Culpability: Responsibility for a fault; blame
Justice is manipulated and Law is malleable.
Moral Dilemma: If Joe hadn't been that 'helpful', he wouldn't have taken the risk and gave in to personal & family pride.
- Keller now faces the consequences placing the Personal above the Social. To get back social order, justice has to be served.
Crimes committed in the play
Keller - Approved the shipping of cracked cylinder heads, pinned the blame of Steve, caused Larry's death
Mother - Complicit in Keller's crime by lying on behalf of him
Chris - Did not act on his 'suspicion'
Ann and George - Too quick to condemn Steve; Ann hid the truth about Larry
Steve - Followed Keller's instructions to send out cracked cylinder heads, despite knowing that they may endanger lives
Neighbours - Inaction despite their belief that Keller did commit the crime
Instances of Law and Justice
- Joe & Bert (The jail, policemen, detective)
- Neighbours' view on the shop incident
- George as a lawyer and his faith in Chris
- Mother's attempt to patch things up
- Keller explaining the incident to the various characters
Joe and Bert
- Bert: Represents innocence; the only character in the play which demands for truth (ref: he asks to see the jail)
- Joe: Hoodwinked many kids into believing that he is the detective/policeman, aka the 'good guy'. Chris was manipulated to some extent as well. They believed in the reality of his game.
- The Justice System is inherently flawed as one cannot be held responsible without proof (consider: no way to proof the phone call between steve and joe). This allows Joe to assume/parade his innocence.
The Neighbours
Who is he to ruin a man's life? Everybody knows Joe pulled a fast one to get out of jail.
- Revelation about neighbours opinions on the incident and how they pretend that nothing's wrong
Then why don't you go out and talk to people? Go on, talk to them. There's not a person on the block who doesn't know the truth.
- Their moral world view is not about the truth of the incident, but the fact that the Law has not proven Joe wrong.
- The nieghbours realise that Law is ineffectual but they allow it to determine their moral & legal standard. Because Joe escapes, they do not condemn him, which reinforces his belief that he's innocent. (consider: is this their crime?)
People come here all the time for cards
- Poker: A game which requires putting up fronts.
They give him credit for being smart
- The neighbours do not believe that Joe is innocent but they give him credit for his success (i.e. getting away with what he did). Their relationships with the Kellers are facades in which they keep up.
To Frank, Law has no grey areas. You either immediately execute the guy or release him, there's no in between.
George & Chris
Outside there doesn't seem to be much of a law
I decided to look like a lawyer, anyway
- Deals with issues of right and wrong
- Returned to have justice served
I can't prove a phone call
- Not proven = not true. All Kellers subscribe to this belief.
- In this scenario, the Law is ineffective and Justice is forfeited. The Deevers are victims of a gross miscarriage.
The court did not know him, Annie!
The court record was good enough for you all these years, why isn't it good now?
- George used to believe and trust in the judicial system, to the point that he rejected his father based on what the court deemed to the truth.
I believed everything, because I thought you did
- Chris is the embodiment of truth to many characters, including George. He believed in Chris's affirmation of the truth, over his own father's.
- Shows that George does not understand law as he has to look to another person to determine right and wrong.
I'm yellow.
- Chris questions the value of any kind of justice if the world is tainted by war profiteering.
Mother
- Mother believes that Joe is no longer culpable after he owns up. This flawed thinking is premised on the fact that Mother's primary crime is deceit.
- Here, she ignores the fact that crime faces REAL consequences under the law and that Steve was held culpable all these years.
- She has no right to determine that Joe would have paid his dues after owning up (consider: does she have the right to tell chris to live?)
Consider...
- Is there a need to accept culpability and blame, even if the law DOESN'T recognize it?
- Court Papers: No punishment (consider: does this mean NO guilt/blame?)
- How do the different characters view Law and Justice?
Keller
- To Keller, Steve is culpable because his family accepted the rule of law and allowed him to be perceived as guilty. However, because Steve and Joe did not intend for the crime, Steve should not be considered a criminal.
Final Considerations...
- What is forgiveness? What is necessary for forgiveness?
- Has justice been served? Can justice serve in a world so unjust?
- Have the characters paid their dues?
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