Paper Topic:

analysis

Analysis of On Civil Disobedience ' by Henry David Thoreau

On Civil Disobedience ' by Henry David Thoreau is one of the most famous writings in the history of American political thought . It has been written in 1849 when young American nation was in the period of infancy . In his essay Thoreau attempts to answer some of the painful questions put forth by the democratic form of government - what is democracy , what are the rights of majority in respect of minority , how can democratically elected power be controlled by the people and remain democratic

and in which situations the people have a right for an upraising to overthrow a futile regime . The language of the is not very simple , it is written as a strong argumentative essay for those readers , who are familiar with basic provisions of political theory . It is to make people think , rather then act

The essay opens with a famous maxima : That government is best which governs least . Later these words have been attributed to Jefferson or Paine , but un fact they first appeared in the writing by Thoreau . I this respect Thoreau writes as an advocate of natural law position such as Locke , who believed , that government should embody the wills of people and it 's interference into the people 's loves is to be reduced to minimum . People would respect laws only in case such laws are made out of their will and nor out of the will of the government

Under Thoreau government is typically more harmful then helpful . Even the democratic form of government is not a panacea , because it is only a rule of majority , which oppresses minority by virtue of its massiveness And secondly , who would guarantee that majority is always right and knows what is better ? Such Thoreau 's insights sound rather unusual for American political thought after the Revolution which tended to take a rather optimistic approach to the government

Thoreau sees a way out in every man 's consciousness . Only a man can after all decide what is right and what is wrong . In case law replaces consciousness people turn into robot-like agents of the government and in their daily life they become agents of injustice . Thusly they serve not to their country , but to its government . Thoreau writes about his allegedly democratic state I cannot for an instant recognize as my government which is the slave 's government also ' Every person bears a moral obligation to evaluate the actions of government and act in accordance with own moral values , because in case a person supports injustice merely on governmental , this person is an accomplice of corrupted government

For Thoreau the main injustice of government contemporary to him is slavey . He sharply attacks both the federal government and the government of his native Massachusetts for their protection of slavery and slave trade . Under his opinion the government would never take real steps to free slaves and the initiative is to come from people themselves . He writes of...

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