Martin Luther King Violation Of Civil Rights

In Martin Luther King Jr’s “Letter from Birmingham jail”, King talks about his imprisonment for his involvement in a nonviolent protest and defends his rights and moral grounds for organizing nonviolent protest activities. In this essay, I will look at his views on nonviolent protest and how they differ from todays violent protests.

From Cherokee Indians refusing to abandon their homes in 1838 to the Sit-ins of the civil rIghts movement in the early 1960s, people have been using acts of civil disobedience to stand against injustice they saw in their communities. Although there are many examples of people abusing this benefit and causing more grief and shame than progress, many have used it to their advantage to bring about positive change for the greater good of society, therefore acts of civil disobedience can positively impact a free society if they remain peaceful, respectful, and justified.

On April 16th, Martin Luther Kind Jr., Minister and Civil Rights Leader, his letter entitled “Letter from Birmingham City Jail”, angers and informs that civil disobedience is not just. He supports this claim by first saying that we will obtain our rights because of heritage and god, then protesting and breaking the law is the correct thing to do, and finally, everyday heroic people are disobedient to find justice. Through King’s use of tone, rhetorical appeal, and rhetorical analysis, he effectively persuades the people of America, to bring justice to this society and to stop the violence.

Throughout history, we have seen many examples of civil disobedience that has positively affected our society. Of these examples, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., was one of the most impactful cases known to the American people. While in the Birmingham Jail, he wrote a letter to the clergymen justifying his then recent endeavors. Words like peaceful, genuine good, and nonviolent all can be quoted from this letter. He stood for the African American people and their equality. He was ready to take the consequences for his actions and gracefully promoted his cause: segregation! We all know that through this, he got what he wanted accomplished. Now, every American citizen can live in equality and equilibrium.

Civil disobedience is a belief that is practiced in which the people disobey the law in a peaceful manner because it does not come to an agreement with their moral values. Over the years this idea of challenging the government has developed into a duty for the people. This concept is explained in the piece “Civil Disobedience” by Henry David Thoreau and “Letter from Birmingham Jail” by Martin Luther King Jr. They both express acts of passive resistance in which the impact is still felt in the modern world. Although, these ideologies were used in Thoreau and King’s time, they need to be updated to fit in today’s world.

In August 1963, while confined to the Birmingham jail and serving a sentence for participating in civil rights demonstrations, Martin Luther King, Jr. received a letter from his fellow clergymen urging him to quit his campaign of nonviolent demonstrations and to allow the courts a reasonable length of time to act. In his response, King, Jr. wrote one of the most powerful documents against social injustice; an argumentative essay that focused the world's attention on him and the resonance of his writings. “Letter from Birmingham Jail” is not only Martin Luther King, Jr.’s defense for his nonviolent demonstrations but also a desperate call for an end to segregation and inequality

Critics of the use of civil disobedience however, will argue that civil disobedience is not always needed to cause non-violent change to an issue and progress will happen slowly over time. I will argue however, that sometime radical and fast change is needed for a society to advance, and that sometimes there are evils and wrongs that are so bad that the ends will justify the

Civil Rights, according to the textbook, are defined as “[are] the most fundamental level, guarantees by the government that it will treat people equally, particularly people belonging to groups that have historically been denied the same rights and opportunities as others” (Krutz ). This could not be closer to what Martin Luther King Jr. was striving for; equal rights, equal care, equal voting, equal opportunities, and the list goes on. The topic of civil disobedience is at the heart of his letter, “The Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” written in 1963. This is frequently brought up when King challenges those who are idly sitting by and allow these unjust acts to happen. King covers a great deal of material while relating logical thinking and ethical descriptions of moral behavior. Instead of writing in hate or anger to his circumstances, he thoughtfully rebuked those who were against him, the movement, and change while maintaining composure.

More recently, civil disobedience manifests itself in the Dakota Access Pipeline demonstrations over the past few months. The Dakota tribes have been protesting the federal government’s decision to build an oil pipe through their sacred lands and water sources. President Donald Trump recently passed an executive order that allowed the “construct[ion] and operat[ion of] the Dakota Access Pipeline, including easements or rights-of-way to cross federal areas” because it is a “substantial, multi-billion-dollar private investment in our Nation's energy infrastructure” (Trump). Protesters have been meet with all sorts of resistance, from water cannons to the arrests of hundreds. Rather than facilitate a peaceful protest, people “are being met with military vehicles and heavily armed law enforcement personnel in riot gear.” (National Public Radio). The rights of the people to protest for their beliefs will also be met with resistance, however it is their duty to persevere and fight against injustices. Civil disobedience has led to the emancipation of slaves, the freedom of the United States of America, and the equality of minorities, and it is now needed to defend the rights of the native people because of its’ powerful

The aims of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s was to end racial discrimination and segregation. Martin Luther King Jr. was one of the leaders of this movement and an advocate for non-violent protests and peaceful resistance. Starting with the Montgomery Bus Boycott, MLK lead a series of non-violent protests, inspired by Thoreau’s essay. Blacks marched, boycotted, and protested for their rights and were arrested in the process. In 1963, the March on Birmingham occurred, to encourage integration and desegregation in Birmingham. Children as young as six years old marched and were arrested. It captured the attention of the nation and employed real social and legal change, as the city was required to integrate and hire African Americans downtown. MLK was a part of the Birmingham Campaign and was arrested and imprisoned, writing his famed “Letter from a Birmingham Jail”. In this letter, MLK expresses his reasons for the protest and his desire for equality. MLK stated “in no sense do I advocate evading or defying the law … I submit that an individual who breaks a 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” (King). In this passage, he states his willingness to accept his punishment for breaking the law, a small price to pay for the possible change he could make in

Civil disobedience is defined as the refusal to obey certain laws or governmental demands for the purpose of influencing legislation or government policy. Many of the world’s greatest leaders encouraged their followers to use civil disobedience to protest. For example, Martin Luther King Jr., Mahatma Gandhi, Susan B Anthony, Rosa Parks, and many other civilians made a change in the world by using civil disobedience. These leaders stated what they believe, by using non-violent actions. It is the citizen's responsibility to act out in civil disobedience according to his or her morals.

Civil disobedience, the deliberate breaking of laws, is one of those struggles that free society needs. When society has fallen ill to corruption, to immoral legislation, to injustice, it is the duty of the citizens to stand up and speak (or scream,

Without this civil defiance, laws and government practices would not have undergone the necessary adjustments that have refined the legal structure followed today. Regarding political obligation, which is relative to the topic at hand, most arguments made favoring adherence to the regulations of the government still leave room for an individual to disagree with and even defy the law. In The Revised Definition of Civil Disobedience Due to the Effect of Social Networks, a book that talks about the constantly changing definition of civil disobedience, Sonia Shaikh says, “…utilitarianism states actions and decisions that produce the most utility or happiness are those one should follow. This belief may very well lead to an individual deciding his compliance with the political institution of his country is best, but it can also produce the opposite: an individual may come to realize that only by defying his government (or perhaps supporting the law of another country) will he be able to achieve a more beneficial state” (13). Shaikh clarifies political obligation and its underlying effects as well as the way individuals may believe that disobedience is the only way they can make a change for the better. She showcases the way one may have different understandings of the same law as well as the way one person’s right is another’s

Every day we hear of something new happening around the world, from silent protests to violent outcries for help; however, many of us believe we are too powerless to truly do anything about it, but that is not always the case. From 1955 to 1965, Martin Luther King Jr., a simple Baptist Minister, was arrested 30 times for nonviolent protests against racial segregation. King often violated segregation laws because he felt that they defied a higher set of laws; during a protest in Birmingham, Alabama, King was arrested and sent to jail-where he wrote a letter addressing his willingness to break the law time after time. In King's letter: 'A letter from a Birmingham Jail' King explains “… that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells

Imagine living in a time when segregation was legal, where you couldn’t go to a certain place, where you could not do certain things all because you were born of a certain race. This is what life was like for the African Americans during the Civil Rights Movement in the twentieth century. Activist Martin Luther King Jr. did a series of nonviolent protesting and helped calmly handle the situations that came with it. After being his protest in Birmingham, King wrote the “Letter to Birmingham Jail”, in which he responds to the clergymen, by utilizing anaphoras, rhetorical questions, and allusions, to declare that through nonviolence and compromises, justice can be provided.