not believe that acting in any other way than non-violently in accordance with Christian values would result in breaking the cyclical pattern of hatred and violence of man against man. In one of his books, Strive Toward Freedom, King, Jr. outlined his nonviolence principles which he believed would cause public sentiment to flow toward the actions of those who loved as opposed to those who hated and used violence. King, Jr. believed the conscience of those witnessing such actions would be the true decision maker. The principles he outlined compare to the beliefs of Socrates in that unjust laws can be broken but one needs the moral conviction and courage of those actions to be prepared to give up even their own life to have such freedoms, “We will take direct action against injustice without waiting for other agencies to act. We will not obey unjust laws or submit to unjust practices. We will do this peacefully, openly, cheerfully because our aim is to persuade. We adopt the means of nonviolence because our end is a community at peace with itself. We will try to persuade with our words, but if our words fail, we will try to persuade with our acts. We will always be willing to talk and seek fair compromise, but we are ready to suffer, when necessary and even risk our lives to become witnesses to the truth as we see it” (Beck 4).
King, Jr. knew that the real issue was not between blacks and whites but between love and peace and hate and violence. His conception of society was the development, through peaceful resistance in order to modify unjust laws, of a “Beloved Community.” King, Jr. recognized that until the chain of hatred and violence were broken through a different means, one of love and peace, then nothing much would change in a society. Like Socrates, he believed that the law and society have a spiritual dimension. He believed that if we turned our backs on those we hate or commit injustices against others ...