Question

selected excerpt on the duty of civil disobedience by henry david thoreau. thoreau wrote this influential essay in 1849 because he was disgusted with the us governments refusal to end slavery and with its participation in the mexican - american war. the practical reason why a majority are permitted to rule is not because they are most likely to be in the right, but because they are physically the strongest. can there not be a government in which majorities do not decide right and wrong, but conscience? - in which majorities decide only those questions to which the rule of expediency is applicable¹? why has every man a conscience, then? it is not desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for the right. the only obligation i have is to do at any time what i think right. how does it become a man to behave toward the american government today? i answer that he cannot without disgrace be associated with it. i cannot for an instant recognize that political organization as my government which is the slaves government also. all men recognize the right to resist the government when its tyranny or its inefficiency are great and unendurable. but almost all say that such is not the case now. but such was the case, they think, in the revolution of 1775. if one were to tell me that this was a bad government because it taxed certain foreign commodities brought to its ports², it is most probable that i should not make an ado about it, for i can do about it nothing. but when a sixth of the population of a nation are slaves, and a whole country is unjustly overrun and conquered by a foreign army³, i think that it is not too soon for honest men to revolutionize. what makes this duty the more urgent is that fact, that the country so overrun is not our own, but ours is the invading army. it is not a mans duty to devote himself to the eradication of any wrong, he may still properly have other concerns to engage him. but it is his duty at least to wash his hands of it and not to give it practically his support. i have heard some of my townsmen say, i should like to have them order me out to help put down an insurrection of the slaves, or to march to mexico - see if i would go. and yet these very men have each, directly by their allegiance, and indirectly, by their money, furnished a substitute. thus, under the name of order and civil government, we are all made to pay support our own meanness. after the first blush of sin, comes its indifference; and from immoral it becomes, as it were, unmoral, and not quite unnecessary to the life which we have made. select the correct answer. which statement summarizes thoreaus rebuttal to a counter - argument he mentions in the excerpt? a. there is more reason to rebel against the government now than there was in 1775. b. now is not the time to resist the government, because it is not behaving tyrannically. c. people should not help to stop rebellions in the south or fight in mexico. d. it is the duty of every american to right any wrong they see in their government.

Explanation:

Thoreau argues that when the government is unjust (such as allowing slavery and engaging in unjust wars), it is the duty of Americans to right these wrongs. He opposes the idea that the current situation is not bad enough to resist, like the counter - argument suggesting now is not the time to resist as the government is not tyrannical. He believes in taking action against government wrongs.

Answer:

D. It is the duty of every American to right any wrong they see in their government