To Kill a Mockingbird: Chapters 25 - 31
Posted: Wed Oct 21, 2020 6:25 pm
To Kill a Mockingbird
Please use this thread to discuss Chapters 25 through 31.Quality books. Great conversations.
https://www.booktalk.org/
Here comes the story of the Hurricane
The man the authorities came to blame
For something that he never done
Put in a prison cell, but one time he could-a been
The champion of the world
I would like to continue providing commentary to the end of the book. Now looking at Chapter 26, Scout is reflecting on the aftermath of the Robinson trial. She has clearly understood that the defence of Robinson by her father Atticus was broadly seen in Maycomb as an appalling lapse of judgement. And yet now we see that Atticus has been re-elected unopposed to the Alabama legislature. How can this be?Chapter 26 wrote:There was one odd thing, though, that I never understood: in spite of Atticus’s shortcomings as a parent, people were content to re-elect him to the state legislature that year, as usual, without opposition. I came to the conclusion that people were just peculiar, I withdrew from them, and never thought about them until I was forced to.
Scout’s Grade Three class is discussing current events, and Hitler’s persecution of the Jews comes up. The conversation reveals how the children cannot comprehend why anyone would be persecuted for their race, unless they are black. Scout muses about how a maniac could possibly get control of a country, which leads to her wondering about the blatant hypocrisy of her teacher Miss Gates, who excoriates Hitler but says about black peopleCecil spoke up. “Well I don’t know for certain,” he said, “they’re supposed to change money or somethin‘, but that ain’t no cause to persecute ’em. They’re white, ain’t they?”
Here we see the underlying racial dynamic of power, that a demonstration of power to convict an innocent man itself sends a powerful signal to the oppressed community about the risks of conversations about truth and justice.it’s time somebody taught ’em a lesson, they were gettin‘ way above themselves, an’ the next thing they think they can do is marry us.
I looked up Cotton Tom, and found the following on Wikipedia:Cecil Jacobs asked me one time if Atticus was a Radical. When I asked Atticus, Atticus was so amused I was rather annoyed, but he said he wasn’t laughing at me. He said, “You tell Cecil I’m about as radical as Cotton Tom Heflin.”
It strikes me as bizarre, politically and psychologically, that Atticus should instruct his daughter to tell people to compare him to Senator Heflin, who was an extreme pro-slavery activist at the top of Alabama politics. Atticus is in fact far more radical than Heflin, so it seems he is telling his daughter to lie in order to cover up his real views. Perhaps he means he is as radical as Heflin in the opposite direction, anti-racist as opposed to pro-racist. But the immediate meaning of the statement reads like a gaffe, favourably comparing himself to someone whom in fact he despises.Heflin first rose to political prominence as a delegate who helped to draft the 1901 Constitution of Alabama. Heflin argued, successfully, for completely excluding black Alabamians from voting, stating, "God Almighty intended the negro to be the servant of the white man." As Secretary of State in 1903, Heflin was an outspoken supporter of men put on trial for enslaving black laborers through fraudulent convict leasing. As detailed in Douglas A. Blackmon's book, Slavery by Another Name, the practices were a brutal, post-emancipation form of slavery in which African Americans were often falsely convicted of crimes and then sold to farmers or industrialists. Heflin explicitly used white supremacist rhetoric to mobilize support for the defendants. He argued before a group of Confederate veterans that forcing blacks to labor was a means to hold them in their proper social position.[1]
I'm not so sure, Robert, that Atticus truly opposes racism and discrimination. I admit the evidence in the book isn't consistent one way or the other, and perhaps also I'm influenced by Lee's earlier book, Go Set a Watchman. The latter book, written before Mockingbird and featuring Atticus as an all-out racist, seems to present a lineage of Atticus's views on race. Watchman refers to an incident in which Atticus--undoubtedly a racist, mind you--defended a black man and got him acquitted. Guided by her editor, Lee reworked the Watchman material into the world-famous book we read, making the passing mention of a black man on trial the center of the new book.Robert Tulip wrote:It strikes me as bizarre, politically and psychologically, that Atticus should instruct his daughter to tell people to compare him to Senator Heflin, who was an extreme pro-slavery activist at the top of Alabama politics. Atticus is in fact far more radical than Heflin, so it seems he is telling his daughter to lie in order to cover up his real views. Perhaps he means he is as radical as Heflin in the opposite direction, anti-racist as opposed to pro-racist. But the immediate meaning of the statement reads like a gaffe, favourably comparing himself to someone whom in fact he despises.
I was surprised by this comment as I had assumed that opposition to racism and discrimination was a key part of the personality of Atticus Finch. Looking back through the book, there are several incidents that support this anti-racist interpretation.DWill wrote:I'm not so sure, Robert, that Atticus truly opposes racism and discrimination.
Thanks, that illustrates how Lee’s thinking evolved, since To Kill a Mockingbird has no avowal of any racist sentiments by Atticus except this strange comparison to the racist senator that prompted this discussion. Perhaps the editor saw that the dramatic power of the book would be enhanced by toning down the original idea of Atticus as holding the same values as his community.DWill wrote: I admit the evidence in the book isn't consistent one way or the other, and perhaps also I'm influenced by Lee's earlier book, Go Set a Watchman. The latter book, written before Mockingbird and featuring Atticus as an all-out racist, seems to present a lineage of Atticus's views on race. Watchman refers to an incident in which Atticus--undoubtedly a racist, mind you--defended a black man and got him acquitted. Guided by her editor, Lee reworked the Watchman material into the world-famous book we read, making the passing mention of a black man on trial the center of the new book.
Moral legitimacy always requires a sense of divine mandate, a belief that values are part of the natural order. Racism cannot survive unless racists sincerely believe their views are good, since no community can endure with a view of itself as evil.DWill wrote: segregation's greatest strength was its identification, in the Southern mind, with virtue and right. That delusion enabled it to survive as long as it did.
This is a good point, illustrating the gradual evolution of prevailing thinking about race. It is important not to impute modern views into people living a century ago. Atticus supports the principle of justice, meaning the right to a fair trial. That does not indicate he understood justice to require abolition of legal inequality based on race.DWill wrote:Atticus puts himself on the line in this book. No doubt he was courageous in insisting that evidence matters just as much when a black man is accused as it does when a white is accused. But regarding the broader matter of legal rights for blacks, there isn't an indication that he has a brief for that. He doesn't work on those issues in the legislature--because no Southerner in the 1930s did.