Editing Civil disobedience (section)

==== Trial strategies ====
Some civil disobedients feel it is incumbent upon them to accept punishment because of their belief in the validity of the [[social contract]], which is held to bind all to obey the laws that a government meeting certain standards of legitimacy has established, or else suffer the penalties set out in the law. Other civil disobedients who favour the existence of government still do not believe in the legitimacy of their particular government or do not believe in the legitimacy of a particular law it has enacted. Anarchistic civil disobedients do not believe in the legitimacy of any government, so see no need to accept punishment for a violation of criminal law.

===== Pleading guilty =====
An important decision for civil disobedients is whether to [[plead guilty]]. There is much debate on this point, as some believe that it is a civil disobedient's duty to submit to the punishment prescribed by law, while others believe that defending oneself in court will increase the possibility of changing the unjust law.<ref>{{citation|url=http://freestateproject.org/news/issues/civil_disobedience.php|title=Rules for Engaging in Civil Disobedience|publisher=Free State Project|access-date=17 July 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100613110110/http://freestateproject.org/news/issues/civil_disobedience.php|archive-date=13 June 2010|url-status=dead}}</ref> It has also been argued that either choice is compatible with the spirit of civil disobedience. [[ACT UP]]'s Civil Disobedience Training handbook states that a civil disobedient who pleads guilty is essentially stating, "Yes, I committed the act of which you accuse me. I don't deny it; in fact, I am proud of it. I feel I did the right thing by violating this particular law; I am guilty as charged", but that pleading not guilty sends a message of, "Guilt implies wrong-doing. I feel I have done no wrong. I may have violated some specific laws, but I am guilty of doing no wrong. I, therefore, plead not guilty." A plea of [[Nolo contendere|no contest]] is sometimes regarded as a compromise between the two.<ref>{{citation|url=http://www.actupny.org/documents/CDdocuments/ACTUP_CivilDisobedience.pdf|title=Civil Disobedience Training|publisher=ACT UP|year=2003|access-date=17 July 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100622091604/http://www.actupny.org/documents/CDdocuments/ACTUP_CivilDisobedience.pdf|archive-date=22 June 2010|url-status=live}}</ref> One defendant accused of illegally protesting [[nuclear power]], when asked to enter his plea, stated, "I plead for the beauty that surrounds us";<ref>{{citation|author=Hurst, John|year=1978|title=A-plant protesters being freed|work=Los Angeles Times}}</ref> this is known as a "creative plea", and will usually be interpreted as a plea of not guilty.<ref name=NLG/>

When the Committee for Non-Violent Action sponsored a protest in August 1957, at the Camp Mercury nuclear test site near Las Vegas, Nevada, 13 of the protesters attempted to enter the test site knowing that they faced arrest. At an announced time, one by one they crossed a line and were immediately arrested. They were put on a bus and taken to the Nye County seat of Tonopah, Nevada, and arraigned for trial before the local Justice of the Peace, that afternoon. A civil rights attorney, Francis Heisler, had volunteered to defend the accused, advising them to plead ''[[nolo contendere]]'' rather than guilty or not guilty. They were found guilty and given suspended sentences, conditional on not reentering the test site.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Canada |first=Public Safety |date=2018-12-21 |title=The Social Reintegration of Offenders and Crime Prevention |url=https://www.publicsafety.gc.ca/cnt/rsrcs/pblctns/scl-rntgrtn/index-en.aspx |access-date=2022-07-10 |website=www.publicsafety.gc.ca}}</ref>

Howard Zinn writes,
{{Blockquote|There may be many times when protesters ''choose'' to go to jail, as a way of continuing their protest, as a way of reminding their countrymen of injustice. But that is different than the notion that they ''must'' go to jail as part of a rule connected with civil disobedience. The key point is that the spirit of protest should be maintained all the way, whether it is done by remaining in jail, or by evading it. To accept jail penitently as an accession to "the rules" is to switch suddenly to a spirit of subservience, to demean the seriousness of the protest&nbsp;... In particular, the [[neo-conservative]] insistence on a guilty plea should be eliminated.<ref>Howard Zinn, ''Disobedience and Disorder: Nine Fallacies on Law and Order'', cited in {{citation|title=On Civil Disobedience in Recent American Democratic Thought|author=Paul F. Power|publisher=The American Political Science Review|volume=64|issue=1|date=Mar 1970|pages=40}}</ref>}}

Sometimes the prosecution proposes a [[plea bargain]] to civil disobedients, as in the case of the [[Camden 28]], in which the defendants were offered an opportunity to plead guilty to one misdemeanour count and receive no jail time.<ref>{{citation|author=Mirelle Cohen|title=The Camden 28 (review)|journal=Teaching Sociology|volume=35|issue=4|date=Oct 2007|pages=391–392|doi=10.1177/0092055x0703500423|s2cid=144154349}}</ref> In some [[mass arrest]] situations, the activists decide to use [[solidarity]] tactics to secure the same plea bargain for everyone.<ref name=NLG>{{citation|url=http://www.nlg-la.org/index_files/cd_questions.pdf|title=Questions and Answers about Civil Disobedience and the Legal Process|author=National Lawyers Guild, LA Chapter|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110727003254/http://www.nlg-la.org/index_files/cd_questions.pdf|archive-date=27 July 2011}}</ref> 

But some activists have opted to enter a [[blind plea]], pleading guilty without any plea agreement in place. Mahatma Gandhi pleaded guilty and told the court, "I am here to&nbsp;... submit cheerfully to the highest penalty that can be inflicted upon me for what in law is a deliberate crime and what appears to me to be the highest duty of a citizen."<ref>{{citation|title=Three Principles of Civil Disobedience: Thoreau, Gandhi, and King|publisher=Lewiston Morning Tribune|date=15 January 2006|author=Nick Gier}}</ref>

===== Allocution =====
Some civil disobedience defendants choose to make a defiant speech, or a speech explaining their actions, in [[allocution]].<ref>{{Cite web |last=Pestorius |first=Margaret |date=2020-02-18 |title=Your Activist Speech in Court |url=https://commonslibrary.org/your-activist-speech-in-court/ |access-date=2024-08-12 |website=The Commons Social Change Library |language=en-AU}}</ref> In ''U.S. v. Burgos-Andujar'', a defendant who was involved in a movement to stop military exercises by trespassing on US Navy property argued to the court in allocution that "the ones who are violating the greater law are the members of the Navy". As a result, the judge increased her sentence from 40 to 60 days. This action was upheld because, according to the [[US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit]], her statement suggested a lack of remorse, an attempt to avoid responsibility for her actions, and even a likelihood of repeating her illegal actions.<ref>{{cite court|url=http://openjurist.org/275/f3d/23/united-states-of-america-v-norma-burgos-andjar|vol=275|reporter=F.3d|opinion=23|litigants=United States of America v. Norma Burgos-Andjar}}</ref> Some of the other allocution speeches given by the protesters complained about mistreatment from government officials.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://prosario-2000.0catch.com/Politics/allocution.htm|title=Allocution|website=prosario-2000.0catch.com|access-date=12 January 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181116083104/http://prosario-2000.0catch.com/Politics/allocution.htm|archive-date=16 November 2018|url-status=dead}}</ref>

[[Tim DeChristopher]] gave an allocution statement to the court describing the US as "a place where the rule of law was created through acts of civil disobedience" and arguing, "Since those bedrock acts of civil disobedience by our founding fathers, the rule of law in this country has continued to grow closer to our shared higher moral code through the civil disobedience that drew attention to legalized injustice."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://grist.org/climate-energy/2011-07-27-tim-dechristophers-statement-to-the-court/|title=Tim DeChristopher's statement to the court|date=28 July 2011|access-date=2 September 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151013163122/http://grist.org/climate-energy/2011-07-27-tim-dechristophers-statement-to-the-court/|archive-date=13 October 2015|url-status=live}}</ref>

===== Trial strategies =====
[[Steven Barkan]] writes that if defendants plead not guilty, "they must decide whether their primary goal will be to win an acquittal and avoid imprisonment or a fine, or to use the proceedings as a forum to inform the jury and the public of the political circumstances surrounding the case and their reasons for breaking the law via civil disobedience." A [[technical defence]] may enhance the chances for acquittal but increase the possibility of additional proceedings and of reduced press coverage. During the [[Vietnam War]] era, the [[Chicago Eight]] used a [[political defence]], but [[Benjamin Spock trial|Benjamin Spock]] used a technical defence.<ref>{{citation|title=Strategic, Tactical and Organizational Dilemmas of the Protest Movement against Nuclear Power|author=Steven E. Barkan|author-link=Steven Barkan|publisher=Social Problems|volume=27|issue=1|date=Oct 1979|pages=19–37}}</ref> In countries such as the United States, whose laws guarantee the right to a [[jury trial]] but do not excuse lawbreaking for political purposes, some civil disobedients seek [[jury nullification]]. Over the years, this has been made more difficult by court decisions such as ''[[Sparf v. United States]]'', which held that the judge need not inform jurors of their nullification prerogative, and ''[[United States v. Dougherty]]'', which held that the judge need not allow defendants to openly seek jury nullification.