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Short biography on martin luther king
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Short biography of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr
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Option 4: Both King and Rawls touch on the nature of just and unjust law, while King goes a step further and argues about responding to unjust law. Write an essay about how individuals do or do not respond to unjust law.
From the creation of the very first civilizations, people have been using laws for potential disputes and or other issues that they come across. With the evolution of time and the expansion of the legal system, many laws were established that did not promote justice and equality. In essence, they did not take into consideration the ethical and racial implications that these laws generated. In our days, laws of this nature are still in effect and are characterized as unjust. They can be found anywhere and can take various forms.
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They may be written and unwritten as it will be examined later. Furthermore, people will either be on the good or the bad side of these laws. In other words, some people will be better off or unharmed by the existence of such laws and others will be unfairly affected by them. As a result, there is variety in the way people deal with them. This can be seen in many works and texts and films such as the “Letter from a Birmingham Jail [King Jr]”, “Justice as fairness”, “Mean Girls” and “The New Jim Crow”. In 1963, Martin Luther King Jr. wrote an open letter concerning the different types of injustice and racial segregation that Negro people had to overcome in Birmingham. In it, King elaborates on the difficulties these people went through. “When you have seen hate filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain your six year old daughter why she can’t go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television.” The letter went on to say how people had the responsibility to disobey these unjust laws and stand up for their rights. “Any law that degrades human personality is unjust”. “I can urge them to disobey segregation ordinances, for they are morally wrong.” However, King clarifies what the nature of such a move will be and mentions “I have earnestly opposed violent tension”. Promoting nonviolent measures, he presents the four steps of the campaign that the oppressed people should follow. First of all is the “collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist”. This is supported later by saying that “Negroes have experienced grossly unjust treatment in the courts. There have been more unsolved bombings of Negro home and churches in Birmingham than in any other city”. The second step is the negotiation with the oppressors, something that did not happen either because negotiation was not accepted by the “White Moderate” or because there were fake promises in the negotiations. “Negro leaders sought to negotiate with the city fathers. But the latter consistently refused to engage in good faith negotiation.” The third step would be self-purification. This would take place by having the person ask himself “Are you able to accept blows without retaliating? Are you able to endure the ordeal of jail?” King says that since the second step of the campaign has failed, the oppressed must move on to direct nonviolent action. “Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community, which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue”. It should be noted that such a campaign was not something obvious.
As mentioned earlier, different people treat unjust law cases differently since they are affected in other ways. Even among the Negroes the reactions varied. There were Negroes in the community that had “adjusted to segregation” because they were “so drained of self-respect and a sense of somebodiness”. Others were so oppressed by the injustices that reacted in violent ways. Mainly these people were in need of a leader that would explain to them why a nonviolent campaign would be more effective. Furthermore there were some “middle class Negroes who have become insensitive to the problems of the masses”. Then there were the white people that are in the oppressor’s side and did not care about the problems. Last, surprisingly enough, there were some exceptions to the rule. Some white people “may see the moral light and voluntarily give up their unjust posture”. “But again I am thankful to God that some noble souls from the ranks of organized religion have broken loose and joined us as active partners in the struggle for freedom.”
Overall, King sympathizes with the exception of the white people and the Negroes who agree to disobey the unjust laws. “One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty. I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience
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of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect of law”, something that reminds me of Nelson Mandela’s acts. In 1971, John Rawls published his work “Justice as fairness”. According to Rawls an unjust law is when at least one of the two following principles are not followed. The first principle is that “each person is to have an equal right to the most extensive basic liberty compatible with similar liberty for others”. The second one is that the “social and economic inequalities are to be arranged so that they are both reasonably expected to be at everyone’s advantage and attached to positions and offices open to all”. If the laws are such that a group of people does not have political liberty, freedom of speech and assembly, freedom of thought, liberty of conscience and other “aspects of the social system that define and secure the equal liberties of citizenship” or the laws are such there are “social and economic inequalities” among the people, then the laws are unjust. These two principles arise from the “theory of the social contract. This theory suggests a situation in which people from a society are called to make rules and laws. These people however, for the purpose of the theory, do not know what their place in society is, they do not know their class position, social status and or their “fortune in the distribution of natural assets and abilities”. Rawls suggests that the unjust laws are the differences one would find when one would compare the two principles of the contractual circumstances mentioned above with one’s “judgments about the basic structure of society which we now make intuitively and in which we have the greatest confidence”. In this theory we distinguish between two kinds of people and their two respective ways of responding to the unjust laws.
The first group is the person who does not find any differences in the principles of the theoretical society and of the present one he lives in. This person does not wish to make any changes to it. Usually this person is a blinded, conformed oppressor. Sometimes he is also innocently blind because of the influence of the masses. On the other hand, the second group is the person who is able to see differences in the two systems and wishes to change principles. Usually this person is either the oppressed who is familiar with the unjust laws, or a logical, equality-promoting person that belongs in the people who are unaffected by such differences. This team goes back and forth comparing the two principles of the theory with the laws in its society and fights for a
change.
King insist that all of the laws ought to reflect the societal moral concerns. In this particular letter, he is making that point in the most explicit manner. He touches on sameness and equivocally states that the law is a form that expression of morality. For instance, he says that separation is a sin yet the law encourages it, and that laws itself is not only unjust, but also sinful. Dr. King also makes a number of dissections which bring out the good quality any legal mind must possess.
The idea of challenging an unreasonable law is central to both King, Jr.'s and Thoreau's plights, though each have very distinct characteristics unique to themselves. In King, Jr.'s case, he saw segregation and racial discrimination as mistakes on the part of the government and he set out to make substantial changes to the status quo. In doing so, he acted upon Thoreau's concept that every person retains the right to judge civil laws for decency and credibility. "One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws," (Birmingham Jail 82). Should one find the law to be in the best interest of each individual as well as society as a whole, he should abide by it and make every effort to live by its standard. But reversely, should the law be found guilty of evil intentions and causing more harm than good, it is the duty of every person under that law to disregard it and make an attempt "to wash his hands of it, and, if he gives it no thought longer, not to give it practically his support," (Disobedience 6).
The tone of King's piece is informative because he explains how color people are being treated. In contrast, Obama's tone of speech is persuading
The letter from Birmingham jail by Dr. Marin Luther King was written as a response of King to nine criticisms made against the Southern Christian leaders and King’s participation in demonstration in Birmingham. King handled many rhetorical devices to convince his opponents such as the white clergymen with his rights to protest, create tension for direct action and to achieve the racial justice. The devices fluctuate between Logos, Pathos and Ethos in a clever way to appeal to his audience and criticize them at the same time. King provided logical supports such as biblical figures, historical and philosophical references. In addition, he used verities of metaphors, allergy and poetic language. In my essay, I will point out some of the rhetorical devices and
Martin Luther King, Jr. is known to be a civil rights activist, humanitarian, a father, and a clergyman. He is well known for fighting for the equal rights of colored people and ending discrimination. King’s Letter from Birmingham Jail is an important part of history that showed King’s opinion of a letter that he happened to read in the newspaper written by a group of clergyman. In this letter, the group of clergyman report that colored people, also known as black people, are being violent towards Birmingham City. Also, the clergymen believed the time that will allow segregation to be diminished was not happening anytime soon because it is not convenient. King refuted the clergymen’s argument in a variety of ways using tactics of argumentation and persuasion like appeal to emotion through real life examples, appeal to logic, and even articulating certain phrases through metaphors and word choice. Many of these different tactics of argumentation and persuasion made his letter very effective and is now seen as a great piece that is looked upon highly today.
During the late 19th and early 20th century, racial injustice was very prominent and even wildly accepted in the South. Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. DuBois were two of the most renowned “pioneers in the [search] for African-American equality in America” (Washington, DuBois, and the Black Future). Washington was “born a slave” who highly believed in the concept of “separate but equal,” meaning that “we can be as [distant] as the fingers, yet one as the hand in all things essential to mutual progress” (Washington 1042). DuBois was a victim of many “racial problems before his years as a student” and disagreed with Washington’s point of view, which led
Facts: Two residents of Virginia, Mildred Jeter a colored woman and Richard Loving a white man, got married in the District of Columbia. The Loving's returned to Virginia and established their marriage. The Caroline court issued an indictment charging the Loving's with violating Virginia's ban on interracial marriages. The state decides, who can and cannot get married. The Loving's were convicted of violating 20-55 of Virginia's code.
In addressing and confronting the problem of injustices among the black Americans in the American society, particularly the violence that had happened in Birmingham, and generally, the inequality and racial prejudice happening in his American society, King argues his position by using both moral, social, and political references and logic for his arguments to be considered valid and agreeable.
Paragraph thirteen is one of the paragraphs that have the most emotional appeal. The first sentence of paragraph thirteen King says, “We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.” By saying that, we know that the oppressors did not want to give the oppressed, who in this scenario was the African Americans, any freedom and they had to fight for their freedom. They had to demand their equality. King uses a very cognitive metaphor, “disease of segregation.” He directly refers to segregation as a disease, an infection. In paragraph thirteen, he also says “We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that "justice too long delayed is justice denied."” (Paragraph 13) King im...
With this intention in mind, he brings up the notion that unjust laws are meant to be broken if the person breaking them has accepted the consequences or if breaking the law is for the bettering of society. King believed that if you break a law that your conscience deemed unjust and accept the punishment in order to make people think about the injustice that the law set in place, you have the highest respect for the law. As stated in the prior paragraph, King refers to the voting system in the state of Alabama and how it is corrupt. The way laws are being voted upon make them unjust, and, therefore, set a baseline for them to be broken. Towards the end of the passage, King brings to light how the police officers were commended for their actions of keeping the protesters in “order and preventing violence”. The white community believed that all laws were just because they did not negatively affect their lives. The black community speaking out and protesting against laws they viewed as unjust were perceived as obscene by the white community. This point of view demonstrates Kings beliefs that unjust laws are breakable, because while the white community in Alabama saw such protests as obscene and unneeded, the rest of the country tuned in to watch everything unfold.
The injustice of segregation laws is leading to a violent impact throughout the African American community, as they strive to have equal rights. In the essay, “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” Martin Luther King Jr. describes the many struggles the African American community is going through. Dr. King effectively uses rhetorical appeals to persuade the clergymen that segregation laws are unjust and must end. Dr. King exemplifies his credibility as an advocate for the ending of segregation laws. He gives an example of how society should realize that there is no need for violence by comparing both Socrates’ and his techniques.
Even though whites and blacks protested together, not all of them got punished in the same ways. Even though it wasn’t folderol committed by either race, racists saw it as this and would do anything to keep segregation intact. Sometimes, the whites would be shunned, by society, and not hurt physically. While the blacks, on the other hand, were brutally kille...
Upon spending his night in jail for refusing to pay his poll taxes, Thoreau said that he felt “As if he alone of all his townsmen had paid his tax” (Thoreau 319). Thoreau is trying to say that he is feeling as if he was the only one who really served his time in prison and paid his justice more than those who object and claim they haven’t. King went to jail due to a program of sit-ins at luncheon counters. While King was in jail he wrote a letter which was formally intended for the eight white clergymen. As I mention before, King believes that he has been unjustly put in jail and he is being a responsible citizen although he knows he has been put in jail wrongfully. By Both being in jail they agree that injustice exists. Thoreau thinks of injustice as pressure that can wear the machine down. King thinks that injustice just exists and tension must be created with direct action to negotiate with the machine. I also agree with King here, how he thinks that injustice still exist because up to this day there is injustice in our country and others as well. As a matter of fact, the black community today is facing injustice by law enforcement. A few black men have been killed by police and the government is not doing much about the issue and letting the police get away with it. This is an example of injustice to all blacks because police seem to be murdering these innocent people only because of their race. This
MLK in these two paragraphs brings up the difference between a just law and an unjust law. Also that the colored people have been following the law just or unjust, while the others have broken laws. Then says that an unjust law should not be followed. Then MLK goes on to break down what is the definition of unjust law.
The rule of law, simply put, is a principle that no one is above the law. This means that there should be no leniency for a person because of peerage, sex, religion or financial standing. England and Wales do not have a written constitution therefore the Rule of Law, which along with the parliamentary Sovereignty was regarded by legal analyst A.C Dicey, as the pillars of the UK Constitution. The Rule of Law was said to be adopted as the “unwritten constitution of Great Britain”.