In "A Point of Law" a man the narrative first calls "the deputy marshal" sits "chewing a toothpick and reading a paper" (221). In the next scene the narrative calls him "the marshal," while Judge Gowan addresses him as "Henry" (222). Elsewhere in the Yoknapatawpha fictions the marshals are distinguished from the sheriffs and their deputies as the officers specifically assigned to the town rather than the county, but in this story both this marshal and the unnamed deputy marshal seem similar to bailiffs who represent the law inside the courthouse.
Outside the courthouse when Lucas and the others arrive, next to the poor black tenant farmers who have gathered, are "rich white lawyers talking to one another around cigars, the proud and powerful of the earth" (221). The critical perspective here seems shared by both Lucas and the narrative.
The sidewalk outside the courthouse is "crowded" with "tenants from their own [i.e. Edmonds'] farm and from other farms along the creek" who have come to town in "battered and limping trucks and sedans" to see Lucas, Nat and George go inside (221). The narrative notes that these black people are "without hope of getting into the courtroom itself" (221), though it does not explain why.
The deputy who helps arrest Lucas and George is called "Tom" by the sheriff (218). He is described as "a plump, voluble man" (217). He does most of the talking during the arraignment, and displays some racial pride in the way he explains how easy it was to discover where the black men had hidden the still.
The man who quickly and informally finds a common-sense way to dispose of the case against Lucas and George is "Judge Gowan" (218). Though the character only appears again in the revised version of the story that is included in Go Down, Moses, the narrative gives him a long-standing Yoknapatawpha presence when Lucas recognizes him as the gentleman who, "thirty and forty years ago," used to stay with "Old Zach Edmonds" for several weeks during quail hunting season (222).
Although we never learn his name, or much else about him, we know "the commissioner" (216) who signs the indictments against Lucas and George for moonshining is a federal official - his office is in "the federal courthouse" (216), and moonshining was a federal crime.
The narrative distinguishes the building which houses "the commissioner's office" as "the federal courthouse in Jefferson" (216), which seems to be a different building than the county courthouse in the Square. Oxford, Mississippi, the town on which so much of Faulkner's Jefferson is based, is in the U.S. government's Northern District of Mississippi, and does have a federal courthouse building.
The narrative distinguishes the building which houses "the commissioner's office" as "the federal courthouse in Jefferson" (62), which seems to be a different building than the county courthouse in the Square. Oxford, Mississippi, the town on which so much of Faulkner's Jefferson is based, is in the U.S. government's Northern District of Mississippi, and does have a federal courthouse building.
Oxford, Mississippi, the town on which so much of Faulkner's Jefferson is based, is in the U.S. government's Northern District of Mississippi, and has a federal courthouse building. In Faulkner's world, the "federal courthouse in Jefferson" (216, 62) is mostly kept distinct from the county courthouse at the center of town that appears much more frequently. Although the fictions don't always make the distinction explicit, in at least three texts Faulkner shows federal criminal cases being tried or handled in the federal courthouse.
The "revenue officers" whom Lucas imagines taking George Wilkins into custody would have worked for the U.S. government (215). Selling or buying alcohol was illegal by Mississippi state law, but in general the moonshiners who made and sold whiskey were prosecuted for evading federal tax regulations.
