Socrates' Trial: The Political Philosophy of Citizenship

That engagement with political philosophy was dramatically intensified when Socrates was,
at the age of seventy, arraigned, tried, and sentenced to death by an Athenian court. Brought
in the usual Athenian way by a group of his fellow citizens who took it upon themselves to
prosecute him for the sake of the city, the charges against him were three-fold: not
acknowledging the city's gods; introducing new gods; and corrupting the young (Apol. 24b).
Each of these had a political dimension, given the civic control of central religious cults
mentioned earlier, and the broad political importance of educating the young to take their
place in the civic order. Timed a few years after a short-lived oligarchic coup in which several
of Socrates' sometime associates (Critias, Charmides) participated, and after the ignominious
Athenian defeat in the wars with Sparta which saw another earlier follower of Socrates
(Alcibiades) turn traitor to Athens, the trial must be suspected of having served as a substitute
for the prohibited political trials of the oligarchic partisans (such trials having been barred by
a general amnesty passed in 403 BCE by the restored democracy; see Cartledge 2009, Ch.7).
Socrates' speeches in the court trialliterary versions of which were produced by Plato,
Xenophon, and a number of other followersforced him to confront directly the question of
his role in an Athens defined by its democratic institutions and norms. Socrates had played
his part as an ordinary citizen, allowing his name to go forward for selection by lot to serve
on the Council, and serving in the army when required. But he had not engaged actively in
public affairs (ta pragmata, Apol.32e): he had not spoken in the Assembly (31c), nor, so far
as we know, brought prosecutions or volunteered for selection for jury service in the lawcourts. In Plato's account, after countering the religious accusations, Socrates acknowledged
this abstention from public affairs but claimed to have had a more significant mission laid on
him by the god Apollo when his oracle at Delphi declared that no man was wiser than
Socrates: his mission was to stir up the city like a gadfly (30e), discussing virtue and related
matters (38a), and benefiting each person by trying to persuade him to care for virtue rather
than wealth for himself and for the city (36c-d). He went so far as to claim that as a civic
benefactor, he deserved not death but the lifetime free meals commonly awarded to an
Olympic champion (36e-37a). Socrates here depicts himself as a new kind of citizen,
conceptualizing the public good in a new way and so serving it best through unprecedented
actions in contrast to the conventionally defined paths of political contest and success (Villa
2001).
While depicting himself in his defense speeches in Plato's Apology as a new kind of virtuous
citizen, Socrates makes three remarks which have in modern times been seized upon as
indications of the principled limits which he might have put on the requirement to obey the
law. The first two recalled political incidents: while serving on the Council, he had voted
against an illegal proposal (32b-c); and under the short-lived oligarchical coup of The
Thirty, he had disobeyed an order of the ruling body to arrest a democratic partisan for
execution (32c-d). The third is a hypothetical remark. If, he imagines, the jurors were to say
to him, we acquit you, but only on condition that you spend no more time on this
investigation and do not practice philosophy, and if you are caught doing so you will die, his
reply would be: I will obey the god rather than you, and as long as I draw breath and am
able, I shall not cease to practice philosophy (both quotations excerpted from longer
sentences, 29c-d). Particularly in Anglophone twentieth-century scholarship, these remarks
have engendered a view of Socrates as endorsing civil disobedience in certain circumstances,
and so have framed the question of civil disobedience and the grounds for political obligation
as arising in Plato. A significant debate on these matters took shape in the United States in the

1960s and 1970s at the time of widespread civil disobedience relating to civil rights and the
Vietnam War: see for example Konvitz 1964, Woozley 1972.
That debate has had to confront the fact that Socrates did not actually disobey his own death
sentence with which his trial concluded: when the time came, he drank the poisonous
hemlock prescribed. Before that moment, Plato imagines Socrates being visited in prison by
his friend Crito (in a dialogue which bears his name), and urged to escape for the sake of his
friends and family, a practice which was tolerated in Athens so long as the escapee fled into
exile. Socrates is not persuaded by Crito's arguments. He begins his examination of them by
recalling principles to which he and Crito had in the past agreed, including the principle that
it is better to suffer injustice than to commit it (Cri. 47a-50a). He then goes on to
ventriloquize a series of speeches which he ascribes to the Laws of Athens against escape.
[6]
These speeches articulate a set of special connections between Socrates and the Laws of
Athens which, depending on one's reading, either flesh out the principle that it is better to
suffer injustice than to do it (by dramatizing reasons on which it would unjust for Socrates to
escape), or else stand in tension with that principle by invoking absolutist grounds that go
beyond those that it would authorize (Harte 1999). On any reading, it is important to bear in
mind that Socrates is choosing to obey a jury verdict that has commanded him to suffer what
is arguably an injustice but not to commit one.
The Laws of Athens appeal to a kind of social contract made between themselves and
Socrates. The contract is unequal: the Laws compare themselves to parents and
slaveowners, and Socrates to child and slave. Obedience is owed because the Laws have
provided the whole basis for Socrates' education and life in the city, a city in which he has
notably chosen to remain, never traveling abroad except on military service. But the Laws
also speak of the opportunity they afford to Socrates to persuade or obey them (51b; 51e52a). The meaning of this clause and its relevance to civil disobedience is again much
debated (Kraut 1984 remains a landmark). Nevertheless, the image of Socrates tried,
convicted, and made to die (by his own hand) at the city's command has come to be the most
vivid and powerful symbol of tension in the relationship between political philosophy and
political authority.

Bijoe Emmannuel v State of Kerala, 1987

The appellants were three children belonging to the Jehovah Witnesses sect who refused to
sing the national anthem on grounds that their religion forbid it. However they stood up
respectfully whenever it was sung. They were expelled from school. The appellants sought
petition restraining authorities to prevent them from attending school.

Standing up respectfully when the National Anthem is sung but not singing oneself
clearly does not either prevent the singing of the National Anthem or cause
disturbance to an assembly engaged in such singing so as to constitute the offence
mentioned in s. 3 of the Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act.
Any law which may be made under clauses (2) to (6) of
Art. 19 to regulate the
exercise of the right to the freedoms guaranteed by Art. 19(1)(a) to (e) and (g) must be
'a law' having statutory force and not a mere executive or departmental instruction.
The circulars issued by Kerala Education Dept penalizing such non singing of anthem
could not therefore be restrictions and moreover they were not related to any of the
grounds in Article 19(2)

Therefore expulsion of the children from the school not joining the singing of the
National Anthem though they respectfully stood up in silence when the Anthem was
sung was violative of Art. s19(1)(a).
Similarly law under Article 25(2) must be law having force of statute.
the question is not whether a particular religious belief or practice appeals to reason or
sentiment but whether the belief is genuinely and conscientiously held as part of the
profession or practice of religion. Referred to West Virginia State Board of Education
v. Barnette: compulsory flag salute and pledge requires affirmation of a belief and an
attitude of mind. There should be compulsion only if remaining passive during the
flag salute creates a clear and present danger.
Therefore, expulsion of the three children from the school for the reason that because
of their conscientiously held religious faith, they do not join the singing of the
national anthem in the morning assembly though they do stand up respectfully when
the anthem is sung, is a violation of their fundamental right to freedom of conscience
and freely to profess, practice and propagate religion.