What's Legit?

Trey Smith

State violence deemed illegitimate calls into question the very premise of terror charges — if state violence is not in all circumstances legitimate then how can non-state violence to end illegitimate state violence in all circumstances be illegitimate? The states’ public position, articulated by recent presidents, is that protesters have every right to peacefully protest the use of illegitimate violence by the state. But as a purveyor of illegitimate violence, what right does the state retain to claim that legitimacy distinguishes state from non-state violence? The state is either forced into the profoundly undemocratic position that its legitimacy is self-generated, and therefore not a function of the consent of the people, or that its legitimacy does derive from the consent of the people and therefore when that consent is withdrawn, so is the states’ legitimacy.
~ from Black Bloc Anarchists and State Terrorism by Rob Urie ~

This article asks a very important question. It's a difficult one for a pacifist like me to answer.

In general, I believe that violence is illegitimate; it represents a failure of the human imagination. However, if my government is utilizing illegitimate force (violence) in my name, do I have the moral and ethical right to use force to try to get them to stop?

This is the same sort of question that Dietrich Bonhoeffer and fellow conspirators faced during World War II when they participated in a failed plot to assassinate Adolph Hitler. Bonhoeffer simply didn't wrestle with this question as an average citizen -- he was a Lutheran minister!

I can only guess that he must have felt that the violence of assassination was morally acceptable to prevent the greater violence that was masterminded by Hitler. While I admire Bonhoeffer for his rectitude and convictions, I am not altogether certain that I personally would have arrived at the same decision.

What about you? Do you believe that it is morally or ethically legitimate to utilize violence in the attempt to try to thwart violence that you deem to be illegitimate?