Henry David Thoreau's Resistance To Civil Government

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Henry David Thoreau was an American philosopher, abolitionist and author. He believed that each person should value their rights and be individual. He expressed the importance of people living a simple life with their own personal values and appreciating nature. He also protested unfair laws in which later his writings influenced Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. His most famous essay is, “Resistance to Civil Government” which proclaimed that the government should be hard-working and function towards to provide ones’ own best interest. Thoreau’s purpose of “Resistance to Civil Government” is for people to act upon wants us to act on our own will and follow our own consciences rather than do what society expects us to do.
Thoreau is …show more content…
After the author begins to explain Thoreau’s purpose for civil disobedience he begins talks about why Thoreau could possibly be right about invoking resistance to our government. As the article continues the author states, “this is strong stuff-and prophetic in more ways than one. What we have here is a kind of working definition of Thoreau’s radicalism; call it willingness to face the “essential facts” (Stephenson, 2013). Activist and leaders are now wanting to follow into Thoreau’s footsteps in achieving their goals and changing the world the way Thoreau wanted us to change …show more content…
He agrees that Thoreau had efforts to make people come face to face with the government. In his essay the author states, “I am suggesting than the principle of personal conscience in resistance to civil government is Thoreau’s unflinching recognition of human interdependency and his acceptance of its political entailments for the citizens of a democracy” (Carton 1998). As he taught his class a majority is not all his students disagreed with the written work done by Thoreau. Many them described Thoreau as a “jerk” and believed he was only being selfish. Although the author makes a point when he states, “it brings them, us, materially and educationally advantage American’s peacefully attending to our own pursuits- face to face to what we already know but rarely acknowledge…” (Carton 1998). He further explains that many young American’s tend to avoid the message set forth by the essay because they don’t want to acknowledge the privilege we are face with today that was a heavy price to
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