On her book Witches, Wife Beaters, and Whores: Common Law and Common Folk in Early America
Cover Interview of January 23, 2012
Lastly
Early settlers created a legal culture that crossed boundaries and time. Shared values, embedded in traditions that migrated across the Atlantic and adapted to conditions on the North American continent, stabilized communities and unified immigrants. This evolving legal culture peaceably Americanized those within its reach—yet, paradoxically, within a context of conflict. Nevertheless, the disputes that brought individuals into the courtroom were generally restrained by the formalities of that venue.
Moreover, if legal contests were eventually fought in legal arenas, it is nothing less than remarkable how often such matters were initiated by ordinary people going about their business on an ordinary day. Samuel Banister fell behind in his rent, the sheriff came to evict him and Banister declined to leave the house. Instead, he shot and killed the sheriff’s assistant, a man Banister only meant to threaten. The implications of property ownership, debtor laws, tenant rights, and live-in servants all contributed to this tragic story.
The legal aspects of the tale may recede to the background in the interest of good storytelling, but they are integral to the narrative nonetheless. So too are the unknown players who move the story forward. By bringing them to the foreground, Witches, Wife Beaters, and Whores addresses the role of common folk in early America.
Those debtors, tenants, and servants played as much of a part in the creation of a legal culture as did the legislators who wrote the laws. By obeying such laws, common folk legitimized the authority of those above them. By circumventing the system and seeking justice or punishment through private negotiations, common folk created common law. I suspect they appreciated the empowerment that the legal process offered, even if they were unaware of how it came to be or that they would be the vehicles by which the rule of law would be Americanized and perpetuated.
Spontaneous generation is one of those wrong theories that clutter the basements of the biological sciences and that now look so very obviously wrong that it is hard to see how anyone could have taken them seriously in the first place. Why wouldn’t it occur to anyone that flies might be laying eggs that were too small for us to see? How simple would the crucial experiment be? What I have tried to do in much of my work is to turn this ‘obvious wrongness’ on its head—why, exactly, does it seem so obviously wrong?—and see what the new picture that emerges from that inquiry says about science and our belief in its results.Daryn Lehoux, Interview of November 13, 2017
It’s commonplace to say that humor is subjective, since what’s funny to you might not be funny to me. But humor is also a loaded concept. If you – or your people – have no sense of humor, or the wrong one, that means you’re less rational, tolerant, understanding, or civilized. You don’t get it. Or, worse, you lack something human. Modern Chinese debates about humor were very much caught up with these fundamental questions of value.Christopher Rea, Interview of October 26, 2016
Lastly
Early settlers created a legal culture that crossed boundaries and time. Shared values, embedded in traditions that migrated across the Atlantic and adapted to conditions on the North American continent, stabilized communities and unified immigrants. This evolving legal culture peaceably Americanized those within its reach—yet, paradoxically, within a context of conflict. Nevertheless, the disputes that brought individuals into the courtroom were generally restrained by the formalities of that venue.
Moreover, if legal contests were eventually fought in legal arenas, it is nothing less than remarkable how often such matters were initiated by ordinary people going about their business on an ordinary day. Samuel Banister fell behind in his rent, the sheriff came to evict him and Banister declined to leave the house. Instead, he shot and killed the sheriff’s assistant, a man Banister only meant to threaten. The implications of property ownership, debtor laws, tenant rights, and live-in servants all contributed to this tragic story.
The legal aspects of the tale may recede to the background in the interest of good storytelling, but they are integral to the narrative nonetheless. So too are the unknown players who move the story forward. By bringing them to the foreground, Witches, Wife Beaters, and Whores addresses the role of common folk in early America.
Those debtors, tenants, and servants played as much of a part in the creation of a legal culture as did the legislators who wrote the laws. By obeying such laws, common folk legitimized the authority of those above them. By circumventing the system and seeking justice or punishment through private negotiations, common folk created common law. I suspect they appreciated the empowerment that the legal process offered, even if they were unaware of how it came to be or that they would be the vehicles by which the rule of law would be Americanized and perpetuated.