Civil Disobedience Essay

The American Constitution was created with the goal of forming a “more perfect union”1 and thereby undoubtedly a free society. The peaceful resistance to laws to draw attention to their moral faults, better known a civil disobedience, has contributed to the creation of a “free society” in two senses; a society free of injustice, and a society in which individuals are free to act upon civil liberties (our rights).

Resistance to unjust law is the main pillar on which this nation was born, as the revolution was an act of disobedience. In their wisdom, our nation’s founders provided a base for the continuation of such protest through the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, as the First Amendment provides for the freedom of political speech and

The notion that civil disobedience is rooted in the “premise that everyman is entitled to decide for himself which laws he is to obey”3 has led to the assertion that civil disobedience will lead to a broken society where laws carry no weight. However, this statement applies to normal society in that every person constantly chooses what laws to abide by in daily life. Furthermore a true act of civil disobedience, as carried out by Muhammad Ali in protesting the draft, accepts the consequences for acting against the law and affirms “just take me to jail”4 in order to further display the true lack of justice and moral standing in the law being broken. A civil disobedient is disobedient only in pointing out the immorality of certain laws. He or she is accepting of the punishments that come with breaking the law. Civil disobedience displays respect for and dialogue with the system it is trying to change because civil disobedients actively choose not to go about eliminating unjust laws through violent means. Civil disobedience adheres to the parameters of the establishment while creating a morally justified argument against some of its abuses, rather than its founding