Download Walden and Civil Disobedience

Thoreau’s Walden (1854)
and
“Resistance to Civil Government”
(1848)
November 1, 2010
Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862)
• 1817: born in Concord on July 12th
• 1834: Emerson settles in Concord
• 1837: HDT graduates from Harvard-beginning of friendship with
Emerson
• 1838: HDT gives first lecture before Concord Lyceum
• 1839: Voyage on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers with his
brother John (who goes unmentioned in the text about this event)
• 1841-43: HDT lives in Emerson’s home in Concord
– 1842: death of Thoreau’s brother John and Emerson’s son
Waldo
• 1844: “Made pencils”
• 1845-47: HDT at Walden Pond (spends a night at Concord jail in 1846)
Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862)
• 1848:“Civil Disobedience”-- originally a lecture that Thoreau
gave on January 26, 1848, at the Concord Lyceum called "The
Relation of the Individual to the State." The essay was first
printed in Aesthetic Papers, Elizabeth Peabody's 1849
periodical under the title "Resistance to Civil Government.“
– Implications of these titles?
• 1854: Walden published
• 1859: Speech in defense of John Brown
• 1862: After a year of declining health, dies in Concord on
May 6th
The Individual and the State
• Can there not be a government in which the
majorities do not virtually decide right and
wrong, but conscience?—in which majorities
decide only those questions to which the rule
of expediency is applicable? Must the citizen
ever for a moment, or in the least degree,
resign his conscience to the legislator? Why
has every man a conscience, then? I think
that we should be men first, and subjects
afterward” (228).
A more perfect union?
• Some are petitioning the State to dissolve the Union
[Garrison], to disregard the requisitions of the
President. Why do they not dissolve it themselves—
the union between themselves and the State—and
refuse to pay their quota into its treasury? Do not
they stand in same relation to the State that the
State does to the Union? And have not the same
reasons prevented the State from resisting the
Union which have prevented them from resisting
the State? (233)
The opportunities for living
• “The opportunities of living are diminished in
proportion as that are called the “means” are
increased. The best thing a man can do for his
culture when he is rich is to endeavor to carry
out those schemes which he entertained
when he was poor.” (237)
Conversation starters
• In “Economy” what is your interpretation of “We have
adopted Christianity merely as an improved method of agriculture”? Is there a reason as to why Thoreau spelt the word
this way?
• At the end of “Where I Lived, And What I Lived for”, what is
you outlook on the last paragraph? Also, do you agree with
his interpretation of the news and the way he portrays it?
• In the section entitled “Reading” do you agree with Thoreau
about “Easy Reading” and “Little Reading”? In addition, do
you thing this is also true in today’s day and age?
Conversation Starters
•
If the best government is that which governs not at all, then it is not a
government at all. When Thoreau asks, “Is a democracy, such as we know it,
the last improvement possible in government?”, is he suggesting anarchy as
that last improvement?
•
It’s been said that “When you got nothing, you got nothing to lose,” so is
Thoreau correct in asserting that if we live as individuals on our own accord
and by our own means, owning few possessions and with very little reliance
on the state, then we would be more apt to stand up to injustices
perpetrated by majority rule?
•
Is it possible that the real “Civil Disobedience” Thoreau is speaking of is not
that of an individual’s rebellion against the government order, but the
government’s uncivil treatment of a large portion of its population (i.e.
slavery, war, taxes), thereby being disobedient to the will of its civilians?
•
How does Thoreau’s “Civil Disobedience” essay compare to the current
political climate in America, in terms of the anti-government rhetoric we
hear from both the left and the right?
Civil Disobedience in 2010?
Colbert’s entrance:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vETT
B3g7D0&feature=channel
“Turns out the political rally is a ripe
form for satire. And while not all the
jokes hit, Saturday's show was
faithful to the format, down to a
"Benediction," a lame poetry reading,
and cheesy musical numbers. ("The
Star Spangled Banner" went wisely
unmocked.) Tim Meadows guested as
a shyster trying to hawk janky rally
memorabilia. Stewart and Colbert
handed out awards for calmness and
fear-mongering, respectively. They
even took on media coverage of
rallies. "There are two options for
reporting on a rally," Stewart said. "It
was either a tremendous success or
horrendous failure”... Stewart thus
managed to mock the very media
tropes that could be used to cover his
own rally” (Slate.com).
Stewart’s closing remarks:
http://www.slate.com/id/2272774/
“Most people…don't live solely as
Democrats or Republicans or liberals or
conservatives. Most of them [are] just
a little late for something they have to
do….
The perpetual pundit conflicterator did not
cause our problems, but its existence
makes solving them that much harder."
As for fixing the political process,
Stewart compared problem solving
with cars merging lanes to squeeze
through a tunnel. "They do it,
concession by concession. … There will
be days of darkness. And sometimes
the light at the end of the tunnel isn't
the promised land. Sometimes it's New
Jersey.”