Martin Luther King Jr. is able to give distinct comparisons between just laws and unjust laws. From his explanation, his description of just laws are laws that are able to uphold human equality and dignity. For just laws, he sees them as laws that can align with moral laws or the law of god. These moral laws are meant to distinguish the actions of another from right and wrong. With unjust laws, MLK explains how these laws degrade human personality, reinforces inequality, and doesn’t uphold principles of morality. From his letter, he goes further about the description of a law stating that a law is just if the applications of said law can be applied to every individual. In the same way, a law is unjust if said law is enforcing burdens on groups while excluding other groups of the same treatment. These unjust laws create imbalanced relationships resulting in hierarchies displaying groups to be superior and inferior. This was shown through examples of segregation laws that discriminate and dehumanize certain minority groups. 

The reasoning behind why these distinctions between just laws and unjust laws is so important is that they shape an individual’s responsibility to their morals. Having this difference of laws is able to show the individual the importance of fighting against oppression and analyze the laws that are a part of their society. Being able to recognize the differences between just laws and unjust laws helps to build confidence in confronting any injustice. It encourages a deeper scrutiny of legal systems to prove that they promote fairness and equality across any group. 

An example of a just law in the U.S. today could be the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which had prohibited discrimination regarding race, color, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, and gender identity. This just law is able to directly connect with MLK’s definition of just laws through it’s support of equality and protecting human dignity. An example of an unjust law could be through the targeting and criminalization of homelessness. These laws punish individuals that sleep in public places when they have no other options for proper housing. This is an unjust law by MLK’s definition due to it punishing the problem of individuals’ poverty rather than trying to treat the root cause creating these problems. It doesn’t match moral or natural law as it intensifies the suffering of others with it’s criminalization of basic human survival. It contradicts what MLK stood for by promoting human dignity and fairness.