the United States of America created a government described as the first true democracy in the world and became the “hope of the human race” (Davidson, Life in America, p. 315). Many felt that the United States would be the model of political, religious, commercial, and industrial freedom, a democratic experiment without precedent. But as the nation developed and expanded, problems arose that began to turn the international model of freedom and peace into a government that descended into increased restrictiveness and war. By the beginning of the 1800s, the nation was becoming divided over several issues: the rising stream of immigrants from Europe; increased taxation to pay for education, expansion, and defense; conflicts over westward expansion; and the controversial issue of slavery. The government bureaucracy grew, and military confrontations with other nations—particularly with Mexico over territory in the Southwest—occurred with greater frequency.

As America’s population and territory increased, emphasis shifted away from the individual and toward the concept of majority rule. Distinct political parties (Whig and Democrat), formed by the presidential election of 1840, further de-emphasized the individual. Collective groups, backed by moneyed interests, exerted control over government policies and ruled through economic and numeric strength rather than through moral conviction. Sensing their devalued role, individuals generally took less personal responsibility for government policies and relegated authority to majority groups who held the reins of power.

As Thoreau saw it, “a government in which the majority rule in all cases cannot be based on justice.” He pleaded for a morally responsible government “in which majorities do not virtually decide right and wrong, but conscience” (Thoreau in Knoebel, p. 312). Special interests and political parties in control of the majority were, in Thoreau’s view, backing unjust policies—especially regarding the issues of slavery and war with Mexico.

ON THE DANGERS OF POLITICAL PARTIES

In his last public address, President George Washington warned of the potentially poisonous effects of party spirit. He felt that parties chose the most likable rather than the most qualified candidates and tended to take both sides of all issues in order to gain the most public support. In the view of Thoreau as well as Washington, majority rule tends to disempower the individual, discourage dissent, and invite corruption. Party politics, which often involve unqualified, unprincipled leaders, overwhelm individual rights and lead to apathy on the part of the average citizen. Thoreau’s essay, “Civil Disobedience,” was written to counter this tendency and to spark action on the part of conscientious citizens.

There was a connection between the two issues. Slaveholding Southern interests and the Democratic party supported the war with Mexico for selfish reasons; they wanted to gain more territory in order to increase the number of slave states. This expansion, Southern interests believed, would break the Union or exert enough pressure on the government to keep slavery legal in the United States.

Slavery: the rift widens

Between 1820 and 1850, the issue of slavery increasingly divided the Northern and Southern states. While the morality of slavery was a subject of debate, arguments over slavery were largely framed in economic terms. In the South, where it was legal, slavery was condoned as vital to the economy and considered “a necessary evil” to enable economic prosperity (Davidson, p. 340). In the North, where increasing numbers of working-class immigrants were settling, slavery was seen by workers and manufacturers as an impediment to fair competition. Immigrant workers and Northern manufacturers—who competed directly with Southern businesses that utilized slave labor—wanted the practice abolished, while Southern plantation owners considered slavery necessary to counter the superior technology of Northern manufacturers.

Abolition had been championed on moral grounds primarily by Quakers as early as 1688, but this angle of protest gained little attention until the early 1800s. Through the work of key antislavery activists, such as Wendell Phillips, William Lloyd Garrison, and John Brown, the abolition of slavery became a core political issue by 1846. Thoreau was among the few outspoken abolitionists who attacked the government’s endorsement of slavery on moral grounds. In his eyes, the inaction of Northerners to stop slavery was as bad as the Southerners’ practice of keeping slaves. Thoreau insisted that citizens should and could effect change through individual actions:

If one HONEST man, in this state of Massachusetts, ceasing to hold slaves, were actually to withdraw from this copartnership, and be locked up in the county jail thereafter, it would be the abolition of slavery in America. For it matters not how small the beginning may seem to be: what is once done well is done forever.
(Thoreau in Knoebel, p. 317)

Religion and social responsibility

The concepts of individual responsibility and social activism did not begin with Thoreau. Puritans and Quakers were some of America’s first civil protesters and activists to act on humanitarian grounds. They began and led the temperance and abolition movements and founded societies dedicated to the concept of peaceful coexistence between man and nature. In fact, Quaker leader William Penn had founded his colony in Pennsylvania (Penn’s Holy Experiment) based on ideals of tolerance and equality. Comprised of men and women of all races and creeds, Penn’s Quakers did not believe in rule by priests, but rather placed responsibility for moral development on the individual. They practiced humanitarian acts—speaking out against slavery, boycotting slave-produced goods, and sheltering and feeding the oppressed—and regularly demonstrated the power of individual action.

Thoreau drew on many concepts developed by the Quakers and other social reformers who went before him. Thoreau, like Penn’s Quakers, escaped mainstream society in his retreat to Walden Pond, and like them he believed it was imperative for the individual to combat immoral policies. “Is there not a sort of blood shed when the conscience is wounded?” Thoreau asks. “Through this wound a man’s real manhood and immortality flow out, and he bleeds to an everlasting death” (Thoreau in Knoebel, p. 318). Like the Quakers, Thoreau believed a truly moral person could not stand idly by and be a party to injustice.

Legacy of distrust and protest

Distrust of the government was a natural byproduct of British tyranny and the American Revolution. Since colonists landed on Plymouth Rock in 1620, protest and revolt had been a part of mainstream life in the New World as individuals pressed for freedom and liberty. One of the Founding Fathers, Thomas Jefferson, even described dissent as healthy and vital to democracy. “I like a little rebellion now and then,” he said, comparing it to a storm in the atmosphere (Davidson, p. 320).

After the adoption of the Constitution, protests surfaced from time to time throughout the country—for example, against the War of 1812. But Thoreau’s concept of civil disobedience, which involved passive resistance, was somewhat new to America. Influenced by Hindu and Buddhist philosophy, Thoreau proclaimed that it was not only legal for Americans to protest immoral government action but that it was their obligation to do so. Like Buddha, who declared that “he who possesses virtue and intelligence, who is just, speaks the truth,” Thoreau proclaimed that anyone adhering to God’s law, speaking out for what is just and right, constitutes a majority (Weinberg, p. 472).

The Mexican War

In 1845 the annexation of the Republic of Texas became a major source of controversy between the United States and Mexico. Mexico claimed Texas as part of Mexico, while Texas received an offer from the United States to become a state in its union. On July 4 Texas agreed to the United States offer, and diplomatic relations between Mexico and the United States ceased. Approximately six months later, in January 1846, President James Polk ordered General Zachary Taylor to advance to the Rio Grande River and prepare for war. In April hostilities erupted.

Triggered by failed diplomacy and conflicts in other areas of the West as well as the annexation of Texas, the Mexican War lasted approximately two years. It was an unpopular war, fueled largely by Southern slaveholders who wanted to increase the number of slave states and upset the balance of power in the Union. (At the time there was an equal number of slave and free states in the Union.) When France and England refused to come to the aid of Mexico, few doubted that the United States would win the war, though many deplored the action. Ralph Waldo Emerson, a close friend of Thoreau, commented that “the United States will conquer Mexico but it will be as the man swallows the arsenic which brings him down in turn. Mexico will poison us” (Emerson in Devoto, p. 492). The U.S. military had never before invaded a sovereign nation, and people regarded this war as an invasion of Mexico, no matter what official reason was given for the outbreak of hostilities. Many, like Emerson, thought the U.S. invasion was unconscionable, and some, like Thoreau, refused to pay the taxes that supported it. The war ended officially in February 1848, but its effects have lingered (as Emerson and Thoreau predicted) to the present day.

ABOLITION LEADERSHIP

Wendell Phillips, William Lloyd Garrison, and John Brown were three of the nation’s best known abolitionists, and all were strongly supported by Henry David Thoreau. Phillips, who presided over the American Antislavery Society from 1865 to 1870, dedicated himself to the abolition of slavery, arguing that it was a sin according to Puritan Christian ideals. Garrison, founder of the first American Antislavery Society, was considered the conscience of the abolition movement. He published an influential abolitionist newspaper, the Liberator, to which Thoreau contributed. Brown was a radical abolitionist who is best remembered for inciting slaves to revolt and, with a small band of men, for killing five slaveholders during a raid on Harper’s Ferry, Virginia. He was condemned by conservative abolitionists and executed for murder, though he was vehemently defended by Thoreau, who compared Brown to Christ, calling him “an angel of light” (Thoreau in Davidson, p. 383).

The Essay in Focus

The contents

Beginning his essay boldly, Thoreau asserts “that government is best which governs least” or “governs not at all” (Thoreau, “Civil Disobedience,” p. 455). He argues that government should function as the will of the people dictates rather than in the interest of a powerful few. Citing the Mexican War as an example of “a few individuals using the standing government as their tool,” Thoreau insists that the majority of Americans object to the war (“Civil Disobedience,” p. 455). Challenging the notion of what a democracy is, he contends that a democratic government should “let [the people] alone” and allow as much liberty as possible—especially in the area of trade. He calls not for an end to all government, but for a better government, and insists that changes toward that end be implemented immediately.

Thoreau then invites Americans to consider what kind of government would command respect and to insist on obtaining that ideal. He questions why people have consciences if they do not act on them but instead relegate moral authority to their legislators, as the government requires. Referring to the government’s endorsement of slavery and the Mexican War, Thoreau insists that people should “be men first, and subjects afterward”; in other words, they should object to such immoral government policies (“Civil Disobedience,” p. 456). If the government or companies are run by people of conscience, he continues, then they will become conscientious, responsible institutions.

Challenging another popular notion about democracy and the duties of the citizen, Thoreau cautions against obeying the law for its own sake. He writes that people should not follow leaders blindly, but should instead question authority. The only law one is required to follow, says Thoreau, is the one put forth by God. He warns that when people place absolute faith in mortals “they are as likely to serve the Devil, without intending it, as God” (“Civil Disobedience,” p. 457).

It is more important, says Thoreau, to cultivate a respect for what is right than for the law. If the law or government action is unjust, citizens have a moral responsibility to oppose it. Thoreau further insists that those who merely voice opposition to the war or slavery but do nothing to stop these ills are just as guilty as those who propagate them.

Thoreau then questions the notion of majority rule, arguing that it does not ensure that the government will do what is “right,” but rather that it will do what is popular. In Thoreau’s view, people must be willing to do what is unpopular, to cast independent votes, and to take action against injustice. He contends that, by refusing to challenge the government, citizens promote the war and slavery. “Under the name of Order and Civil Government,” Thoreau asserts, everyone is made to support human “meanness” (“Civil Disobedience,” p. 462).

Thoreau also examines a call made by a number of abolitionists of his era for Massachusetts and other free states to secede from the Union. Commenting on this proposal, Thoreau asks why these so-called people of conscience do not refuse to pay their taxes, which are being used to support slavery and the Mexican War. He maintains that the only place for a moral person is in jail because it is “the only house in a slave State in which a free man can abide with honor” (“Civil Disobedience,” p. 465).

Thoreau next tells of his personal act of civil disobedience. He says he has paid no poll tax for six years in protest of the government’s tolerance of slavery and its campaign against Mexico. Finally arrested in Concord for this stance, he gives details of his short prison stay—one night—before someone (presumably his aunt) paid his tax and he was released. He is clearly upset by the action of the person who paid the tax for him. Thoreau realizes his rescuer’s intentions were good, but he attempts to show that he lost his opportunity to challenge the government when the tax was paid for him.

Realizing that most men think differently from him, Thoreau decries the actions of politicians such as Daniel Webster, who believed that the Constitution defended the practice of slavery. Saying “no man with a genius for legislation has appeared in America,” Thoreau further blasts Thomas Jefferson and the Founding Fathers because they did not outlaw slavery in their initial draft of the Constitution (“Civil Disobedience,” p. 478).

Thoreau once again calls for a government truly based on liberty and freedom, and warns that without better leadership or action on the part of the masses, America is sure to decline. He insists that, as Confucius says, the individual is the basis of an empire and should be respected by the government as such. He says that though the United States has taken a big step forward in founding the first multicultural democracy, improvements can be made. It is up to individuals to assert themselves and take control of the government and truly make it a government of the people, as it was intended to be. Thoreau ends the essay optimistically, saying that if individuals respect one another and are regarded by the State as her source of power rather than her slaves, true democracy will occur.

Sources

Thoreau’s essay grew out of his personal experiences—his refusal to pay poll taxes that would help support the Mexican War and slavery, and his subsequent incarceration. The style of his essay resembles that of one of the leading abolitionists of his day, Wendell Phillips, who was, along with William Lloyd Garrison, Thoreau’s personal friend. Thoreau also took cues from Thomas Carlyle, whom he frequently lectured on. In fact, “Civil Disobedience” was first created as a public lecture, which he delivered in Concord in 1848.

Reviews

Thoreau’s original “Civil Disobedience” lecture was delivered at the Concord Lyceum in Concord, Massachusetts, on January 26, 1848, under the title “The Relation of the Individual to the State.” Nathaniel Hawthorne’s niece, Elizabeth Peabody, published the lecture in her periodical, Aesthetic Papers, a year later under a new title, “Resistance to Civil Government.” Thoreau created the new title for this first publication of his essay. The essay would not be republished until after Thoreau’s death in 1862. It was included in the 1866 volume A Yankee in Canada, with Anti-Slavery and Reform Papers. In this collection, the essay was titled “Civil Disobedience,” the name by which it is often known today. Followers of a recent trend, however, prefer to retain Thoreau’s title “Resistance to Civil Government.”

Hardly anyone read Thoreau’s essay in his own lifetime. As a result, it had little impact during the 1800s. At the turn of the century, however, seventy years after it was written, the Russian writer Leo Tolstoy discovered the essay and commented on it in The North American Review. Shortly thereafter, Mohandas Gandhi, who was leading a revolution of workers in India, published the tract in his newspaper and later in pamphlet form. Gandhi, who named his movement after Thoreau’s essay, was most responsible for making “Civil Disobedience” popular throughout the world. In the 1960s, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. reintroduced Thoreau’s work in the United States, where it became more popular than ever before as people applied its philosophy to the civil rights movement and protests against the Vietnam War. King spoke of the continued relevance of Thoreau’s words to this later era. “As a result of his writings... we are the heirs of a legacy of creative protest. It goes without saying that the teachings of Thoreau are alive today; indeed they are more alive today than ever before” (King in Thoreau, p. 453).

Transcendentalism

Thoreau’s life and work challenged the new American nation’s notion of progress and industrialization. While the mainstream touted the benefits of expansion and industrialization and moved in droves to the burgeoning cities, Thoreau retreated to the woods and insisted that man was actually regressing and harming the world rather than progressing and improving it through technology. He and a select group of other writers—Emerson, Herman Melville, William Blake, Charles Dickens, and Thomas Carlyle—became known as transcendentalists.

Part of the Romantic movement, transcendentalism fundamentally entails a belief that all wisdom comes from nature; that experience is key to understanding; and, akin to Buddhist philosophy, that knowledge must be acquired firsthand, through individual experience. Transcendentalism places primary emphasis on the individual and on instinct over reason, insisting that every person possesses “divine Reason” (Curti, p. 297). These ideals tended to support the American concept of democracy.

Antimaterialist transcendentalists such as Thoreau cautioned against the potentially corrupting elements of the democratic model, such as basing all decisions on majority rule rather than moral conviction. In “Civil Disobedience,” Thoreau breaks ground as a transcendental activist, insisting that it is not enough to merely believe or speak out against injustice—one must act. His essay describes his individual act of disobedience and encourages others of conscience to follow his lead and change America.