In Herman Melville’s short story, “Bartleby the Scrivener,” Bartleby is a character who refuses to conform to the requirements of his job. While the unnamed narrator comes to realize that he and the rest of humanity have something in common with Bartleby, we don’t respect the character for his stubbornness; we believe that he carries out his unwillingness to conform simply too far. Melville published the short story in 1853. Seven years earlier, in 1846, Henry David Thoreau published “Resistance to Civil Government,” an essay that represents one of the most important documents written about our right to confront the government and disobey its laws when we believe those laws are immoral. The essay has been read by people all around the world inspiring leaders like Mahatma Gandhi in his fight to free India from Great Britain and Martin Luther King, Jr., in his fight for political and civil rights for Blacks and all other people who have been deprived of them.
Write an excerpt from the text of Thoreau’s “Resistance to Civil Government”: “Resistance to Civil Government”.” (Links to an external site.)
