Rule of Law, Visual Arts & Film
"Great nations write their autobiographies in three manuscripts – the book of their deeds, the book of their words and the book of their art."
– John Ruskin
The rule of law is not just an abstract concept; it is a vision of our nation’s democratic ideals that has revealed itself in America’s artistic heritage. We see this vision in paintings and sculpture, in popular cartoons and illustrations, in America’s changing architectural tastes, and in the folk art of untrained and often anonymous citizens. All of these visual artifacts tell the story of America’s evolution as a nation conceived from the belief in the rule of law as the foundation of our Constitution, our representative form of government, our economic system, and the rights and responsibilities we have as citizens in a free and open society.
– John Ruskin
The rule of law is not just an abstract concept; it is a vision of our nation’s democratic ideals that has revealed itself in America’s artistic heritage. We see this vision in paintings and sculpture, in popular cartoons and illustrations, in America’s changing architectural tastes, and in the folk art of untrained and often anonymous citizens. All of these visual artifacts tell the story of America’s evolution as a nation conceived from the belief in the rule of law as the foundation of our Constitution, our representative form of government, our economic system, and the rights and responsibilities we have as citizens in a free and open society.
Rule of Law & the Visual Arts
To make teaching the rule of law a truly interdisciplinary experience for students, we have added a visual arts component to supplement the reading and film lists. While historical texts, primary documents, and literature provide explanations and examples of the rule of law, and films can dramatize the concept, it is the visual arts that allow students to study the symbolism and iconography that, over the years, have come to reflect the rule of law visually.
Using The REED-LO Scaffolding Approach to Art lesson template for teaching students about art, the REED-LO Matrix, and the Sample Lesson Plans below, teachers will be able to engage students in decoding the symbolism and iconography of visual images to understand more clearly how artists have depicted the rule of law and its connections to such related issues as justice, good and evil, right and wrong, freedom and responsibility, equal rights, fairness, and citizenship.
We also provide an Annotated List of Suggested Visual Arts representing a range of artistic genres, historical periods, and themes, and, where possible, links to the works.
We encourage you, the teacher, to use this material to improve your students’ skills in identifying and explaining symbolism, imagery, tone and mood in the visual arts. We also hope that you will find this material a valuable resource for interpreting the visual arts as a commentary on the rule of law in a historical context, and, that in so doing, your students will strengthen their own understanding of the importance of the rule of law in their daily lives and the necessity to preserve and protect it as the foundation for the rights and freedom we all enjoy.
The visual arts materials included here fulfill many of the requirements for Virginia’s Civics and Economics Standards CE 1c, CE 2a, CE 3a and b, and CE 8d.
NOTE: The Virginia Law Foundation & The Virginia Bar Association Rule of Law Project is indebted to B. Scott Crawford for his selfless contributions to “The Rule of Law in the Visual Arts. Former Director of Education at The Taubman Museum of Art in Roanoke, VA, Scott is an adjunct instructor in the history department at Virginia Western Community College and an adjunct instructor in the art history department at Virginia Tech. We wish to acknowledge his creation of the four lesson plans and his permission to use his copyrighted REED-LO materials below. Click on them to access the information.
Sample Lesson Plans
The website currently has four lesson plans, each aligned to the Virginia SOLs for eighth grade Civics and Economics. These lesson plans may be adapted to meet the teacher’s time constraints, student needs, and student ability level. Please, share these ideas with your colleagues, particularly if you teach in a combined civics-language arts class. As noted above, we encourage teachers to develop their own interdisciplinary lesson plans and submit them for possible inclusion here so that we may continue to expand the collection of existing plans.
Before using these lesson plans or reviewing the Annotated List of Suggested Visual Arts, we encourage you to read the REED-LO SCAFFOLDING APPROACH TO ART and the accompanying REED-LO Matrix to assist you in using these lesson plans and developing your own.
• Lesson 1: The Rule of Law and Public Virtue
• Lesson 2: The Rule of Law and Equality
• Lesson 3: The Rule of Law and Political Cartoons – Social Forces that Impact the Rule of Law
• Lesson 4: The Rule of Law and the Struggle between Democracy and Totalitarianism
More details on the background and relationship between Pierre Daura and Herman Bottcher, and an enrichment lesson titled "The Rest of the Story," are available at http://cenphilsoc.brinkster.net/bottcherlesson2.htm.
We wish to thank Scott Crawford for providing this material and for designing the lesson plan.
Using The REED-LO Scaffolding Approach to Art lesson template for teaching students about art, the REED-LO Matrix, and the Sample Lesson Plans below, teachers will be able to engage students in decoding the symbolism and iconography of visual images to understand more clearly how artists have depicted the rule of law and its connections to such related issues as justice, good and evil, right and wrong, freedom and responsibility, equal rights, fairness, and citizenship.
We also provide an Annotated List of Suggested Visual Arts representing a range of artistic genres, historical periods, and themes, and, where possible, links to the works.
We encourage you, the teacher, to use this material to improve your students’ skills in identifying and explaining symbolism, imagery, tone and mood in the visual arts. We also hope that you will find this material a valuable resource for interpreting the visual arts as a commentary on the rule of law in a historical context, and, that in so doing, your students will strengthen their own understanding of the importance of the rule of law in their daily lives and the necessity to preserve and protect it as the foundation for the rights and freedom we all enjoy.
The visual arts materials included here fulfill many of the requirements for Virginia’s Civics and Economics Standards CE 1c, CE 2a, CE 3a and b, and CE 8d.
NOTE: The Virginia Law Foundation & The Virginia Bar Association Rule of Law Project is indebted to B. Scott Crawford for his selfless contributions to “The Rule of Law in the Visual Arts. Former Director of Education at The Taubman Museum of Art in Roanoke, VA, Scott is an adjunct instructor in the history department at Virginia Western Community College and an adjunct instructor in the art history department at Virginia Tech. We wish to acknowledge his creation of the four lesson plans and his permission to use his copyrighted REED-LO materials below. Click on them to access the information.
Sample Lesson Plans
The website currently has four lesson plans, each aligned to the Virginia SOLs for eighth grade Civics and Economics. These lesson plans may be adapted to meet the teacher’s time constraints, student needs, and student ability level. Please, share these ideas with your colleagues, particularly if you teach in a combined civics-language arts class. As noted above, we encourage teachers to develop their own interdisciplinary lesson plans and submit them for possible inclusion here so that we may continue to expand the collection of existing plans.
Before using these lesson plans or reviewing the Annotated List of Suggested Visual Arts, we encourage you to read the REED-LO SCAFFOLDING APPROACH TO ART and the accompanying REED-LO Matrix to assist you in using these lesson plans and developing your own.
• Lesson 1: The Rule of Law and Public Virtue
• Lesson 2: The Rule of Law and Equality
• Lesson 3: The Rule of Law and Political Cartoons – Social Forces that Impact the Rule of Law
• Lesson 4: The Rule of Law and the Struggle between Democracy and Totalitarianism
More details on the background and relationship between Pierre Daura and Herman Bottcher, and an enrichment lesson titled "The Rest of the Story," are available at http://cenphilsoc.brinkster.net/bottcherlesson2.htm.
We wish to thank Scott Crawford for providing this material and for designing the lesson plan.
Rule of Law in Film
"Movies can and do have tremendous influence in shaping young lives … towards the ideals and objectives of normal adulthood." – Walt Disney
The following films have been selected from The 25 Greatest Legal Films Honorable Mentions compiled by The American Bar Association in 2008. To view the entire list of films, click here.
We gratefully acknowledge the ABA’s permission to include these films and their accompanying synopses as an additional resource for the Virginia Law Foundation & The Virginia Bar Association Rule of Law Project. We hope you will find these films an instructive addition to your classes. As with longer works of literature, we recommend that, to make the most of instructional time, teachers may want to consider using selected scenes from these movies rather than show the entire film. Lesson plans for many of these films are available on various Internet websites.
The following films have been selected from The 25 Greatest Legal Films Honorable Mentions compiled by The American Bar Association in 2008. To view the entire list of films, click here.
We gratefully acknowledge the ABA’s permission to include these films and their accompanying synopses as an additional resource for the Virginia Law Foundation & The Virginia Bar Association Rule of Law Project. We hope you will find these films an instructive addition to your classes. As with longer works of literature, we recommend that, to make the most of instructional time, teachers may want to consider using selected scenes from these movies rather than show the entire film. Lesson plans for many of these films are available on various Internet websites.
To Kill a Mockingbird (1962, suggested MPAA rating PG): Gregory Peck lends his legendary dignity to the role of Atticus Finch, Harper Lee’s iconic small-town attorney. Penned for the screen by Horton Foote, the movie was an instant classic, as lawyer Finch rises above the naked racism of Depression-era Alabama to defend a crippled black man (Brock Peters) falsely accused of rape by a lonely, young white woman. Finch’s quiet courage is seen through the eyes of Scout (Mary Badham), his 6-year-old daughter, and embraced by an emerging generation of lawyers as the epitome of both moral certainty and unyielding trust in the rule of law. When the accuser’s drunken, incredulous father glares and asks Atticus, “What kind of man are you?” the unspoken answer is easy: both the self-assured lawyer and upright human being we all hope to be.
Twelve Angry Men (1957, suggested MPAA rating PG): Henry Fonda produced and starred in this faithful adaptation of Reginald Rose’s critically acclaimed stage play chronicling the hostile deliberations of a jury in a death penalty case. A lone juror (Fonda) expresses his doubts about what seems at first an open-and-shut prosecution. What tumbles out of the ensuing discussion is a gut-wrenching examination of the prejudices, prejudgments and personal psychological baggage these assembled citizens have brought to a life-or-death debate over the fate of the young Puerto Rican defendant. Based on Rose’s own experience as a juror in a manslaughter trial, the play was first adapted for TV by Sidney Lumet, who went on to direct the movie version, his first feature film.
Inherit the Wind (1960, PG): Spencer Tracy and Frederic March, play two grand old lions of the law, Clarence Darrow and William Jennings Bryan, as they grapple in the historic 1925 Scopes “monkey trial” in backwoods Dayton Tenn. The film, adapted from a 1955 play by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee, is a fictionalized account, and the characters’ names are changed, however slightly (Tracy’s Darrow is Henry Drummond, and March’s Bryan is Matthew Harrison Brady). But much of the courtroom testimony was taken straight from the trial transcript. Nor have Americans evolved much; 80 years later a federal judge in Pennsylvania was forced to rule on “intelligent design.”
A Man for All Seasons (1966, G): Paul Scofield [provides an] Oscar-winning performance as Sir Thomas More, the Tudor-era judge made chancellor of England. He is caught in the political struggle involving Henry VIII’s decision to defy the Roman Catholic Church and divorce his wife to wed Anne Boleyn. Lines from playwright Robert Bolt’s stirring script are frequently quoted in U.S. court opinions: “I know what’s legal, not what’s right. And I’ll stick to what’s legal.” And: “This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast—man’s laws, not God’s! And if you cut them down, and you’re just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then?”
Philadelphia (1993, PG-13, teacher discretion advised): Tom Hanks won an Oscar as an Ivy-educated gay attorney who claims his big-time law firm fired him after discovering he contracted AIDS. Denzel Washington [provides a] vibrant and nuanced performance as the solo personal injury lawyer who takes the case when everyone else turns [it] …down, and who comes to terms with his own homophobia.
Judgment at Nuremberg (1961, NR): Stanley Kramer directed this searing portrayal of the Nazi war crimes trials set in 1948. The … script focuses, in particular, on charges brought against four German judges who are accused of allowing their courts to become accomplices to Nazi atrocities. An American judge, Dan Haywood (Spencer Tracy), finds himself trying to understand how these once-esteemed colleagues allowed themselves to be used. He gets little or no help from average Germans, who are busy distancing themselves from Germany’s Nazi past. When one of the judges, Ernst Janning (Burt Lancaster), breaks from the others and confesses, it becomes clear that—whatever their original intentions—these judges have chosen political obligations over their personal senses of right and wrong.
Young Mr. Lincoln (1939, NR): Henry Fonda makes an engaging, beardless and believable Abraham Lincoln in John Ford’s fictionalized account of Lincoln’s early adult years from New Salem to Springfield…. The key plot point revolves around a killing that takes place during a July 4th brawl. As a newly minted lawyer, the young Lincoln manages to quell a lynch mob by telling them he needs the two brothers accused in the murder to be his first real clients. The film won an Academy Award for its screenplay and has been named to the National Film Registry.
Amistad (1997, R, teacher discretion advised): Steven Spielberg directed this historic drama of the famous 1839 slave ship uprising. An all-star cast includes Matthew McConaughey, Morgan Freeman and Anthony Hopkins as former President John Quincy Adams, who argues the case to the U.S. Supreme Court. Justice Harry Blackmun reads the court’s opinion in a cameo role as Justice Joseph Story. The film was criticized for taking liberties with the facts, but it succeeds as a portrayal of antebellum America coming to grips with slavery—and how the law was employed both for and against.
Ghosts of Mississippi (1996, PG-13, teacher discretion advised):Based on the true story of efforts to bring to justice Byron De La Beckwith for the 30-year-old murder of civil rights activist Medgar Evers, the film begins with the murder and the events surrounding the first two trials, both ending in hung juries. The movie then focuses on the joint efforts of District Attorney Bobby DeLaughter and Myrlie Evers, wife of the slain civil rights activist, as they struggle to bring Beckwith to trial for the third time and succeed in seeing him convicted for his 30-year old crime. (Review adapted from the ABA synopsis and a review by Joel Schesser).
The Pelican Brief (1993, PG-13, teacher discretion advised): This adaptation of John Grisham’s novel, recounts the attempt to solve the assassination of two Supreme Court justices. Darby Shaw, a law student, and Gray Grantham, a Washington investigative reporter, begin a search for the truth that leads them to the White House and suggestions that the president’s staff may be involved, or at least attempting to cover up the murders. Stonewalled by the FBI and forced into running for their lives, they finally discover that the murders are part of a corporate conspiracy to gain drilling rights in an environmentally protected area. The story reflects the ever-growing concern regarding large corporations and their ties to elected officials, and the impact this has on the government’s obligation to act according to the rule of law in protecting citizens’ rights.
The Oxbow Incident* (1943, NR): This adaptation of Walter Van Tilburg Clark’s novel, stays close to his original story. Set in 1885 Nevada, the film captures the horror of a western lynching party as seen through the eyes of Gil Carter and Art Craft as they get caught up in the mob mentality that results in the capture and lynching of three wranglers falsely accused of stealing cattle. Against a few objections from some members of the posse, notably Gil and Art who want to wait for more evidence and a proper trial, stronger, more violent voices prevail; and, in the end, the three men are hanged. Too late, the posse discovers that the men were innocent. Clark’s novel goes far beyond the typical western tale of good vs. evil. In this situation good and evil are ambiguous concepts and the very nature of justice as attainable is questioned.
Seven Days in May* (1964, NR): Adapted by Rod Serling from the best-selling novel by Fletcher Knebel and Charles Waldo Bailey II, Seven Days in May was allegedly inspired by the far-right ramblings of one General Edwin Walker. At the height of the Cold War, American President Jordan Lyman, more concerned with conscience than popularity, negotiates a controversial treaty with the Soviet Union. As the beleaguered president’s approval rating plummets, General James Matoon Scott, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, and other senior officers, convinced that the president’s actions threaten national security, plan a coup d’etat to seize the government. Colonel “Jiggs” Casey and alcoholic Senator Raymond Clark finally reveal the plot, thus forcing the resignations of Scott and his fellow collaborators. Seven Days in May serves as a cautionary tale for all citizens who assume that the rule of law will never allow such events to happen in America.
Hotel Rwanda (2004, PG-13):
He Named Me Malala (2015, PG-13):
Twelve Angry Men (1957, suggested MPAA rating PG): Henry Fonda produced and starred in this faithful adaptation of Reginald Rose’s critically acclaimed stage play chronicling the hostile deliberations of a jury in a death penalty case. A lone juror (Fonda) expresses his doubts about what seems at first an open-and-shut prosecution. What tumbles out of the ensuing discussion is a gut-wrenching examination of the prejudices, prejudgments and personal psychological baggage these assembled citizens have brought to a life-or-death debate over the fate of the young Puerto Rican defendant. Based on Rose’s own experience as a juror in a manslaughter trial, the play was first adapted for TV by Sidney Lumet, who went on to direct the movie version, his first feature film.
Inherit the Wind (1960, PG): Spencer Tracy and Frederic March, play two grand old lions of the law, Clarence Darrow and William Jennings Bryan, as they grapple in the historic 1925 Scopes “monkey trial” in backwoods Dayton Tenn. The film, adapted from a 1955 play by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee, is a fictionalized account, and the characters’ names are changed, however slightly (Tracy’s Darrow is Henry Drummond, and March’s Bryan is Matthew Harrison Brady). But much of the courtroom testimony was taken straight from the trial transcript. Nor have Americans evolved much; 80 years later a federal judge in Pennsylvania was forced to rule on “intelligent design.”
A Man for All Seasons (1966, G): Paul Scofield [provides an] Oscar-winning performance as Sir Thomas More, the Tudor-era judge made chancellor of England. He is caught in the political struggle involving Henry VIII’s decision to defy the Roman Catholic Church and divorce his wife to wed Anne Boleyn. Lines from playwright Robert Bolt’s stirring script are frequently quoted in U.S. court opinions: “I know what’s legal, not what’s right. And I’ll stick to what’s legal.” And: “This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast—man’s laws, not God’s! And if you cut them down, and you’re just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then?”
Philadelphia (1993, PG-13, teacher discretion advised): Tom Hanks won an Oscar as an Ivy-educated gay attorney who claims his big-time law firm fired him after discovering he contracted AIDS. Denzel Washington [provides a] vibrant and nuanced performance as the solo personal injury lawyer who takes the case when everyone else turns [it] …down, and who comes to terms with his own homophobia.
Judgment at Nuremberg (1961, NR): Stanley Kramer directed this searing portrayal of the Nazi war crimes trials set in 1948. The … script focuses, in particular, on charges brought against four German judges who are accused of allowing their courts to become accomplices to Nazi atrocities. An American judge, Dan Haywood (Spencer Tracy), finds himself trying to understand how these once-esteemed colleagues allowed themselves to be used. He gets little or no help from average Germans, who are busy distancing themselves from Germany’s Nazi past. When one of the judges, Ernst Janning (Burt Lancaster), breaks from the others and confesses, it becomes clear that—whatever their original intentions—these judges have chosen political obligations over their personal senses of right and wrong.
Young Mr. Lincoln (1939, NR): Henry Fonda makes an engaging, beardless and believable Abraham Lincoln in John Ford’s fictionalized account of Lincoln’s early adult years from New Salem to Springfield…. The key plot point revolves around a killing that takes place during a July 4th brawl. As a newly minted lawyer, the young Lincoln manages to quell a lynch mob by telling them he needs the two brothers accused in the murder to be his first real clients. The film won an Academy Award for its screenplay and has been named to the National Film Registry.
Amistad (1997, R, teacher discretion advised): Steven Spielberg directed this historic drama of the famous 1839 slave ship uprising. An all-star cast includes Matthew McConaughey, Morgan Freeman and Anthony Hopkins as former President John Quincy Adams, who argues the case to the U.S. Supreme Court. Justice Harry Blackmun reads the court’s opinion in a cameo role as Justice Joseph Story. The film was criticized for taking liberties with the facts, but it succeeds as a portrayal of antebellum America coming to grips with slavery—and how the law was employed both for and against.
Ghosts of Mississippi (1996, PG-13, teacher discretion advised):Based on the true story of efforts to bring to justice Byron De La Beckwith for the 30-year-old murder of civil rights activist Medgar Evers, the film begins with the murder and the events surrounding the first two trials, both ending in hung juries. The movie then focuses on the joint efforts of District Attorney Bobby DeLaughter and Myrlie Evers, wife of the slain civil rights activist, as they struggle to bring Beckwith to trial for the third time and succeed in seeing him convicted for his 30-year old crime. (Review adapted from the ABA synopsis and a review by Joel Schesser).
The Pelican Brief (1993, PG-13, teacher discretion advised): This adaptation of John Grisham’s novel, recounts the attempt to solve the assassination of two Supreme Court justices. Darby Shaw, a law student, and Gray Grantham, a Washington investigative reporter, begin a search for the truth that leads them to the White House and suggestions that the president’s staff may be involved, or at least attempting to cover up the murders. Stonewalled by the FBI and forced into running for their lives, they finally discover that the murders are part of a corporate conspiracy to gain drilling rights in an environmentally protected area. The story reflects the ever-growing concern regarding large corporations and their ties to elected officials, and the impact this has on the government’s obligation to act according to the rule of law in protecting citizens’ rights.
The Oxbow Incident* (1943, NR): This adaptation of Walter Van Tilburg Clark’s novel, stays close to his original story. Set in 1885 Nevada, the film captures the horror of a western lynching party as seen through the eyes of Gil Carter and Art Craft as they get caught up in the mob mentality that results in the capture and lynching of three wranglers falsely accused of stealing cattle. Against a few objections from some members of the posse, notably Gil and Art who want to wait for more evidence and a proper trial, stronger, more violent voices prevail; and, in the end, the three men are hanged. Too late, the posse discovers that the men were innocent. Clark’s novel goes far beyond the typical western tale of good vs. evil. In this situation good and evil are ambiguous concepts and the very nature of justice as attainable is questioned.
Seven Days in May* (1964, NR): Adapted by Rod Serling from the best-selling novel by Fletcher Knebel and Charles Waldo Bailey II, Seven Days in May was allegedly inspired by the far-right ramblings of one General Edwin Walker. At the height of the Cold War, American President Jordan Lyman, more concerned with conscience than popularity, negotiates a controversial treaty with the Soviet Union. As the beleaguered president’s approval rating plummets, General James Matoon Scott, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, and other senior officers, convinced that the president’s actions threaten national security, plan a coup d’etat to seize the government. Colonel “Jiggs” Casey and alcoholic Senator Raymond Clark finally reveal the plot, thus forcing the resignations of Scott and his fellow collaborators. Seven Days in May serves as a cautionary tale for all citizens who assume that the rule of law will never allow such events to happen in America.
Hotel Rwanda (2004, PG-13):
He Named Me Malala (2015, PG-13):