If a thousand men were not to pay their tax-bills this year, that would not be a violent and bloody measure, as it would be to pay them, and enable the State to commit violence and shed innocent blood.
Source: On the Duty of Civil Disobedience, 1849.
-- Henry David Thoreau, (Jul 12 1817-1862), US essayist, poet, naturalist; He is best known for his description of life at Walden Pond, Walden, 1854 and his essay Civil Disobedience, 1849.