And that lesson was best expressed by a 32-year-old black woman who participated last week in an Occupy Birmingham event in downtown Birmingham's financial district.

Here is a video that was shot and posted to Facebook of her conversation with Birmingham police officers who were called to the scene by someone who complained that the dozen protesters were loitering.

One police officer tells her that she should do the right thing and apply for a permit to hold a protest.

"The right way would have been still waiting on white people to give black people integration, you know, when they just woke up and had a conscience like we're going to do the right thing" she tells the officer. "At a certain point you have to stand up and, like, we can't go that way because it's going to get blocked."

And she is exactly right. Alabama officials back in the 1950s and 60s used every bullshit legal excuse they could dream up to prevent civil rights demonstrators from marching, registering voters, etc.

And now it's loitering, which is more BS.

Watch the video and you'll be inspired by this woman. She is as polite and civil as she can be with the officers, pleading with them to "give us 20th and 5th." That's the street corner where Birmingham's big banks are located.

At the end of the video, one of the officers again tells them they need to do the right thing and follow the law.

"Laws change," the officer says.

She points out forcefully that the lawful way is not always the right way and notes that some of her fellow demonstrators are white.

"We used to couldn't even stand on the corner with these people," she says. "Laws change."