Civil Disobedience In The 60's

The question of whether or not peaceful resistance toward the law impacts society in a positive way is really a question of circumstance. If I were to refer back to the historical aspects of the subject, then my immediate answer would be yes, it does; peaceful resistance has often prevailed in situations that required immediate attention, yet were simply overlooked by the general public, despite their importance. One extremely important example of this would be the many boycotts during the civil rights movements of the 60's. Civil disobedience was a way to communicate the true inequality represented by the phrase, ''separate but equal'' by peacefully marching for their beliefs. For example, many white officials used various schemes to prevent

One significant advocate for this proposal is author Henry David Thoreau; in his essay ''Civil Disobedience'', he says, ''I ask for, not at once no government, but at once a better government. Let every man make known what kind of government would command his respect, and that will be one step toward obtaining it.'' But in some cases, to ask the government concerning the grievances of the people is sometimes considered a lost cause, if their beliefs differ from that of the government about a subject. This would lead to using civil disobedience as a last pitch effort to get their point across. And of course, not everyone impacted agrees with a change, but if the subject at hand were to violate the U.S. Constitution or the Bill of Rights, then people have a right to protest their unheard grievances peacefully, even if it means breaking the law (hopefully people know the risks of doing so). Martin Luther King, Jr. and his followers had a right to march, because preventing African Americans from voting is a violation of the 15th Amendment to the Constitution, which allowed them to vote after the Civil War; they were simply asking for their rights back, and used actions when words were not