Civil Disobedience

Civil Disobedience Senior Seminar Mrs. Civitella

Civil Disobedience Civil disobedience- noun: a refusal to obey laws, pay taxes, etc: a non-violent means of protesting or of attempting to achieve political goals

Examples of Civil Disobedience Person: Resistance to: Sam Adams, 1774 Henry David Thoreau, 1849 Harriet Beecher Stowe, 1852 Alice Paul, 1916-1917 Rosa Parks, 1955 Martin Luther King, Jr., 1963 Karen Silkwood, 1974 Cindy Sheehan, 2005-present • Tea Tax • Mexican Am. War, slavery • Fugitive Slave Law • Women’s suffrage • Segregation • Civil Rights Act • Nuclear energy laws • Against the War in Iraq and Afghanistan

Questions to consider? • How does history view acts of civil disobedience? • Are all efforts beneficial? • Do we as a nation want to allow peaceful protest? • How effective are peaceful protests? • What makes a protest legitimate? • PETA, anti-abortion, Tea Party, Wall Street Protests? • How effective is the media in peaceful protest?

Camden 28 May, 1970- The New York Times published evidence of the secret bombing campaign in Cambodia February, 1971- The Pentagon Papers- New York Times were leaked the top secret report detailing the mistakes and mistruths of the Vietnam conflict dating all of the way back to Kennedy NY Times v. U.S. 1971 the court finds in favor of the papers based on the first amendment Mar, 1971- burglary of the F.B.I. office in Media, PA evidence of FBI techniques against COINTELPRO were published in newspapers

Camden 28 August 22, 1971- break in of federal building in Camden, NJ leads to the arrest of anti-draft protestors Charged with: Conspiracy to remove & destroy files from a F.B.I. office, Army Intelligence Office, destruction of government property, interfering with Selective Service The group faced up to 47 years in federal prison

Camden 28 • Offered a plea bargin to plead guilty and be charged with one misdemeanor • They decided to plead guilty and have each member testify • They called themselves “America’s conscience” • The media called them the Camden 28 • The group included 4 Catholic priests, 1 Lutheran minister, 22 Catholic lay people, 1 unidentified

The Catholic Left “Catholic left”: name given by the government and the media to this non-violent anti-war movement The Catholic left had claimed responsibility for over 30 draft board raids and the destruction of a million Selective Service documents Believed in civil disobedience to call attention to their belief that all killing, even in war, was morally indefensible

Camden 28 Activists, with the help of three young lawyers, asked the jury to nullify the laws against breaking and entering saying that the country had had “enough” of the “illegal & immoral” war in Vietnam The second part of the defendant’s case was that they should be acquitted on the grounds that the raid would not have taken place without the self-admitted help of FBI informer who was provocated and encouraged by being providing with the tools to carry out the raid

Camden 28 After 3 ½ months, the case went to the jury Judge Fisher broke new legal ground in saying that they could acquit if they felt that the government’s participation had gone to “intolerable lengths” After 3 days of deliberation the jury of 7 women and 5 men found the Camden 28 not guilty on all counts

Bob Hardy and the F.B.I. • What role did Bob Hardy play in the Camden 28? • Why did he go to the F.B.I.? • What is civic virtue? • Do you believe that justice was served? • justice- to act or treat fairly

Testimony Questions presented to the jury by the defendants and their corroborating witnesses: Who went too far? The Camden 28 or the government? How effective was Mrs. Good’s testimony?

Civil Disobedience