On the Duty of Civil Disobedience

ON THE DUTY OF CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE

    I heartily accept the motto, -- "That government is best which
governs least"; and I should like to see it acted up to more rapidly
and systematically.  Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which
also I believe, -- "That government is best which governs not at
all"; and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of
government which they will have.  Government is at best but an
expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are
sometimes, inexpedient.  The objections which have been brought
against a standing army, and they are many and weighty, and deserve
to prevail, may also at last be brought against a standing
government.  The standing army is only an arm of the standing
government.  The government itself, which is only the mode which the
people have chosen to execute their will, is equally liable to be
abused and perverted before the people can act through it.  Witness
the present Mexican war, the work of comparatively a few individuals
using the standing government as their tool; for, in the outset, the
people would not have consented to this measure.
    This American government -- what is it but a tradition, though a
recent one, endeavoring to transmit itself unimpaired to posterity,
but each instant losing some of its integrity?  It has not the
vitality and force of a single living man; for a single man can bend
it to his will.  It is a sort of wooden gun to the people
themselves.  But it is not the less necessary for this; for the
people must have some complicated machinery or other, and hear its
din, to satisfy that idea of government which they have.
Governments show thus how successfully men can be imposed on, even
impose on themselves, for their own advantage.  It is excellent, we
must all allow.  Yet this government never of itself furthered any
enterprise, but by the alacrity with which it got out of its way.
It does not keep the country free.  It does not settle the West.  It
does not educate.  The character inherent in the American people has
done all that has been accomplished; and it would have done somewhat
more, if the government had not sometimes got in its way.  For
government is an expedient by which men would fain succeed in
letting one another alone; and, as has been said, when it is most
expedient, the governed are most let alone by it.  Trade and
commerce, if they were not made of India rubber, would never manage
to bounce over the obstacles which legislators are continually
putting in their way; and, if one were to