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Things Are Seldom What They Seem: Judges And Lawyers In The Tales Of Mark Twain, Lucia A. Silecchia

Scholarly Articles

This article explores the many and varies legal characters that populated the bench and bar in Mark Twain’s work. Judges and lawyers have long captivated the minds and talents of authors, and Twain was a prolific creator of jurisprudential characters. This article’s thesis is that a careful study of Twain’s fiction reveals a disturbing pattern of inconsistency between the conduct of his attorneys and judges and the quality of justice that their actions bring about. In all too many of Twain’s tales, true “justice” is far more likely to be achieved where lawyers and judges violate legal rules through deception, …