Question

How does Martin Luther King appeal to "eternal and natural law" help him examine human laws

Answer 1

A "Letter from the Birmingham Jail," written by Martin Luther King Jr. is a response to white clerics who claimed he was extremist and violent. A specific example that King addressed was the "willingness to break the laws" that clerics had seen as a threat to society. He then defines this term of an "unjust law" by stating that "an unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in the eternal and natural law." In one example, King exemplifies how something can be legally and morally wrong. "We can never forget that everything Hitler did in Germany was legal." In this way Martin Luther King examines human laws that in many cases are contrary to the "eternal and natural law".