{"id":5574,"date":"2004-02-18T11:09:12","date_gmt":"2004-02-18T18:09:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/2004\/02\/18\/i-fought-the-law-2.html"},"modified":"2014-11-05T15:24:06","modified_gmt":"2014-11-05T22:24:06","slug":"i_fought_the_la-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/02\/18\/i_fought_the_la-2.html","title":{"rendered":"I fought the law"},"content":{"rendered":"

Xkot quotes<\/a>, in the context of the gay marriage brouhaha in San Francisco<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Anyone in a free society where the laws are unjust has an obligation to break the law.
\n— Henry David Thoreau<\/p>\n

To which I’d add:<\/p>\n

If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable.
\n— Justice Louis Brandeis (1856-1941), Attributed (1912)
\nGood men must not obey the laws too well.
\n— Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)
\nRightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add “within the limits of the law,” because law is often but the tyrant’s will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual.
\n— Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)
\nOne who breaks an unjust law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for law.
\n— Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968), Letter from Birmingham Jail (1964)<\/p>\n

On the other hand:<\/p>\n

It is a besetting vice of democracies to substitute public opinion for law. This is the usual form in which masses of men exhibit their tyranny.
\n— James Fenimore Cooper (1789-1851), _The American Democrat_ (1838)<\/p>\n

and:<\/p>\n

I know no method to secure the repeal of bad or obnoxious laws so effective as their stringent execution.
\n— Ulysses S. Grant (1822-1885), Inaugural Address<\/p>\n

and, of course:<\/p>\n

What right does Congress have to go around making laws just because they deem it necessary?
\n— Marion S. Barry, Jr. (b. 1936), Attributed<\/p>\n

The main problem being, of course, that “unjust” is a relative term, and what our neighbor considers to be a just breaking of a law to obey a higher sense of justice may, to us, be anarchy, tyranny, or just plain old reprehensible.<\/p>\n

To take the current example, the city of San Francisco is disobeying state law and issuing marriage licenses to gays. Some <\/i>folk consider that law as unjust (I certainly do), and so applaud SF’s actions. <\/p>\n

On the other hand, if the city government were handing out syringes of heroin, letting people buy machine guns, or putting large displays of the Ten Commandments up on city property — each of which would violate laws that some <\/i>folk think are unjust — I suspect that very different constituencies would applaud and condemn them.<\/p>\n

I think King’s formulation is best, because it recognizes civil disobedience as an individual act (not a governmental one), and it requires folks to take responsibility for their flouting of the law. Civil disobedience is meant to stir up the conscience to see the law changed, not to promote disrespect for the law per se<\/i>.<\/p>\n

While I agree with the sentiment of the San Francisco city government in this, if I’m going to condemn other thumb-nosing at laws by other communities, I have to condemn it, as well. There are certainly other, and better, avenues available to change or overturn the state law in question (a ballot proposition, so truly the vox populi<\/i>) than simply ignoring it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Xkot quotes, in the context of the gay marriage brouhaha in San Francisco: Anyone in a free society where the laws are unjust has an obligation to break the law….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[25,718],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5574","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gay-stuff","category-marriage-equality"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":49576,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/02\/13\/huckabee-happy-wedding-days-and-the-holocaust.html","url_meta":{"origin":5574,"position":0},"title":"Huckabee, Happy Wedding Days, and the Holocaust","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 13-Feb-15 8:06am","format":false,"excerpt":"So the headline belowis a bit misleading, as Huckabee didn't actually say that. Precisely. He didn't, at least in the quoted passage, attribute to King any opinion whatsoever about gay marriage.Instead, he quoted from King's \"Letter from the Birmingham Jail\" about civil disobedience, in the context of attacking those gosh-darn\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5882,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/07\/05\/wist_o_the_day.html","url_meta":{"origin":5574,"position":1},"title":"WIST-o-the-day","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 5-Jul-04 8:09pm","format":false,"excerpt":"One who breaks an unjust law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over...","rel":"","context":"In "Politics & Law"","block_context":{"text":"Politics & Law","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":39576,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2013\/11\/05\/the-us-catholic-bishops-and-enda.html","url_meta":{"origin":5574,"position":2},"title":"The US Catholic Bishops and ENDA","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 5-Nov-13 2:50pm","format":false,"excerpt":"ENDA (the Employment Non-Discrimination Act) \u00a0is a proposed law that would make it illegal for nonreligious employers to discriminate in hiring and firing based on sexual orientation or gender identity. \u00a0That's pretty much it -- nothing weird or bizarre about the mechanisms involved (we have plenty of other non-discrimination laws),\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Church & State"","block_context":{"text":"Church & State","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law\/church-state"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/11\/not-persecuted.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":29895,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/08\/18\/the-law-sometimes-seems-unjust.html","url_meta":{"origin":5574,"position":3},"title":"The law, sometimes, seems unjust","author":"***Dave","date":"Sat 18-Aug-12 9:47am","format":false,"excerpt":"Unless you can afford a civil attorney to pursue matters like the one below. \u00a0Very sad. Embedded Link Families still waiting for headstones a year later - The Denver Post All Joan Ebel wants is her headstone.\"Here I am,\" said Ebel Friday afternoon as she pointed at the granite slab\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":51174,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/05\/17\/the-law-can-be-respected-or-feared.html","url_meta":{"origin":5574,"position":4},"title":"The law can be respected or feared","author":"***Dave","date":"Sun 17-May-15 5:43pm","format":false,"excerpt":"And the way people behave toward it in each case will differ. In the former, people strive to uphold the law because it's the accepted and right and good thing to do. In the latter, people take their fear into account in the behavioral calculus they perform regarding the law\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":131529,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/09\/13\/marriage-in-name-only.html","url_meta":{"origin":5574,"position":5},"title":"Marriage in Name Only","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 13-Sep-16 10:44pm","format":false,"excerpt":"After the Supreme Court ruled in Obergefell that blocking gay couples from marrying was unconstitutional, the initial reaction from lawmakers in conservatives states was defiance. That's largely faded, but a new tactic has come onto the scene that's even more insidious, as exemplified in the story below.Rather than blocking gay\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5574","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5574"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5574\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46745,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5574\/revisions\/46745"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5574"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5574"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5574"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}