Page "North and South (1855 novel)" Paragraph 43

Rebellion against authority, seen as unfair, is woven through the story.

Established institutions are seen as inhumane or selfish and therefore fallible (( Stoneman, 1987 ): For instance, Mr. Hale breaks with the Church on a matter of conscience, Frederick Hale participates in a mutiny against the Navy and is forced into exile because the Law would hang him for what he considered a just cause.

His rebellion parallels that of the strike by workers who take up the cause to feed their children ( Gaskell, 1855, chapter 17 ).

Both are impotent and engaged in a struggle ( a war, in the eyes of the workers ) whose terms are dictated by those who maintain their power by force: the law and the mill masters ( Stoneman, 1987, pp 122 – 126 ).

Margaret rebels in many ways that expresses her personal liberty — ignoring social proprieties ; challenging authority by lying to the police to protect her brother from whom she learns that power, when arbitrary, unjust, and cruel, can be defied not so much for oneself but on behalf of those most unfortunate.

Even Mrs. Hale rebels in her own way: " prouder of Frederick standing up against injustice, than if he had been simply a good officer " ( Gaskell, 1855, chapter 14 ).