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Julian Robinson
Ms. Thompson
Honors British Literature Block 3 Skinny A
January 26, 2015
A Law That People Might Break: Draft 2
Unjust Laws: What's in Your Back Pocket?
"How does one determine when a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man-made code
that squares with the moral law, or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony
with the moral law. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas, an unjust law is a human law
that is not rooted in eternal and natural law." - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.. Dr. Martin Luther
King Jr. won the Nobel Prize for Peace in 1964. He advocated for racial equality and was
perhaps the largest leader in the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 60s. Today, there are
laws in place that are unjust enough to break without negative consequences. Here are a few
examples: it is illegal to carry an ice cream cone in your back pocket on Sunday, and cars cannot
be driven in reverse in Glendale, Arizona. MLK Would say these laws are ok to break because
they are outdated and dont take both the victims and the perpetrators point of view into
consideration.
First off, MLK would have believed that carrying an ice cream cone in your pocket on
Sunday is an unjust law in todays society. because it is outdated. The point of this law was to
keep people from stealing horses from peoples pastures. This was relevant back when the law
was first made, but it is silly now. The morality of the law does not makes sense. For example,
someone could be walking down the street and need to store their ice cream quickly. Your back
pocket it perfect for that. Another example is that it is a extremely convenient way to store your

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creamy, dreamy, and delicious delicacy on a hot summer day. The other laws are mainly unjust
because of their ignorance to both sides of the story.
Also, laws are unjust because they do not see both sides of the law as equal. In the law
about the car, one drives in reverse a lot, for example, to back out of parking lots, driveway, etc.
A law like this forbids Glendale citizens to reverse for seemingly no good reason. No one is
going to get hurt as long as the driver pays attention to where they are backing up.
In conclusion, Martin Luther King Jr. would say these are fair laws to break because the
laws are unjust. What is an unjust law? A law that does not use morality to prove itself just. A
solution to a law such as this would be to modify the ice cream law to only apply where people
could steal horses. In modern times, this is not relevant, and this law should be removed, or else
people are going to break it. The car solution would to be to just get rid of the law. MLK was a
imperative figure in the Civil Rights Movement, and he broke many laws(Jim Crow) of his
time. Take into account his point of view on these subjects.