Letter From a Birmingham Jail

¶ … Letter From a Birmingham Jail

Throughout Martin Luther King's Letter from a Birmingham Jail, the author develops the concept of distinguishing just laws from unjust laws. In that regard, Dr. King relied primarily on logos as a rhetorical tool to lay out the objective justification for (first) establishing that the morality of laws can be evaluated, and (second) for establishing that certain specific laws are capable of fair characterization as immoral.

The author reminds his audience about the relevance of the lessons of very recent history (at the time of its writing):

"We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was 'legal' and everything the Hungarian freedom fighters did in Hungary was 'illegal.' It was 'illegal' to aid and comfort a Jew in Hitler's Germany. Even so, I am sure that, had I lived in Germany at the time, I would have aided and comforted my Jewish brothers. If today I lived in a Communist country where certain principles dear to the Christian faith are suppressed, I would openly advocate disobeying that country's antireligious laws."

In this argument, Dr. King uses the logical technique of direct comparison, although he also adds an element of both pathos and ethos in doing so. The logical argument is the direct comparison by example that formal laws can be distinctly immoral and that the concept of morality and concern for fellow human beings is more important to uphold than unjust laws. The emotional component (pathos) of the appeal is the natural comparison implied between the persecution of the Jews in Nazi Germany and the current circumstances of the African-American subject to unjust laws and discrimination in the U.S. The credibility or character element of the appeal (ethos) is implied by the suggestion that the author is a man of objective moral concern who would sympathize equally with any minority group being persecuted or denied their rights under unjust laws. The author's objective in this regard is to establish that his passion is for justice in principle more so than for the interests of the one minority group of which he is a part.

The author anticipates counterarguments to his thesis in the form of the characterization of moral justification of the specific law the violation of which was the basis of his arrest. This also introduces the logical principle that laws can be patently unjust on their face (such as outright segregation laws) or unjust merely in their unjust application to further immoral objectives.

"Sometimes a law is just on its face and unjust in its application. For instance, I have been arrested on a charge of parading without a permit. Now, there is nothing wrong in having an ordinance which requires a permit for a parade. But such an ordinance becomes unjust when it is used to maintain segregation and to deny citizens the First Amendment privilege of peaceful assembly and protest."

In addition to undermining the argument that the author violated a just law rather than an unjust law, it also establishes the basis for a wider strategic approach to challenge segregation and all of the different methods used at the time to perpetuate it. This concept was particularly important to the anti-segregation efforts in many southern states where state authorities and elected officials alike were infected with a racist sentiment and were very well-practiced, ever since the Jim Crow era, in methods of imposing racist measures under the color of formal laws that were benign on their face.

Dr. King uses the appeal to his credibility again in his reminder to his audience that the author is a moral critic of unjust laws and circumstances rather than someone merely seeking to avoid the requirements of laws because they harm his personal interests. The argument is that those whose objection to formal laws is predicated on self-interest do so more by evading it or breaking it as necessary to pursue their unlawful objectives.

"In no sense do I advocate evading or defying the law, as would the rabid segregationist. That would lead to anarchy. One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty."

In that argument, the author also draws a comparison with those most committed to maintaining segregation; presumably, he was referring to those who physically attacked and sometimes killed both African-Americans and white anti-segregation civil rights workers, secretly and under the cloak of darkness. According to Dr. King, one of the hallmarks of justified civil disobedience is that those whose defiance of laws is genuinely a function of their principled objection to laws that are unjust do so openly and unashamedly rather than secretly. The author further explains the basic logic of this conclusion:

"I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for law."

In that passage, Dr. King argues that the highest moral concern of improving society and protecting those whose interests are not adequately protected by existing law is far more important than any moral obligation to obey unjust laws. The author also directly addresses the notion that laws are also susceptible to being unjust by virtue of the manner in which they are established by illegitimate or immoral legislative authority. This is another logical argument that formal laws are not necessarily just simply as a result as having succeeded in becoming laws because that legislative process is hardly immune to immoral objectives or to moral corruption of the processes.

"A law is unjust if it is inflicted on a minority that, as a result of being denied the right to vote, had no part in enacting or devising the law. Who can say that the legislature of Alabama which set up that state's segregation laws was democratically elected?"

Dr. King repeatedly criticized the relative non-involvement of respected members of the majority (i.e. white) community who professed to sympathize with the plight and objectives of African-Americans while simultaneously criticising Dr. King's methods as "radical" or "extreme."