Civil Disobedience

What is the central idea of "Civil Disobedience"?

• People must overthrow the government.

• Most government will do its best for its citizens.

• The fewer people who run the government, the better.

• Citizens should be willing to act on their own sense of right and wrong.

Thoreau's view of the war with Mexico is best described as

• He was not interested in the war.

• He supported the United States military

• He was against it.

• He wanted to fight in the war.

Why is Thoreau not afraid of being in jail or not paying the tax?

• It was only his body that was imprisoned, not his mind. He was willing to go to jail to prove his point.

• Jail was not that bad, and he was only there for a short time.

• He was afraid of being jailed because his friends will come support him.

• He was tired and old. He lived a good life and has proposed his beliefs, so if he dies in prison, he dies a happy man.

According to Thoreau, to what does a person owe the strongest loyalty?

• God’s moral authority

• his or her conscience

• his or her state government

• “this American government”

What is "civil disobedience"?

• The act of obeying all civil laws

• The act of refusing to obey a law that is believed to be unjust

• The act of creating new laws for civil reform

• The act of voting in a civil election

According to MLK, what is civil disobedience?

• a struggle between two social groups

• breaking the law in a peaceful manner

• breaking the law with the use of violence

• a struggle between branches of the government

Thoreau uses the phrase “that we should be men first, and subjects afterwards in order to:

• demonstrate the difference between democracy and monarchy.

• argue that humans have a need for government

• explain the need for loyalty to one's own country.

• further the claim that each individual must follow his or her own conscience.

Which of the following leaders did Thoreau's essay have the greatest impact on?

• Martin Luther King, Jr.

• Malcolm X

• Abraham Lincoln

• Barack Obama

What was Thoreau's primary act of civil disobedience in his own life?

• Public rallies and protests

• Refusal to pay taxes

• Boycotting the cotton industry

• Writing humorous satire against the government.

Thoreau compares government to a machine. In his comparison, what should a good person do with this machine?

• A good person should be like a mechanic that fixes the machine.

• A good person should be like a broken part that stops the machine from working.

• A good person should stop using the machine altogether

• A good person is a machine herself.