Resistance movement

“ The question is how this struggle is to be waged.
FIVE EXERCISING POWER In Chapter One we noted that military resistance against dictatorships does not strike them where they are weakest, but rather where they are strongest. By choosing to compete in the areas of military forces, supplies of ammunition, weapons technology, and the like, resistance movements tend to put themselves at a distinct disadvantage. ”

“ National ideals, based on a co-operative social order, would have the same power of resistance almost as a religion, which is, of all things, most unconquerable by physical force, and, when it is itself militant, the most powerful ally of military power. ”

“ I cannot forbear to wish, that this commotion may end without bloodshed, and that the rebels may be subdued by terrour rather than by violence; and therefore recommend such a force as may take away, not only the power, but the hope of resistance, and by conquering without a battle, fave many from the sword. ”

“ The inequality of the ground that the enemies found in advancing, after having driven in our right, enabled our them to rally and to resist. But this resistance was of short duration. Every one had been engaged in hand-to-hand combats; every one was worn out with lassitude and despair of success, and a confusion so general and so unheard-of. ”

“ I say, at a crisis like this we might better have lost a thousand men in battle, for it will turn thousands against us, and rouse the slumbering spirit of resistance here, at the very crisis when, had it slumbered on a little longer, all was ours. ”

“ But the extreme hollowness of the objection before us becomes at once obvious, when I turn the tables, and demand whether the practice of injurious resistance offers immunity from extreme trial, danger, hardship and suffering? How happens it that human beings enough to people from eighteen to forty such globes as ours, have perished in war? ”

“ The opposition to these measures of aggression ceased to be wholly confined to the mere handful of technical abolitionists, and to spread and to take possession of the minds of the whole people, exciting surprise and alarm, and arousing them to some slight efforts at resistance. ”

“ This I know: a successful resistance is a revolution, not a rebellion! Rebellion indeed appears on the back of a flying enemy; but revolution flames on the breast-plate of the victorious warrior. Who can tell, sir, whether, in consequence of this day’s violent and mad address to his majesty, the scabbard may not be thrown away by them as well as by us; and, should success attend them, whether, in a few years, the independent Americans may not celebrate the glorious era of the Revolution of 1775, as we do that of 1688? ”

“ How can organizational strength in the resistance be developed? How can participants be trained? What resources (finances, equipment, etc.) will be required throughout the struggle? What types of symbolism can be most effective in mobilizing the population? ”

“ One city in proscription and the rest in rebellion can never be a remedial measure for general disturbances. Have you considered whether you have troops and ships sufficient to reduce the people of the whole American continent to your devotion? It was the duty of your governor, and not of men without arms, to suppress the tumults. If this officer has not demanded the proper assistance from the military commanders, why punish the innocent for the fault and the negligence of the officers of the crown? The resistance is general in all parts of America ”

“ An idea seemed to be entertained that all that was necessary to constitute a war was organized hostility in the district of country in a state of rebellion — that conflicts on land and on sea — the taking of towns and capture of fleets — in fine, the magnitude and dimensions of the resistance against the Government — constituted war with all the belligerent rights belonging to civil war. ”

“ We have too little power of resistance against this ferocity which champs us up. What front can we make against these unavoidable, victorious, maleficent forces? What can I do against the influence of Race, in my history? ”

“ If the first be our object, and resistance is offered to us, how foolish to leave our enemies the means of resisting us with success? how weak to spare men who have done all they could to slay us, or women and children, by which the race of our adversaries may be kept up and increased? ”

“ Those who fight and win with force, ultimately find it both convenient and expedient to follow the line of least resistance; and they continue to rely upon force in time of peace as well, ostensibly to maintain law and order, but practically to suppress and stifle every rising spirit. ”

“ In my ardour to attain the goal, I do not forget the nature of the ground where the race is to be run. The destruction of those institutions which I condemn, appears to me to be hastening on too rapidly. I abhor the very idea of a revolution. I am a determined enemy to every species of violence. ”

“ The armies and navies of the world are kept up by three causes: cowardice, love of dominion, and lust for blood. (§ 3 ¶ 5)
It is cowardice that makes it difficult to meet invasion by the method of passive resistance. More courage and discipline are needed for the successful practice of this method than for facing death in the heat of battle. But I am persuaded that there is in England enough courage and enough capacity for discipline to make success in passive resistance possible if education and moral teaching were directed to that end instead of to warlike prowess. ”

“ Such a force, since it would meet with no military opposition, would not need to be large, and would not be in the state of mingled fear and ferocity which characterizes an invading army among a hostile population. ”

“ You say injurious resistance, war and bloodshed will never cease till aggression cease! Will aggression ever cease? Can it ever cease? Is it not a necessary result of the laws of nature? What is the conclusion from such premises, but this - that man's nature obliges him to aggress and resist just as he does, and there is no hope that he will ever cease doing either. ”

“ Passive resistance, that is, soul-force, is matchless. It is superior to the force of arms. How, then, can it be considered only a weapon of the weak? Physical-force men are strangers to the courage that is requisite in a passive resister. ”

“ What are your means of resistance? Are there, in all the islands put together, ten thousand white men capable of hearing arms? Are not your forces, such as they are, divided into small portions which can never act in concert? ”

“ It must also be remembered that all resistance opposed by the regular army is, according to the needs of the situation, ascribed to the inhabitants, and that the invader invariably avenges on the civil population the checks which he suffers during the campaign, and even his own mistakes. ”

“ This significant expression is heard over and over again during the Revolution, and it explains the success of the insurrections.—Alexandre, in command of the Saint-Marcel battalion, says in his report: "Why make a resistance which can be of no usefulness to the public, one which may even compromise it a great deal more?..." ”

“ Where, and in what? It is here that we find people, revolutionists, who, whilst maintaining their own lives altogether under the system of force, strive against this force, opposing violence to violence. ”

“ And the ever-recurring wars that result—the conquests of weaker tribes or nations, and the over-running of their territories by the victors, are instances of social movements taking place in the directions of least resistance. ”

“ The impossibility of relief, and the certain prospect of wanting every necessary of life, should your opponents confine their operations to a simple Blockade, point out the absurdity of resistance. Such is your situation! ”

“ In a widely discussed pamphlet, If We Should Be Invaded, issued just before the outbreak of the present war, Jessie Wallace Hughan, of the War Resisters League, maintained that non-violent resistance would be more effective even in meeting an armed invasion than would reliance upon military might. ”

“ And, at the same time that, to carry on external aggression or resistance, the ruling power in each group sacrificed the personal claims of its members, the function of defending its members from one another was in but small degree discharged by it: they were left to defend themselves. ”

“ To organize a resistance would have been impossible, with countesses fainting on every side, duchesses in hysterics. The men of our party, too, avowed that without an armory of guns, pistols, and cutlasses they were powerless. ”

“ Again, when belligerent measures do become authorized by extreme resistance, and a legitimate state of war exists, and civil authority is prostrate, and violence and bloodshed seem the last desperate resort, yet war measures must be kept within certain restraints in all civil contests in all civilized communities. ”

“ And he wanted them to believe him when he told them that Passive Resistance pure and simple was an infinitely finer weapon than all the sticks and gunpowder put together. They might strike work, but they might compel nobody else to strike work, and, if, as a result of their strike, they were sentenced to be imprisoned, whipped, or to both, they must suffer even unto death—that was Passive Resistance, nothing else. Nothing else, and nothing less than that, would satisfy the requirements of Passive Resistance. ”

“ There is always then resistance between conflicting forces; and resistance, we know, strengthens the current. What power was at work for the last fifty years and marshalled, on that fatal August day of 1914, the formidable army that swept over Belgium, France and Russia? ”

“ Belligerent measures, too, must come, not from subordinates, but from those empowered to command, and be commensurate only with the opposing array,-the persons, places, and causes where resistance flagrante bello exists of the reckless character justifying violence and a disregard of all ordinary securities and laws. ”

“ And we will defend ourselves with our own right arm; and if in the heat of strife we shall spill blood, or rend asunder the Realm—of a surety this is not 'Disunion or civil war,' but it is that which is called glorious revolution. ”

“ The study of the political strike leads us to a better understanding of a distinction we must always have in mind when we reflect on contemporary social questions. Sometimes the terms force and violence are used in speaking of acts of authority, sometimes in speaking of acts of revolt. ”

“ The fact is, there are two ways of inciting the suffering classes to violence: one is that of the so-called revolutionists, who directly advise them to use force; the other, and by far the more dangerous, is that of the so-called friends of order who try to leave them no other hope than force. ”

“ Such, the advocates of non resistance would persuade us, are the legitimate results in this country of war on the one hand and of a long-protracted peace on the other. But there are men of less vivid imaginations, and, perhaps, of visions less distorted by fanatical zeal, who fail to perceive these results, and who even think they see the reverse of all this. ”

“ Emile Péan exclaimed, "The old man is simply working in his profession, but the young man is working out his promotion."
Before this Tacherat and this Barlet entered, before the butts of the muskets had been heard ringing on the stones of the staircase, this Assembly had talked of resistance. Of what kind of resistance? We have just stated. The majority could only listen to a regular organized resistance, a military resistance in uniform and in epaulets. Such a resistance was easy to decree, but it was difficult to organize. ”

“ But now, in spite of the misfortunes which have befallen our Order, I feel myself a thousand times more ready for action, more authoritative, more strong and more daring, at the head of our mute and black-robed militia, who only think and wish, or move and obey, mechanically, according to my will. ”