Civil Disobedience and Standards of Society Anonymous 10th Grade

Written in 1884, Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is a tale about a young boy’s journey to freedom from society, and his struggle with his conscience during a time in the past when slavery was the norm for society. Huck, a rebellious boy, escapes from Pap, his abusive father, and embarks on a journey along the Mississippi River with Jim, a runaway slave who yearns for freedom in the North. Throughout their journey Huck and Jim encounter various personalities, but each person’s opinion of African Americans is the same. Slaves were considered property, not actual human beings. Unlike the rest of society, Huck’s struggle with his conscience portrays civil disobedience by not adhering to societal expectations. To act in civil disobedience means to disobey accepted laws or standards. Civil disobedience should not be mistaken with law defying acts of crime based on selfishness because “…any act of civil disobedience is rooted in a prior act of obedience to individual conscience” (Evans). People who act in civil disobedience are “Persons who choose to disobey the laws of their lands or the moral teachings of their culture do so because they feel an obligation to higher kinds of law or to superior sort of ethics…”...