On the Duty of Civil Disobedience | Page 5

are undoubtedly its most
conscientious supporters, and so frequently the most serious obstacles
to reform. Some are petitioning the State to dissolve the Union, to
disregard the requisitions of the President. Why do they not dissolve it
themselves--the union between themselves and the State--and refuse to
pay their quota into its treasury? Do not they stand in same relation to
the State that the State does to the Union? And have not the same
reasons prevented the State from resisting the Union which have
prevented them from resisting the State?
How can a man be satisfied to entertain and opinion merely, and enjoy
it? Is there any enjoyment in it, if his opinion is that he is aggrieved? If

you are cheated out of a single dollar by your neighbor, you do not rest
satisfied with knowing you are cheated, or with saying that you are
cheated, or even with petitioning him to pay you your due; but you take
effectual steps at once to obtain the full amount, and see to it that you
are never cheated again. Action from principle, the perception and the
performance of right, changes things and relations; it is essentially
revolutionary, and does not consist wholly with anything which was. It
not only divided States and churches, it divides families; ay, it divides
the individual, separating the diabolical in him from the divine.
Unjust laws exist: shall we be content to obey them, or shall we
endeavor to amend them, and obey them until we have succeeded, or
shall we transgress them at once? Men, generally, under such a
government as this, think that they ought to wait until they have
persuaded the majority to alter them. They think that, if they should
resist, the remedy would be worse than the evil. But it is the fault of the
government itself that the remedy is worse than the evil. It makes it
worse. Why is it not more apt to anticipate and provide for reform?
Why does it not cherish its wise minority? Why does it cry and resist
before it is hurt? Why does it not encourage its citizens to put out its
faults, and do better than it would have them? Why does it always
crucify Christ and excommunicate Copernicus and Luther, and
pronounce Washington and Franklin rebels?
One would think, that a deliberate and practical denial of its authority
was the only offense never contemplated by its government; else, why
has it not assigned its definite, its suitable and proportionate, penalty?
If a man who has no property refuses but once to earn nine shillings for
the State, he is put in prison for a period unlimited by any law that I
know, and determined only by the discretion of those who put him
there; but if he should steal ninety times nine shillings from the State,
he is soon permitted to go at large again.
If the injustice is part of the necessary friction of the machine of
government, let it go, let it go: perchance it will wear smooth--certainly
the machine will wear out. If the injustice has a spring, or a pulley, or a
rope, or a crank, exclusively for itself, then perhaps you may consider

whether the remedy will not be worse than the evil; but if it is of such a
nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then I
say, break the law. Let your life be a counter-friction to stop the
machine. What I have to do is to see, at any rate, that I do not lend
myself to the wrong which I condemn.
As for adopting the ways of the State has provided for remedying the
evil, I know not of such ways. They take too much time, and a man's
life will be gone. I have other affairs to attend to. I came into this world,
not chiefly to make this a good place to live in, but to live in it, be it
good or bad. A man has not everything to do, but something; and
because he cannot do everything, it is not necessary that he should be
petitioning the Governor or the Legislature any more than it is theirs to
petition me; and if they should not hear my petition, what should I do
then? But in this case the State has provided no way: its very
Constitution is the evil. This may seem to be harsh and stubborn and
unconcilliatory; but it is to treat with the utmost kindness and
consideration the only spirit that can appreciate or deserves it. So is all
change for the better, like birth and death, which convulse the body.
I do not hesitate to say, that those who call themselves Abolitionists
should at once effectually withdraw their