...In the early 1950's Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King Jr., and countless other African Americans as well as White Americans fought together for a cause that was against Segregation and the Jim Crow Laws. They were feeling the effects of racism from the Civil War back in the 1800's. African Americans were not being treated kindly, neither were the White Americans who befriended them. Those who fought against the Jim Crow Laws weren't just fighting to be rebellious against the nation, but they were fighting to be free of an unjust unconstitutional law that was established and enforced by our Government. When I say they were "fighting" that law I do not mean they were actually throwing riots and chaos everywhere they went. They were more so doing peace rally's. They had peaceful sit-ins, they drove a bus around the country, they had conferences and speeches. They were not doing what today's rebellions are trying to justify as "peaceful". They still stood for the Red, White, and Blue. They obeyed civil laws, they did not kill, nor did they light towns on fire. The MLK group only wanted others to feel love for them, to accept them into society, and to be treated as real Americans with real...
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...also led him to his choices as an influential writer. Thoreau disobeyed, he disobeyed the government. He refused to pay a poll tax, believing that it supported the Mexican-American war and the expansion of slavery. Because of this, Thoreau was arrested by a sheriff and jailed overnight. But being the Protester he is, Thoreau used his jail time and refusal to pay the poll tax as a way to inspire and raise awareness about the Mexican-American War. After he was released, he wrote an essay called “Resistance to Civil Government”, later titled “Civil Disobedience.” The essay was written about how tyrannical the government’s actions were and how we were to change things. “Civil Disobedience” has been an influence to peaceful protesters around the world, such as Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. Without Martin Luther King Jr. our country might still be discriminating and racist. Without Thoreau’s inspiring essay, Martin Luther King Jr.’s protests may not have been as effective and peaceful as they...
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...people who are not part of the Government that can help us to have the rights that is best for our country. The argument in this essay will be about Civil Disobedience,now Civil Disobedience is the refusal to comply with certain laws or to pay taxes and fines,as a peaceful form of political protest.This essay will include great examples about Civil Disobedience such as,”The Letter From Birmingham Jail” by Martin Luther King,”The Declaration...
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...Eduardo Ortiz-Montelongo English 1A: Essay #1 Professor Gomez 28 September 2010 Both Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. were goal-oriented leaders. Gandhi desired self-rule for India. King wanted first class citizenship for African Americans. Instead of separating religion and politics, both men incorporated both in their leadership roles. Both men chose nonviolence as their strategy because they had felt that it was the only practical solution capable of achieving their objectives. The ideas of nonviolent movements were difficult to achieve, but they were not impossible to accomplish which is shown in the work of these two great leaders Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. Two men from two different time periods but yet they have the same views on how to establish a nonviolent movement. Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. were civil right activists who took a form of action to obtain equal rights amongst their society. The way they handled nonviolent situations was by taking a non direct action. Also the sacrifice that they had to go through whether it had been by being passive resistance or simply by injustice laws that had to be broken. Gandhi developed his theory of Satyagraha (“soul force”), which implicates social justice through love as well as suffering the consequences. Having to read two distinct stories at distinct time they both manage to have something in common which is CHANGE. We end with MLK- demanding that the actions for equal rights will be...
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...Social Injustices Henry David Thoreau and Martin Luther king both stood up and fought against social injustices. Thoreau wrote his essay “Civil Disobedience” to express his views on the role of government. Thoreau also expressed his ideas about what men should do to stand up to a government that sought to suppress its citizens. King started reading Thoreau during his school years and adopted his non-violent ways of protest. He molded his actions around Thoreau’s essay and fought for equal rights for the African American community. Both authors sought peaceful means to protest against things they deemed social injustices. In Thoreau’s “Civil Disobedience” and King’s “Letters from a Birmingham Jail” they present the problems with current societies and a peaceful way to bring those problems to the forefront. Thoreau and King both show their selflessness when they sacrificed their personal freedom for an issue. Thoreau was thrown in jail for not paying a poll tax. He refused to pay the tax because; he did not support slavery and the Mexican America war. Although Thoreau’s views in “Civil Disobedience” were his own and he was not trying to push them on anyone, they obviously had a profound impact on Martin Luther King. Writer Michael Mink of Investors Business Daily said this about King, “He was fascinated by the idea of refusing to cooperate with an evil system, he was so deeply moved that he reread the work several times. King became convinced that noncooperation with evil...
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...issues that deal with the topic of civil disobedience. The messages that are told throughout the poem have had major influences on civil disobedience advocates such as Henry David Thoreau, Mahatma Gandhi, and Martin Luther King. This work offers explanations that can be applied to dilemmas that can’t be resolved with a simple form of action. According to the Theosophical Society of America, The Bhagavad- Gita, commonly known as the “Gita” has been passed back and forth between America and India through these civil disobedience activists. They each had influences on each other along with the Gita. Some reoccurring themes that may have influenced Thoreau, Gandhi, and King include questions about the right way to live, seeking higher knowledge, and how no action is still a form of action. The version of The Bhagavad- Gita that is told in The Norton Anthology of World Literature, 3rd edition, begins with the moment of crisis in Arjuna’s mind. Arjuna is the middle son of his five brothers who are apart of the Pandavas. He is apart of the warrior caste and is the most skilled and feared archer of his time. They are about to engage in war with their cousins, the Kauravas, because the leader, Duryodhana, is denying the Pandavas any share of the kingdom even after tackling every peaceful resolution there was. One aspect to keep in mind that separates some of these views form the Gita is that the Hindu religion believed in reincarnation or transmigration of souls. This heavily influences some...
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...I believe that peaceful resistance to laws positively impacts a free society. It allows conscience and morals to govern a free society and allows for a country to positively evolve. The founding fathers created the United States through a revolution, standing against the injustice of the British towards them. The birth of our nation serves as an example of why peaceful resistance is important maintaining an effective and moral government. Civil disobedience allows conscience and morals to govern a free society, not the ideals of the majority. As Thoreau stated in his essay, Civil Disobedience, “a majority are permitted…to rule…not because they are most likely to be right, nor because this seems fairest to the minority, but because they are...
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...We the Students Essay Contest In order to establish a free and just society, the people must be willing to reject unjust and immoral laws. This is because laws that violate the human rights of any individuals threaten everyone else as well. Civil disobedience is the violation of unjust laws and acceptance of the punishment that comes with breaking those laws. The punishment that comes with violating the law must be accepted in order to ensure that order is maintained and that so to draw a distinction between civil disobedience and lawlessness. Peaceful resistance to unjust laws is needed in order expose and call attention to laws that are unjust and therefore positively impacts society. The resistance must be peaceful or many may be unwilling...
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...Peaceful resistance to laws positively impacts a free society. It stresses our natural rights as written in the Consititution. By doing so, we are practicing the rights to protect, assemble peaceably, and oppose laws, as stated in the First Amendment. While to some, civil disobedience may seem as an idea that destroys a society, to others (including myself) is just another way to bring about awareness and change to a society. In Martin Luther King's "Letter from Birmingham Jail", civil disobedience is shown throughout King's actions. King's peaceful protest movements showed resistance to several negative impacts of injustice. In the essay, King states that although Alabama clergymen were criticizing his actions, his argument was...
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...the right and wrong ways of dealing with this. “The Lesson,” by Toni Cade Bambara, does not necessarily have to do with the racial oppression King describes, as Bambara tells a short story expressing how a group of children living in poverty view the richer lifestyle, but some of King‟s categories of dealing with oppression can be seen in how Bambara‟s characters react to what they are observing. At the start of Bambara‟s “The Lesson,” Sylvia expresses her dislike and almost hatred for Miss Moore. This is made obvious by many of the statements she makes when introducing the characters and story: “I‟m really hating this nappy-head bitch and her goddamn college degree,” and “though I never talk to her . . . I wouldn‟t give the bitch that satisfaction.” Hatred is often the first step in acting violently, one of King‟s ways of meeting oppression. While Sylvia, or anyone else at any time during the story, does not actually act violently, their thoughts and feelings show signs of possible violence in the future. Not only do Sylvia and the children show a tendency of hatred towards Miss Moore, but to each other as well—especially aimed at Mercedes. The reader can gather that Mercedes‟s family has a little more money than the rest of them and Mercedes has no problem rubbing that fact in. When standing outside the store, Mercedes brags that her father would buy her the expensive toy boat if she wanted it, and Rosie responds by showing her some hostility: “Your father, my ass.” While the...
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...into a designation otherwise of human rights. The civil rights ensures citizen's ability to fully participate in the civil and political life of the state without discrimination or political repression and protect the freedom of classes of people and individuals from unwarranted infringement into those rights by governments, private organizations and other entities. Many men and women help made a huge impact in changing the world during the civil rights movement. The civil rights movement was a worldwide political movement for equality before the law occurring between approximately 1950 and 1980. Many men and women help make a difference during the civil rights. There were many but some just stood out in particular. Jesse Jackson and Martin Luther King Jr. are famous Civil Right leaders, often considered to be some of the greatest. They believed that African Americans should get more political power. Throughout the Civil Rights Movement they were always known as the people that TOOK action with what was given. Rosa Louise McCauley Parks was an African-American civil rights activist, whom the U.S. Congress called "the first lady of civil rights", and "the mother of the freedom movement”. The black businesses in the neighborhoods suffered tremendously and also the convenient stores. Riots and protest were mainly in the black neighborhoods. In the last three decades, Congress has put in place a number of civil rights laws prohibiting discrimination in educational programs...
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...government, because without government our society would result in chaos. Sometimes, when there is an unjust law and the government won't take the initiative to fix it, the public must act as civil disobedient to bring awareness and fix the unjust law. There have been times when citizens have felt the need to revolt against the government because of an issue that is unjust. There were such cases during the time of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Henry David Thoreau made such actions to prove their point. Civil disobedience is justified when its goal is to obtain equal rights and service for everyone, without causing physical damage to people and their property, and without breaking the just laws that are already enforced. It should only be practiced when the government fails to uphold justice and fix laws that don't allow everyone the equal rights already given to some. In his essay, "Civil Disobedience" Thoreau wrote in 1849 after spending a night in the Walden town jail for refusing to pay a poll tax that supported the Mexican War. He recommended passive resistance as a form of tension that could lead to reform of unjust laws practiced by the government. He voiced civil disobedience as "An expression of the individual's liberty to create change" (Thoreau ). Thoreau felt that the government had established order that resisted reform and change. "Action from principle, the perception and the performance of right, changes things and relations; it is essentially revolutionary" (Thoreau...
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...GKE Task 2 Part A: Justify two significant social and/or political changes that occurred as a result of the actions of one world leader. Mohandas Gandhi (1869-1948) once said, “My life is my message” (Soomo, 2013). He was a world leader that led by example. In this essay I will give an example of a political and a social change created by Gandhi’s teaching. To begin with Gandhi’s background, as a young adult in London, he trained as a barrister according to Sohail (2005). Sohail identified that Gandhi soon discovered a disliking for the busy lifestyle, high standard of living, and expense of the city. Even though he only spent a few years in London, it really shaped his simple living views that he would live his entire life by. His next big adventure was in South Africa. Sohail stated that Gandhi became a leader with the Indian National Congress and fought for equality. He was a leader in the Indian community. According to Lal (2012), Gandhi practiced Satyagraha, the practice of non-violent resistance, to make political points without violence. It was also here that he organized small self-sufficient communities, Lal described. Gandhi led others by his own example. I believe this is why he was so influential. He didn’t just tell the public how change should occur; he showed the people how it occurred and the importance of the change. Most leaders of that time demanded obedience, or else severe punishment followed. Gandhi’s approach forever changed the world socially...
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...Month, the annual celebration of historic events and achievements made by black Americans. While Black History Month is recognized in Canada and the United Kingdom, it first began in the United States in 1976. Schools everywhere have been teaching children about the Civil Rights Movement – Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks, Malcolm X – and the events that helped America make the progress to reach that turning point, like Sojourner Truth’s work as an abolitionist and Harriet Tubman as she helped free slaves through the Underground Railroad. While these historical figures are certainly worth learning about, we gathered four lesser-known ones from our book WHO WINS?: 100 Historical Figures Go Head-to-Head and You Decide the Winner by Clay Swartz,...
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...The other narrative represented by Reverend William H. Borders' confrontation of segregation in 1957 decided on a non-violence strategy to fight segregation after the Montgomery Bus Boycott in Alabama. Both the Southern Manifesto of 1956 and Reverend William H. Borders' confrontation of segregation in 1957 represent contrasting ideas regarding segregation in the South. On one hand, the Southern Manifesto of 1956 symbolizes legal regression, supporting segregation and believing in the concept of “separate but equal”; on the other hand, Reverend William H. Borders' confrontation of segregation in 1957 represents community-driven and nonviolent progression, as it reflects the desire for integration and equality among blacks and whites. This essay will discuss legal regression, community-driven progression, and the impact of both ideologies. White Southerners used legal instruments to maintain segregation, denouncing their hypocrisy. The Southern Manifesto declared the Supreme Court decision on Brown vs Board of Education to be unconstitutional and uses the case of Plessy v. Ferguson to support their claim. Jim Crows laws permitted “separate but equal” facilities for Black and Whites and was supported by Plessy v. Ferguson– Supreme Court decision (GML! 668). The. This case emerged in Louisiana when railroad companies were required to have separate cars for Black passengers and a light-skin African American man named Homer Plessy refused to move to the ‘colored ‘section of the train...
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