People who break the law are "criminals, period" only in the most uninteresting sense. I certainly would not make any claim that most drug dealers are acting in political protest - I don't know enough to say, and would be unsurprised if the overwhelming majority had purely a narrow profit motive; but I do want to raise the issue that breaking laws is often a powerful part of convincing our fellow citizens to change them. MLK very specifically argued that it is our moral responsibility not to obey an unjust law.