Civil Disobedience In Letter From Birmingham Jail

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During the 1900s African Americans were being segregated all around the United States. Martin Luther King Jr. engaged on direct action on these unjust conflicts towards Negroes and was justified in doing so. In the “Letter from Birmingham” King argues that injustice is present in society and nonviolent direct action is the only way to make a real efficient change. He argues against the clergymen’s “A Call for Unity” and rationalizes the protests and demonstrations he led, resulting in his imprisonment. In “A Call for Unity”, the clergymen claim that civil disobedience is an ineffective tactic used to arouse a change in society. Rather than protests and demonstrations, negotiation should be encouraged. They state that, “a cause should be pressed in the courts and in negotiation among local leaders” (Carpenter, et al par. 7). Although negotiation is a rational alternative to civil disobedience, King argues that negotiations occurring in the past did not bring the change the Negro …show more content…
He emphasizes how the act of segregation forms an unfair social hierarchy, because it "gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority” (King par. 17). King Jr. displays evidence of unfair acts on Black African Americans. For example, the “unsolved bombings of Negro homes and churches in Birmingham” (par. 6). He explains how only injustice could result in an act as atrocious and detrimental as that, taking the lives of many Negroes and harming countless others. While the clergymen in “A Call for Unity” disagree with King’s tactics, they also acknowledge the presence of injustice in society, as they state, “We recognize the natural impatience of people who feel their hopes are slow in being realized” (Carpenter, et al par. 3). Unless nonviolent direct action is taken against the crime of injustice, the Negro population will continue to be
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