When Faith Is Shaken, by Lea
Disclaimer: None of the characters used belong to me, no profit is made from this story and no infringement is intended.
Authors Note: This was originally an English assignment I wrote that I thought I might as well post. All feedback is appreciated.
Dear Journal,
It is now a few years after Tom's trial and I still find it hard to comprehend what occurred. Perhaps by writing some of my thoughts down I'll be able to let go. It's so unfair. How could they have convicted him? The evidence was so clear, so abundant; it was impossible not to see that he was innocent. I mean, not only was his left hand not his strong side, but he COULDN'T EVEN USE IT! And multiple testimonies said that Mayella had been brutally beaten by someone who predominantly used his left hand. It was impossible for him to have done it! Also she had been grabbed around the neck while being hit, which obviously requires two hands, something Tom didn't have.
If the defendant had been a kind, young, hardworking white man, the same type of man Tom was except for his skin color, and he had been up against the uneducated, dirty, mostly drunken, lazy slob of a man in Ewell, the young man would have won the case, no doubt about it. So what was the big difference? So his skin was a different color, so what? A court should stand for justice. If a man is blatantly innocent, then how could normally sane, rational, good men become so stubborn, cruel and wrong and unfairly incriminate him?
My estimation of human character went down a great deal that day. I have never seen anything worse than it. My father always taught me that the court was the one place where all men were equal and everyone had a fair chance, that it was the one place where justice would prevail, and I truly believed him. I thought that regardless of the beliefs and prejudices people held against others in normal day to day life, when they came into a courtroom, things changed and people would be fair and impartial, because that's what a trial is about.
I don't really blame Tom for running. I suppose if the trial brought down my faith in mankind so drastically it is only fair to assume it did the same for Tom, with him the one being wrongfully convicted. He had trusted white men and they had betrayed that trust. He must have felt they didn't deserve his trust anymore, which frankly, the men who found him guilty didn't. A man's life was put in their hands, and they showed how undeserving they were of the responsibility. And when he ran, they shot him. I understand that they had jobs to do, and to them he wasn't Tom, he was just another convict, but 17 TIMES! That goes well beyond what was necessary, they could have shot him once, in the leg perhaps. They didn't have to kill him, and even if they did, it did not require anywhere close to 17 shots, that goes way beyond making sure they got him, that is being deliberately malicious.
I can only hope and pray that these peoples cruel and horrible actions didn't make Tom believe that all white people are like that, because that isn't true. There are some people in this world who care about others, regardless of their race. I will be forever thankful to my father for teaching me about equality and how to be a good person and to Tom Robson for showing me how important it is to be that type of man.
-Jeremy Finch
