Mr. Gilmer Quotes

Mr. Gilmer smiled grimly at the jury. “You’re a mighty good fellow, it seems – did all this for not one penny?”
“Yes, suh. I felt right sorry for her, she seemed to try more’n the rest of ’em – ”
“You felt sorry for her, you felt sorry for her?” Mr. Gilmer seemed ready to rise to the ceiling.
The witness realized his mistake and shifted uncomfortably in the chair. But the damage was done. Below us, nobody liked Tom Robinson’s answer. Mr. Gilmer paused a long time to let it sink in.

– Harper Lee

To Kill a Mockingbird, Chapter 19. Poor black field worker Tom Robinson’s compassion for white woman Mayella Ewing is used against him at his trial in the prejudiced and racially-divided society of Maycomb.

“If you had a clear conscience, why were you scared?”
“Like I says before, it weren’t safe for any n***** to be in a – fix like that.”
“But you weren’t in a fix – you testified that you were resisting Miss Ewell. Were you so scared that she’d hurt you, you ran, a big buck like you?”
“No suh, I’s scared I’d be in court, just like I am now.”
“Scared of arrest, scared you’d have to face up to what you did?”
“No suh, scared I’d hafta face up to what I didn’t do.”

– Harper Lee

To Kill a Mockingbird, Chapter 19. Prosecutor Horace Gilmer questions Tom Robinson on the witness stand. While Gilmer is trying to suggest that Tom didn’t have any reason to be scared if he wasn’t doing anything wrong, the fact that Tom ends up on trial shows his fears were well-founded. Because of Maycomb’s prejudices black people have a whole other set of fears in addition to those of white people.

“Well, Mr. Finch didn’t act that way to Mayella and old man Ewell when he cross-examined them. The way that man called him ‘boy’ all the time an’ sneered at him, an’ looked around at the jury every time he answered – ”
“Well, Dill, after all he’s just a negro.”
“I don’t care one speck. It ain’t right, somehow it ain’t right to do ’em that way. Hasn’t anybody got any business talkin’ like that – it just makes me sick.”

– Harper Lee

To Kill a Mockingbird, Chapter 19. Dill Harris complains to Scout about the way prosecutor Mr. Gilmer questioned Tom Robinson in court. Dill is not like a lot of the children in Maycomb, who are products of their parents racist teaching. Rather he is sensitive to the unjust treatment meted out to a black man in the judicial system.
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