The Town Responds to the Outcome of the Trial (SK's class)

Ch. 21/22: Using Miss Maudie, Miss Stephanie, and Bob Ewell as examples, describe the town’s response to the trial.

Depending on their opinion of segregation, the town members reacted very differently. Miss Maudie was disappointed in the outcome. She saw the town as white-only people, which they were. People didn’t like Negroes, but they loved all the whites. She was mad because, even though the jury knew Tom was innocent, he was convicted guilty. This wasn’t fair, he shouldn’t be considered guilty because of his skin colour.

Miss Stephanie said she didn’t care too much about the trial, but she really did. She wanted Tom to be convicted, and that he was. She loved to spread rumors, and when she found out that Tom was convicted, she had something she could tell everyone. It wasn’t a rumor, but she adored gossip. She would always be gossiping about something, and this gave her one more thing to spread.
Obviously, Bob Ewell was happy about the outcome of the trial, because it was against his daughter. He was really the one who beat his daughter, but knew that, if he blamed it on a black man, he would be convicted guilty. Bob wanted to get out of the things he did, so he blamed it on Tom. When Tom was proven guilty, Bob was a very happy man. He knew what he did was wrong, but was willing to do anything to get out of it.
The town, overall, was fairly pleased with the outcome. People didn’t like Negroes very much, so when one more left, they were happy. Even though most people knew it was wrong, they were pleased with the departure of a black man. That was the white people at least. The other black people in the town were obviously very upset, and angry, but they couldn’t do anything about it. Nobody listened to black people.

Cole V.