The Sultan's Dilemma

AL-Hakim, Tawfiq. "The Sultan's Dilemma." Lawall, Sarah. The Norton Anthology of World Literature. NY: The Twentieth Century, 2002. 2282-2336.

This is a play that tells the story of Justice. What is Justice? In the beginning we see a Condemned Man who is waiting to meet his fate by the Executioner at Morning Prayer. We are left wondering why this man is in prison and what he did that he cannot speak of. The Vizier, Sultan, and Chief Cadi show up what is believed to be after Morning Prayer and the Condemned Man has not been executed. It is finally known that the Condemned Man was being executed because he was telling the villagers that the Sultan had not been manumitted and bearing such stigma is not entitled to rule over the free people.  The previous Sultan died spontaneously and departed before manumitting him and the Vizier wanted to kill the Condemned Man while burying his fault with him. The Cadi, Vizier, and The Sultan deliberate on what to do with the situation of having a salve ruling over the free people. Should they kill him and put an end to the conspiracy or follow the law? The Cadi believes very strongly that they should follow the law and have the Sultan sold at auction. The sultan has to choose between the Sword which imposes and exposes and the Law which threaten and protects. It is once at action that the person who bought the Sultan is the Lady who is well known as the village whore. She beats the Cadi at his own games asking him "…in order to buy you must manumit; in order for me to possess I must not possess. Do you find this reasonable?". They come to an agreement that at Morning Prayer she will release the Sultan. The Cadi, furious on how this Lady beat him at what he knows best, convinces the Muezzin to do Morning Prayer at midnight. Believing that since she said she would give him back at Morning Prayer is didn't matter what time it was.

               This play or story shows how we battle daily trying to do and figure out what is right. Trying to find what is right with in us and according to the law of the land. Is there justification for acts that seem to be treason or conspiracies? We are judged everyday on our actions, environment, and our social/economic status. How are the people who decide what is right according to the law can twist it to benefit them and the situation at hand?

Lady Justice

 

Awalt, Chad. Lady Justice. www.chadawalt.com/justice2.html.

Lady Justice is seen in almost every court room around the world. She bears three symbols the scales, sword, and the blindfold. The scales represent that she carefully weighs the claims of each person that come into the courtroom and each scale carries symbols. These symbols are engraved to the scales such as a dove to represent good, the Gemini to represent the he/she said, a snake to represent evil or bad claims, a scroll to show the written law or facts. The second symbol is her sword. Her sword represents that she rules swift and justly with the enforcement measures. The sword is barely held by her right hand, but is close to her body. Last is her blindfold and the most recognizable and represents decisions of objectivity and impartial judgments.  The original sculpture of Lady Justice is unknown. She bears Greek and Roman ties and is thought to be a version of Aphrodite, or her sister Themis. Within her ties to Greco-Roman, she also carries early symbols of Christianity with her.

Lady Justice represents everything we would hope for in our courtrooms and criminal justice system. Sadly, that is not always the case. Just like the Cadi in The Sultan’s Dilemma he started out strong and worked by the law he swore to upheld and then at the end he took the law that he was righteously devoted to and twisted it to fit his means for getting the sultan back. This happens every day in our court rooms by police officers, lawyers and judges. The law was put in place to protect the rights that our forefathers went above and beyond to protect, not to be dissected by officials to bend it to their needs.

Hurricane

Dylan, Bob. "Hurricane." Desire. By Bob Dylan. 1976

Bob Dylan wrote this song in protest to the unlawful imprisonment of Rubin "Hurricane" Carter. It touches on acts of racism and profiling which eventually lead to a false trial and conviciton. Bob Dylan is an amazing song writer by taking a story and committing it to music that you can't seem to get out of your head. This song was controversial and he was sued by the eye witness Patricia, which was later dismissed. This song is also believe to help bring attention to the Carter case. Carter was found guilty of the murders in 1966, and he was awarded the right to a new trial and was convicted again in Feb 1976. However, in 1985 a Federal Judge ruled that Carter did not receive a fair trial and filed a motion to dismiss the charges.

               Just like the Condemned Man in The Sultan's Dilemma he was put into prison as a quick fix to the problem. Although in Carter's case, people were killed and the prosecution wanted their killers quick. There are millions of cases that have fallen through the cracks of justice. Weather it was finding the quick fix to the solution or the overloading of our Lawyers to invest the appropriate about of time on cases. The Cadi also in The Sultan's Dilemma, let's his emotions cloud his judgement when The Lady beats him at the law, also similar to how this crime was clouding by profiling and racism.  Everyday we are influenced by our surroundings, beliefs, social and economical status. What we may interpret as one thing someone else may see it totally different.

Pistols shots ring out in the barroom night
Enter Patty Valentine from the upper hall
She sees the bartender in a pool of blood
Cries out "My God they killed them all"
Here comes the story of the Hurricane
The man the authorities came to blame
For something that he never done
Put him in a prison cell but one time he could-a been
The champion of the world.

Three bodies lying there does Patty see
And another man named Bello moving around mysteriously
"I didn't do it" he says and he throws up his hands
"I was only robbing the register I hope you understand
I saw them leaving" he says and he stops
"One of us had better call up the cops"
And so Patty calls the cops
And they arrive on the scene with their red lights flashing
In the hot New Jersey night.

Meanwhile far away in another part of town
Rubin Carter and a couple of friends are driving around
Number one contender for the middleweight crown
Had no idea what kinda shit was about to go down
When a cop pulled him over to the side of the road
Just like the time before and the time before that
In Patterson that's just the way things go
If you're black you might as well not shown up on the street
'Less you wanna draw the heat.

Alfred Bello had a partner and he had a rap for the corps
Him and Arthur Dexter Bradley were just out prowling around
He said "I saw two men running out they looked like middleweights
They jumped into a white car with out-of-state plates"
And Miss Patty Valentine just nodded her head
Cop said "Wait a minute boys this one's not dead" So they took him to the infirmary
And though this man could hardly see
They told him that he could identify the guilty men.

Four in the morning and they haul Rubin in
Take him to the hospital and they bring him upstairs
The wounded man looks up through his one dying eye
Says "Wha'd you bring him in here for ? He ain't the guy !"
Yes 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.

Four months later the ghettos are in flame
Rubin's in South America fighting for his name
While Arthur Dexter Bradley's still in the robbery game
And the cops are putting the screws to him looking for somebody to blame
"Remember that murder that happened in a bar ?"
"Remember you said you saw the getaway car?" "You think you'd like to play ball with the law ?"
"Think it might-a been that fighter you saw running that night ?"
"Don't forget that you are white".

 

Arthur Dexter Bradley said "I'm really not sure"
Cops said "A boy like you could use a break
We got you for the motel job and we're talking to your friend Bello
Now you don't wanta have to go back to jail be a nice fellow
You'll be doing society a favor
That sonofabitch is brave and getting braver
We want to put his ass in stir
We want to pin this triple murder on him
He ain't no Gentleman Jim".

Rubin could take a man out with just one punch
But he never did like to talk about it all that much
It's my work he'd say and I do it for pay
And when it's over I'd just as soon go on my way
Up to some paradise Where the trout streams flow and the air is nice
And ride a horse along a trail
But then they took him to the jailhouse
Where they try to turn a man into a mouse.

All of Rubin's cards were marked in advance
The trial was a pig-circus he never had a chance
The judge made Rubin's witnesses drunkards from the slums
To the white folks who watched he was a revolutionary bum
And to the black folks he was just a crazy nigger
No one doubted that he pulled the trigger
And though they could not produce the gun
The DA said he was the one who did the deed
And the all-white jury agreed.

Rubin Carter was falsely tried
The crime was murder 'one' guess who testified
Bello and Bradley and they both baldly lied
And the newspapers they all went along for the ride
How can the life of such a man Be in the palm of some fool's hand ?
To see him obviously framed
Couldn't help but make me feel ashamed to live in a land
Where justice is a game.

Now all the criminals in their coats and their ties
Are free to drink martinis and watch the sun rise
While Rubin sits like Buddha in a ten-foot cell
An innocent man in a living hell
That's the story of the Hurricane
But it won't be over till they clear his name
And give him back the time he's done
Put him in a prison cell but one time he could-a been

 

A Time to Kill

Grisham, John. A Time to Kill. Wynwood Press, 1989.

A Time to Kill was Grisham’s first novel, but was rejected many times before being published after The Firm, The Pelican Brief, and The Client. This book was inspired when Grisham witnessed the testimony of a 12 year old rape vicitm. This book is set in 1984 in the fictonal town of Clanton, Mississippi. Ten year old Tonya Hailey is kidnapped and horribly raped by two white males. They left her to die, but fortunalty she is found and rushed to the hospital. Tonya’s father Carl Lee, takes matters into his own hands. He had heard that in the next town over a young black girl was raped by white men and they were aquitted, he was not going to let that happen. While the young men are being taken to the courthouse, Carl Lee emerges from the cloest and kills the white men, while accidently wounding Deputy Looney. Carl Lee is arrested at his house and taken to jail to await his trial. His trial is full of courupt motions with the District Attorney wanting public support so he can run for governor, a brother of one of the white males who wants revenge and go to the Ku Klux Klan. This book is full of twists and turns and leaves you wanting to know what will happen to Carl Lee Hailey.

In 1996, it was made into a movie starring Matthew McConaughey, Samuel L Jackson, Sandra Bullock, and Kevin Spacy. One of the most famous scenes is the closing argument by Matthew McConaughey’s character.

 This shows how our system is easily courpt. Having elected officials aspiring for political goals and having a high profile case can set that in motion, even is the person is innocent. Just like the Vizier in The Sultan’s Dilemma he would go anywhere and do anything to protect a secret that could harm or damage the sultan, or his reputation.

Law Abiding Citizen

 

Law Abiding Citizen. Dir. F. Gary Gray. Perf. Gerard Butler, et al. October 16, 2009. The Film Department: Overture Films.

               This film was released in 2009 and was directed by F.Gary Gray. With an amazing cast of Jaime Foxx as ADA Nick Rice and Gerard Butler as Clyde Alexander Shelton. Gerard Butler’s character Clyde witnessed his wife and daughter be brutally killed in front of him by 2 home invaders, Clarence James Darby and Rupert Ames. As the court date approaches for the invades and Clyde finally able to get justice for his family, prosecutor Rice makes a deal with Darby with a plea of a lesser sentence in exchange for sending Ames to death row. He makes this deal because he was unable to obtain DNA evidence to convict the two. What is ironic is Darby is the one who killed them, not Ames. With news of the plea deal, Shelton does not feel like justice was served and begins to plan to take on the system he sees as corrupt. Fast forward 10 years  when Ames is schedule to die by lethal injection, somethings goes wrong and he dies a slow pain full death. Shelton then takes his vengeance out on Darby by dismembering him. Rice finds Shelton and he willingly gives himself up, which sets in motion the events to lead to him trying to take down the corrupt system.

               I am sure most of us have or have known someone who did not get justice. That they were “rail-roaded” by the system.  I know that we have a system that has been set in stone for years by our forefathers, but I am sure that didn’t not fore see the circumstances and crimes we have to deal with today. Some say, if it isn’t broken why fix it? I am not saying that the system is broke, but flawed. Like every other person out there. Our officials have emotions, surrounds, beliefs that do in fact affect their decision making and it something that is human and we can not control. I do not have a solution to this problem, but rather awareness for us to seek ourselves. Where one or more are gathered, we can move mountains.