A state of disobedience

From the transcript at trial: Commonwealth of

Virginia v. Alvin Scheer

DIRECT EXAMINATION, CONTINUED

BY MR. STENNINGS:

Q. What did you find in Baltimore, besides a job, Alvin?

A. Well, I noticed posters going up all over town, eventually. They were kind of crudely done, if you know what I mean. Well . . . maybe crude isn't quite the right word; the drawings were a good enough likeness, after all.

You know the ones I mean? They showed Governor Seguin from a front view and from the side, just like she was a criminal or something. For a while there they were everywhere: "Wanted: Dead or Alive."

Now, of course, nobody ever took any credit for them. They weren't official. They didn't offer any reward or anything like that.

But it started me to thinking, which never did come too easy to me. I mean, I'm not stupid. I never read books much, but I'm not stupid.

Anyway, if the White House could pay people to march in parades, and I was pretty sure that's where that money I was handed did come from, why couldn't they make up—have someone make up—some posters like that?

Take it all together: the parades, the news that all seemed to come from one side only, the posters. What did it add up to?

To me? Well, I added one and one and one and came up with the White House. But I figure to a lot of folks, it probably seemed like it added up to real—what do you call it?—a tidal wave? Yeah, a tidal wave of support for doing whatever it took to knock Texas into the dirt.

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