| Apparently MLK did believe that: > "In no sense do I advocate evading or defying the law, as would the rabid segregationist. That would lead to anarchy. One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty. 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." You claim: > You think a law is unjust, fight the law, don't break it and try to get away with it. So you and MLK are claiming that a non-Jew in Nazi Germany who violates legislation by helping a Jew is morally culpable unless they do it publicly? Seems pretty questionable, and I even agree with the strict Kantian maxim of not lying to the murderer at the door! Perhaps you and MLK are confusing a strategy with morality. Perhaps it is strategically valuable to violate unjust legislation openly and suffer the consequences. That shouldn't mean that it is morally wrong to violate them in secret. To me, it seems like there are two claims that are being tied together unnecessarily. 1) one has no obligation to obey unjust legislation 2) one has an obligation to disobey it openly to bring public awareness of the unjustness and increase likelihood of reform. To me, you're just as culpable for not doing #2 whether or not you do #1. In other words, if you're morally culpable for not violating unjust legislation in public, then you bear that culpability whether or not you violate the legislation in private or not, and violating unjust legislation in private entails no culpability on its own. [edit: I completely rewrote when I realized MLK really did say that] |