Civil Disobedience is an essay by Henry David Thoreau. Published in 1849 under the title
Resistance to Civil Government, it expressed Thoreau’s belief that people should not allow
governments to overrule or atrophy their consciences, and that people have a duty both to avoid
doing injustice directly and to avoid allowing their acquiescence to enable the government to
make them the agents of injustice. Thoreau was motivated in part by his disgust with slavery and
the Mexican-American War. (source of intro:
https://archive.org/details/civil_disobedience_librivox)
Henry David Thoreau's "Resistance to Civil Government"
(also known as "Civil Disobedience")
Seminar Preparation Questions
1. What does Thoreau mean when he says that "when men are prepared for it" they will have a
government that governs not at all?
2. According to Thoreau, what is the American government?
3. What are some problems associated with a society based on majority rule? (Paragraph 3)
4. What does Thoreau mean when he writes, “Must the citizen ever…resign his conscience to
the legislator?” (Par. 4)
5. What is the difference between “immoral” and “unmoral”? (Par. 5)
6. Thoreau responds in this essay to some of the burning issues of his day. What are they and
what is his opinion of each?
7. How does Thoreau feel about his time in jail? What does he learn from his experience?
8. Create a discussion question or two related to this text.