204
See also: Jean-Jacques Rousseau 154–59 ■ Adam Smith 160–63 ■ Edmund
Burke 172–73 ■ Karl Marx 196–203 ■ Isaiah Berlin 280–81 ■ John Rawls 294–95A
lmost a century after Jean-
Jacques Rousseau claimed
that nature was essentially
benign, American philosopher
Henry Thoreau developed the idea
further, arguing that “all good
things are wild and free”, and that
the laws of man suppress rather
than protect civil liberties. He
saw that political parties were
necessarily one-sided, and that
their policies often ran contrary to
our moral beliefs. For this reason,
he believed it was the individual’s
duty to protest against unjust laws,
and argued that passively allowing
such laws to be enacted effectively
gave them justification. “Any fool
can make a rule, and any fool will
mind it,” as he said about English
grammar, but the principle runs
through his political philosophy too.
In his essay Civil Disobedience,
written in 1849, Thoreau proposes
a citizen’s right to conscientious
objection through non-cooperation
and non-violent resistance—which
he put into practice by refusing to
pay taxes that supported the war in
Mexico and perpetuated slavery.Thoreau’s ideas contrasted sharply
with those of his contemporary Karl
Marx, and with the revolutionary
spirit in Europe at the time, which
called for violent action. But they
were later adopted by numerous
leaders of resistance movements,
such as Mahatma Gandhi and
Martin Luther King. ■IN CONTEXT
BRANCH
Political philosophyAPPROACH
Non-conformismBEFORE
c.340 BCE Aristotle claims that
the city-state is more important
than the individual.1651 Thomas Hobbes says
that society without strong
government reverts to anarchy.1762 In The Social Contract,
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
proposes government by
the will of the people.AFTER
1907 Mahatma Gandhi cites
Thoreau as an influence on
his campaign of passive
resistance in South Africa.1964 Martin Luther King is
awarded the Nobel Peace
Prize for his campaign to
end racial discrimination
through civil disobedience
and noncooperation.MUST THE CITIZEN
EVER RESIGN HIS
CONSCIENCE TO
THE LEGISLATOR?
HENRY DAVID THOREAU (1817–1862)
Mahatma Gandhi’s campaign of civil
disobedience against British rule in
India included the Salt March of 1930,
undertaken in protest against unjust
laws controlling salt production.