It will often be exercised when wrong, but better so than not to be exercised at all.

I am only an armchair observer of the correspondence between Thomas Jefferson, Abigail Adams and John Adams.  Three brilliant minds of markedly different life experiences writing about significant things about which they could and did differ and yet underpinned with a magnificent regard and respect for one another.  Every time I encounter their correspondence I am both educated and astonished at its value.

In checking on a Thomas Jefferson quote,

The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions, that I wish it to be always kept alive. It will often be exercised when wrong, but better so than not to be exercised at all. I like a little rebellion now and then. It is like a storm in the Atmosphere. 

I find that it is from a letter written in Paris on February 22nd, 1787 by Jefferson to Abigail Adams regarding early reports of Shays' Rebellion (1786-7).  Delays of weeks and months in movement of news within the US and between America and Europe necessarily meant that correspondents were often speaking at cross purposes owing to asynchronous knowledge.  

The Congress of the Confederation had sent Jefferson to Paris in 1784 as Minister Plenipotentiary, joining Benjamin Franklin and John Adams in shaping the new nation's relationships with the powers of Europe.  He remained there for five years.

Shays' rebellion highlighted a divide in interpretations of the event.  Jefferson saw it and similar disturbances as a stress test, a valve for relieving pressures and a catalyst for necessary change.  Abigail Adams' views were much more critical.  The rebels were:

Ignorant, restless desperadoes, without conscience or principals, have led a deluded multitude to follow their standard, under pretence of grievances which have no existence but in their own imaginations. 

And both were correct to a degree.  Abigail Adams and John Adams held the ideal of, as John Adams phrased it in his Massachusetts state constitution of 1780 (the world's oldest functioning written constitution), of

  A government of laws, and not of men.

Something like Shays' Rebellion was an assault on that ideal.

Jefferson, always attuned to the dangers of strong central government, sympathetic to the freedoms of the common man, and an anti-federalist, took a larger view that government was not and could not be perfect and should be expected to be tested and to evolve to better protect the interests and natural rights of its citizens.

Everyone can encompass two contradictory views depending on the circumstances.

We should honor and respect the law.

We should protect natural rights from predatory interests and government.

Jefferson was not an anarchist and Abigail Adams was not an authoritarian.  

We have a current day parallel with views about the January 6th riot at the Capitol in Washington, D.C.  As usual, it has been politicized almost beyond recognition for political advantage.  Some see it as an armed insurrection and some see it as a just another, and relatively minor, riot as the nation has experienced repeatedly over the past couple of years.  

Empirically, the insurrection view is falling out of favor.  No weapons involved.  No one charged with treason or insurrection.  No organizing entity discovered.  It was just another riot by disgruntled citizens, more peaceful, less lethal (no murders committed by the rioters) and less damaging to property than the dozens of other riots by other disgruntled citizens in the prior year.

But it is easy to see echoes of Abigail Adams and Thomas Jeffersons views of Shays' Rebellion.  Adams' view "We should honor and respect the law" requires us to condemn the riot.  Jefferson's view "We should protect natural rights from predatory interests and government" requires us to acknowledge the rioter's concerns.