ENDS AND MEANS

Plainly sometimes the end does justify the means -- e.g., lying to spare someone's feelings -- the question is in which cases
Cases of Civil Disobedience or nonviolent resistance: the rightful end (social justice) justifies the "wrongful" (i.e., illegal) means

Prima facie principle: we have a moral obligation to obey the law and it's morally wrong not to do so
Challenging Cases

Least Exceptional: U.S. Civil Rights Protests; O. Schindler.
More Controversial: Environmental Protests, e.g., spiking trees; nonviolent Abortion protests, e.g., blocking clinic entry; May Day: "stop the war or we'll stop the government"

mitigating factors

slightness of the infraction: the nonviolence of the protest
the rightness of the end pursued v. wrongness of the laws & practices being resisted: clearer with hindsight

INDIVIDUAL CONSCIENCE AND THE LAW

Thoreau's defense of "Civil Disobedience"

we should be men first and subjects second: higher obligation to to follow our individual consciences than to obey the law

Discussion: law and ethics distinct

decisions about obeying the law are themselves moral decisions
doesn't follow that legality isn't morally relevant

some acts may be morally o.k. except for being illegal: taking a drink (during prohibition) or a toke (now)
but morally wrong given their illegality: running red lights

nor that it is: e.g. running red lights carefully at 4am

LAW AND ORDER

Costs of Civil Disobedience

others will be led to disobey: conduces to anarchy

if everyone just obeyed those laws they agreed with
there'd be no respect for law
hence, breakdown of social order (based on law, as it is)

costs the community: have to pay for law enforcement

Singer

these genuine costs that need to be weighed
against the benefits sought by the protestors

DEMOCRACY

Argument: It's never right to violate democratically enacted laws

citizens of democracies are bound by their social contract to acceptance of majority rule & hence to obey the laws
democracies provide legal means to change unjust laws, e.g.,

Acknowledgement: these considerations have much force

if the "democratically enacted" laws really are so

majority consent not covertly coerced: managed consent
representative government really is
the channels really are open & not just run-arounds

There may still be situations in which disobedience to democratically enacted laws is justified: majority approval doesn't make right

if the wrong is grievous enough: e.g. racial discrimination
and "going through channels" is less effective than direct action

CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE

Mitigating factors: truly civil & nonviolent resistence
gospel according to Gandhi and Martin Luther Kind Jr.

not resisting law enforcement

\accepting the legal penalty for your actions
shows the sincerity of the protest and respect for the law

can be viewed not as a minority attempt to coerce the majority but to convince the majority

A.H.: "The first duty of the revolutionary is to get away with it."

VIOLENCE

Malcolm X's critique of MLK style "beg ins"

perpetuates unjust subservience-dominance relations
the oppressed have the moral right to exercise their perogatives (whatever the law says) and to defend themselves against those (however legally empowered) who would interfere.

Is violent resistance ever justified?

may be to prevent or correct even greater evils
a useful distinction

violence against people
violence against property

example: the American Revolution:

the founding fathers were lawbreakers
England was even partly democratic

Indiscriminate "terrorist" violence never justified: ineffective even as a means since it alienates people from the cause.