R

emember Mr. Tumnus of Narnia, one of the stars of the film The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005)? He was a faun — half-human, half-goat — with a pointy beard, small horns, cloven hooves, goat-legs, glossy black hair and a long tail — and now he’s a lawyer too.

I saw him in the 2011 Robert Redford film The Conspirators, about the assassination of US president Abraham Lincoln in 1865. This took place just two years after the end of the American Civil War between the Union (the 25 states opposing slavery) and the Confederacy (the 11 southern slave states).

The film is about the consequences of the defeated south’s murderous vengeance. In it “Mr. Tumnus” is reincarnated as Frederick Aiken. A young attorney on his first case, he finds himself defending Mary Surrat, the only woman implicated in Lincoln’s killing.

The Conspirators is a cerebral, conceptual movie, requiring knowledge of American history as well as the philosophy and principles of constitutional democracy. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get the image of Mr. Tumnus with his pointy ears, horns and goat-legs out of my mind as Aiken fought in the courtroom to defend his unwanted client. I kept giggling inwardly as I watched the movie, even as I was absorbed by the seriousness of the issues.

You see, both characters were played by Scottish actor James McAvoy, who seems to have a penchant for roles that put him in a damned-if-you-do-damned-if-you-don’t situation.

As Mr. Tumnus, he was caught between his fear of Jadis (the evil White Witch ruling Narnia with an iron hand) and his conscience, which prevented him from betraying Lucy Pevensie to her. The witch knew that a Daughter of Eve or Son of Adam would bring about her downfall and was determined to kill all the Pevensie children.

As Aiken, he was caught between his partisan sentiments as a war hero of the Union and his commitment as a lawyer to the principle that everyone has a right to a good defense. He is deeply reluctant to defend Mary Surrat (Robin Wright), the Southerner who owned a boarding house in Washington where John Wilkes Booth, Lincoln’s assassin, met with fellow plotters — including Mary’s son, John.

Blind with rage and grief at the death of their beloved president, the people of the North were out for blood. In the film, their leaders — notably Edwin Stanton, Secretary of War (played by Kevin Kline as Donald Rumsfeld was not available!) — are eager to placate them by having her convicted and executed as quickly as possible.

The task of preventing a lynching fell first to Senator Reverdy Johnson, the former attorney general. As a Southerner, Johnson felt he would weaken Mary’s defense and forced Aiken to step in.

“There is no presumption of innocence, no burden of proof, no jury of your peers, and no appeal. She is at least entitled to a defense”, Johnson reminds Aiken.

In the end, Aiken’s conversion to Mrs. Surrat’s cause is about the underlying principles involved: The right to a fair trial, which she clearly was not getting from a military tribunal more interested in politics and punishment than justice. “It’s John Surrat you want,” says Aiken to Stanton, who grimly replies, “I’ll settle for either one”.

The film uses a little-known footnote to a well-known story to remind us to use constitutional means at times when it’s the most difficult to do so. We should not, as Johnson says, “in our grief [or rage] betray our better judgment and partake in an inquisition”.

As one reviewer said, the film is “all about the un-American things Americans can do when collectively threatened”. It makes an analogy between the anarchic aftermath of Lincoln’s assassination and the post-9/11 infringement of civil rights in the name of “the war on terror”. It draws parallels between the conspirators of 1865 and the present-day inmates of Guantanamo — including even the humiliating hoods both have had to wear.

After the alleged G30S communist coup attempt of 1965, Indonesians also gave in to unbridled rage, violence and murder. We set up the notorious Mahmilub (Mahkamah Militer Luar Biasa) in 1966, a special court-martial for soldiers and civilians allegedly involved in the G30S incident. Like many such tribunals, it guaranteed the guilt of those who came before it.

After Soeharto, however, we behaved a bit better. The Indonesia Reform Era did not establish Mahmilub-type tribunals to deal with Jamaah Islamiyah terrorists after the horrific Bali, J.W. Marriott and Kuningan bombings.

Instead, they were processed through the usual criminal trial process, in open court, with appeals. Yes, our judiciary has big problems, but sticking to constitutional principles of the rule of law is a victory for all Indonesians.

It’s always a tough battle to give rights to unpopular defendants, particularly when everyone considers them guilty, but as The Conspirator shows, it is the hard cases that matter. They are the one that really test our principles. And, yes, that even applies to the very worst of our current crop of suspected corrupters!

In the end, we are all Mr. Tumnus and Frederick Aiken facing the same big question: Will we give in to our primitive emotions or uphold (democratic) principles and stay true to our conscience?

Stay tuned folks — it’s a battle fought every day in our struggling courts!

The writer (www.juliasuryakusuma.com) is the author of Julia’s Jihad.