University of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class Volume 3 | Issue 2 Article 6 Revisiting a Seminal Text of the Law & Literature Movement: A Girardian Reading of Herman Melville's Billy Budd, Sailor James McBride Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.law.umaryland.edu/rrgc Part of the English Language and Literature Commons Recommended Citation James McBride, Revisiting a Seminal Text of the Law & Literature Movement: A Girardian Reading of Herman Melville's Billy Budd, Sailor, 3 U. Md. L.J. Race Relig. Gender & Class 285 (2003). Available at: http://digitalcommons.law.umaryland.edu/rrgc/vol3/iss2/6 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by DigitalCommons@UM Carey Law. It has been accepted for inclusion in University of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@UM Carey Law. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. REVISITING A SEMINAL TEXT OF THE LAW & LITERATURE MOVEMENT: A GIRARDIAN READING OF HERMAN MELVILLE'S BILL Y BUDD, SAILOR* James McBride, J.D., Ph.D.** Ay, there is a mystery; but, to use a scriptural phrase, it is a "mystery of iniquity," a matter for psychologic theologians to discuss. But what has a military court to do with it? -Captain Vere in Herman Melville, Billy Budd, Sailor' All writers on the science of policy are agreed, and they agree with experience, that all governments must frequently infringe the rules of justice to support themselves; that truth must give way to dissimulation, honesty to convenience, and humanity itself to the reigning of interest.