A few, reformers and martyrs, serve the state with their consciences also, but they are usually treated as enemies. Thoreau declares that he cannot associate with the American government, because it is a slave's government. He appeals to the right of revolution and the case of 1775. It has become a military state, and honest men ought to rebel. He criticizes not only southern slave-owners but northern merchants and farmers who care more about commerce and agriculture than they do about humanity.
Thousands are against slavery and the war, but they do nothing about it.
Voting, he says, is like playing a game with right and wrong. Voting for the right does nothing for it if the majority passes the expedient instead. Thoreau accurately predicts that by the time the majority abolishes slavery there will be no slavery left to abolish. Although it is not necessarily a man's duty to work to eradicate a wrong, it is his duty not to support practically a wrong. We must not only refuse to fight in an unjust war, but also refuse to support the unjust government which conducts the war.