Comparing 'To Kill A Mockingbird And Twelve Angry Men'

Compare and contrast of Tom Robinson’s trial and the boy’s.

Prejudice, racism, classes, apathy, justice. These are the wonders and horrors of the American judicial system. Both the novel “To Kill a Mockingbird” and the play “Twelve Angry Men”, portray those subjects in both similar and different ways. The trials in “To Kill a Mockingbird” and “Twelve Angry Men” had many similarities, but all of those stemmed into differences. I will be addressing the settings, the jury prejudice, the lawyers, and the way they would be ruled in modern society.

The first part of every story is it’s setting. Both of the accused came from an eastern dwelling, the boy was a slum in the 1950s, while Tom came from a tiny hamlet in the 1930s. in both trials prejudice is a huge role in the story. Tom Robinson suffered a greater form of prejudice, racism. Unaltered pure racism. This is shown when Atticus says to Jim “Tom Robinson is a coloured man, Jim, no jury in this part of the world’s going to say ‘we think your guilty but not really’ on a charge like that.” (TKMB 219) The belief was that

In tom’s ruling was built on the testimony of two people, the plaintiff was the town’s white trash, while the defendant was a hard working black with a good background, but the ruling, rather than being swayed by background, as a modern court might be, the ruling was hinged on race. The boy’s ruling came down to the story, with no evidence on either side, congruent to Tom’s story, but as juror four put’s it “His entire story is flimsy. He claimed he was at the movies. That’s a little ridiculous, isn’t it?” (TAM 4 act one) He also claims a knife fell out of his pocket and later, that same knife was used to kill his father. And he had a good motivation too; getting beaten with fists. Although I think in both trials the outcome would be the same; a reasonable doubt of