Conforming to the laws of the land

Fairly than speaking about the necessity to conform to the legal guidelines of the land, I’d stress the im­portance of adhering to the rule of regulation. The rule of regulation implies that individuals are ruled not by the whims and fancies of people however by the regulation, which offers certainty and predictability. The rule of regulation additionally means respecting human rights (such because the rights of human liberty and safety) and particular person rights and freedoms (resembling freedom of expression, peaceable meeting and the correct to dissent). One can’t communicate on the necessity to conform to legal guidelines with out talking of the necessity to respect human rights – together with the rights of the weakest teams of society. It’s necessary that not solely the citizen but additionally these in authorities respect the rule of regulation and act throughout the framework of the spirit of the regulation.

Conforming to the legal guidelines of the land additionally requires the state to use the regulation with an excellent hand and never apply the regulation in an indiscriminate method.

Nevertheless, we must also not neglect that human historical past is strewn with examples of individuals consciously refusing to evolve to legal guidelines that have been merciless, inhuman or manifestly unjust, and practised civil disobedience.

Mahatma Gandhi’s Salt March was supposed to defy the unjust legal guidelines of the British rulers who had imposed a tax on the manufacturing of salt.

In the US, Rosa Parks was arrested by the police for refusing to surrender her seat to a white particular person in defiance of the segregation legal guidelines, which operated within the bus companies in Alabama. It’s mentioned that because the officer took her away, she recalled that she requested: “Why do you push us round?” She remembered him saying: “I don’t know; however the regulation’s the regulation and also you’re beneath arrest.”

So in sure excessive circumstances, there could also be the next responsibility to disobey the regulation – such because the legal guidelines of apartheid and segregation, and those who violate the rules of our widespread humanity. In expressing dissent, one should be conscious that such expressions don’t spill over into violence or lead to wrongful deeds.

As Martin Luther King mentioned, in his well-known speech from the Lincoln Memorial: “Allow us to not search to fulfill our thirst for freedom by ingesting from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We should endlessly conduct our wrestle on the excessive airplane of dignity and self-discipline. We should not permit our inventive protest to degenerate into bodily violence.”

It’s necessary that not solely the citizen but additionally these in authorities respect the rule of regulation and act throughout the framework of the spirit of the regulation