LAW-2581 Civil Disobedience
This course examines civil disobedience and protest from legal, philosophical and historical perspectives. Issues discussed include: reasons for obeying or disobeying the law; the relation between law and ethics; varieties of civil disobedience; arguments used to justify civil disobedience; the use of civil disobedience in social change and protest movements; the role of lawyers in representing those engaged in civil disobedience; whether lawyers can participate in civil disobedience. We will examine the writing of authors who seek to justify civil disobedience and their critics starting with the classical Greek thought and focusing on Henry Thoreau, Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., John Rawls, and contemporary writers. The course examines the use of civil disobedience in Gandhi's South African Rights and Indian independence movement, the American civil rights movement, opposition to the war in Viet Nam, the environmental movement, and the anti-abortion movement, and in contemporary protest movements in the United States and other countries.
Students may elect to write a paper in lieu of the final exam. Students who wish to fulfill the law school legal writing requirement may after completing the course enroll in a Directed Study for credit with Professor Rodwin and write an extended paper that builds on the paper written for the class. Grades will be based on a paper (80%), exam (20%) and class participation.