Justice Ostracized Popular Media Portrayals of Justice Resisted
John Grisham in The Pelican Brief creates a plot which revolves around the killing of two judges of the United States Supreme Court. This is much more significant than the killing of two state judges or federal judges sitting in lower federal courts for several reasons. First, the United States Supreme Court is composed in nine total judges thus, even the loss of one judge can significantly affect the philosophical and ethical orientation of the highest court in the United States. Second, Grisham provided that these were fairly ethical judges who valued the rights of the American citizens and the principles of justice more than the influence of wealthy corporations and powerful politicians. The death of these particular justices, as a consequence, was in many ways a means for Grisham to portray in a metaphorical way the murder of legal ethics, judicial neutrality, and objective approaches to justice in the United States of America. Finally, rather than creating protagonists in the form of large law firms or the Attorney general of the United States, Grisham instead chose two marginal players in Americas legal system. He chose, to be precise, a law professor in far-off Louisiana and one of that law professors law students. Structurally, the novel creates a monolithic legal system in which justice is ignored by the mainstream of the American legal system and it is only through the life-threatening efforts of a couple of legal idealists that justice has any hope of prevailing. It is, in many respects, a David versus Goliath battle and the legal system is the immoral and indifferent Goliath whereas the little people struggling for justice are the Davids . Justice is a casualty, ostracized as considerations of wealth and political power predominate, and the American public is left to wonder how justice can ever prevail in a system so heavily weighted against justice and toward commercial interests and selfish political aspirations.
Some might argue, viewing the novels portrayals and depictions more optimistically, that justice does prevail in the end. Such an argument is problematic for several reasons. As an initial matter, Grisham portrays this victory for justice because that is what is expected in the popular media. Novels and Hollywood movies overwhelmingly have happy endings and sad endings do not attract large commercial audiences. Second, and a more salient flaw, is that the protagonists are depicted as exceptions rather than standard types of lawyers. Their pursuit of justice, the identification and arrest of the wealthy masterminds behind the murder of the two United States Supreme Court Justices, is constantly fraught with risk and obstacles. Indeed, because these protagonists dare to pursue justice where it is not desired, the killers also want to kill the protagonists and they succeed with the law professor. Finally, there is a comprehensive and pervasive resistance to the pursuit of justice in every branch of the American government. The novel provides that the President of the United States will appoint more commercially-sensitive judges to replace the murdered judges who advocated fairness and justice. Judges will allow bias and ambition to affect their judicial functions in order to ascend to more prestigious positions within the legal hierarchy. Legislators will support the judges that their generous campaign donors recommend. What emerges, rather than justice prevailing through a happy Hollywood ending, in a vast government infrastructure motivated by greed and political aspirations. The happy ending, in effect, is irrelevant and the dominant theme of the novel is that justice is of tenuous applicability and that it is dangerous to pursue justice in the United States. The American public can derive no firm type of confidence from these portrayals.
A more specific series of depictions and portrayals is provided by John Grisham in his novel, Rainmaker. Rather than premising his plot on murders, he frames his plot in terms of a poor family whose son has died as a result of an insurance companys unethical and illegal behavior. The death has been caused by the insurance companys refusal to pay for the sons medical treatment, this treatment it is implied would have saved the boys life, and the insurance contract obligated payment for the medical treatment. Justice is again at stake and there are striking parallels in the depictions that Grisham makes in Rainmaker and The Pelican Brief. First, the denial of justice is metaphorically represented in the boys death. Second, commercial interests function to resist the pursuit of justice and to influence the legal and the political systems. The novel provides, for example, that judges are reluctant to rule against the insurance companies because this may negatively affect their changes for promotion within the legal system. Finally, the protagonist is once again an individual on the margins of the legal system with virtually no political influence and not truly a member of the legal elite. Instead, Grisham depicts the pursuer of justice in the form of new law school graduate. This new law school graduate gets a decent job immediately thereafter, however, this law firm is purchased by a wealthier law firm and he loses his job. It is while working for a low-class lawyer that he meets the family whose son has died as a result of the insurance companys failure to honor its contract. His pursuit of justice against the insurance company is once again a dangerous and risky decision personally and professionally.
The dominant theme which emerges from both of these novels is that the American legal system is influenced and dominated by the wealthy and the politically power. Justice is denied in a variety of forms. Judges that disagree can be killed or denied promotions. Lawyers and FBI agents who investigate these crimes can be killed or denied promotions. The American legal system does not tolerate threats to the wealthy and the politically powerful. This confirms the thesis of this paper, that some media depictions of the pursuit of justice function to diminish confidence in the American legal system, because the representations are ones of naked greed and hypocrisy. There are additional facts that support this conclusion and these facts have to do with the authors background and professional experiences. These novels were not written by a detached artist, a political radical, or a Hollywood screenwriter looking to make a name for himself. Quite the contrary, John Grisham is the ultimate insider to the American legal system and its peculiarities and hypocrisies. He is a licensed attorney, he has practiced law for many years, and he is familiar with the topics he addresses and the depictions he deliberately makes. He understands the differences between the idealism of law school students and the more competitive world of experienced lawyers and judges. These make his media portrayals seem more authentic and legitimate to the American public as a result, the effect if diminishing confidence in notions of justice is even stronger because the depictions and portrayals are coming from a knowledgeable and trusted insider. If Grisham believes that Justice has been ostracized, then the public will likely share the same sentiments.
In the final analysis, these novels are rich in depictions and portrayals which doubtlessly affect and influence public perceptions of the American legal system and its alleged devotion to justice. The implications are that the pursuit of justice is frequently dangerous and seldom successful. A more hopeful message, if one is to be found, is that these media depictions also attempt to identify the main problems. Grisham seems to be saying the judicial integrity and justice can only be promoted in a system in which commercial interests are withdrawn and in which politics is excluded to the extant possible. These seem reasonable means for attempting to bring justice back into the American legal system.
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