Our Conscious Is Our Jury

At first I was confused about this assignment but after reading Jury of Her Peers it all made perfect sense. Poor Mrs. Peters, torn between her civic duties as the sheriff’s wife and her internal conscious as a woman. She is completely trusted to abide by the law by the attorney and her husband, “of course Mrs. Peters is one of us” (89) said the attorney. Mrs. Peters tries to convince herself throughout the entire story that she is doing the right thing by trying to find evidence to support that Minnie had in fact strangled her own husband. “The law is the law,” she says to Mrs. Hale (92). On the outside, she is the sheriff’s wife and must do the right thing, but on the inside she identifies with Minnie. She is convinced by Mrs. Hale That Minnie had a terrible life with her husband. A husband who was cold and hard, abusive even. The more she finds out about Minnie, Mrs. Peters begins to feel bad for Minnie.  When Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale find the dead bird; the only happy thing Minnie must have had, the proof of motive, Mrs. Peters remains silent. Her individual identity as a woman is challenged. She can understand why Minnie would have killed her husband. Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale sympathize with Minnie. They get together her quilt and fruit that Minnie cared so much about. Her internal conflict tortures her: in the end she does not share that she knows Minnie killed her husband with the attorney or the sheriff. Only she and Mrs. Hale know the truth. In the end her individual identity as a woman overshadows her social identity as the sheriff’s wife.