1 Neither the men nor the women see their relationships in these terms. As I discuss later, the Baptist women believe that they have chosen the ways they relate to their husbands. For a less sympathetic view of Baptists in a southern community, see H. G. Bissinger, Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team, and a Dream (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1990), Where the Baptists in that community appear to be both racist and materialistic.Google Scholar

2 Avery, Chet, “The Front Porch,” 9 MCS Conciliation Q. 2 (1990). The Mennonites, who, like the Quakers, are primarily concerned with peace making and reconciliation, have a similar position regarding conflict. As a veteran member of the Mennonite peacemaking program in Central America put it, “Conflict provides the energy, motivation and heightened awareness to bring about change.” Mark Chupp, “When Mediation Is Not Enough,” 10 MCS Conciliation Q. 2, 2 (1991).Google Scholar

3 I am not questioning the sincerity of their beliefs, but regardless of how sincere and strong religious beliefs appear to be, the enforcement of them is problematical. As Kidder and Hostetler show, even among the Amish, whose isolation from the outside world is much greater than the Baptists' and whose social control mechanisms are also much more obvious, there is a good deal of deviation from the religious beliefs, particularly among youths. See Robert, L. Kidder, & Hostetler, John, “Managing Ideologies: Harmony as Ideology in Amish and Japanese Societies,” 24 Law & Soc'y Rev 895 (1990). See also Greenhouse at 32–33: “Some readers will finish the book and want to know: ‘So that's what they think in Hopewell (maybe). What do they do about conflicts when they occur?’ This is a legitimate question and one whose answer would have to range much more widely than this book.Google Scholar

4 Sally Engle Merry, Getting Justice and Getting Even: Legal Consciousness among Working Class Americans (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990) (“Merry, Getting Justice”).Google Scholar

5 Id. at 74–75.Google Scholar

6 Yngvesson, Barbara, “Inventing Law in Local Settings: Rethinking Popular Culture,” 98 Yale L.J. 1689, 1691–1692 (1989).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

7 Engel, David Similarly emphasizes enduring factors in his study of court use in “Sander County.” In that county aversion to litigation emerged from an enduring set of norms that stressed that individuals were responsible for their own destinies. Therefore, people who sue in order to vindicate their rights, especially if they are plaintiffs in tort actions, are trying to get someone else to pay for what was the plaintiffs' own fault. Engel, David M., “The Oven Bird's Song: Insiders, Outsiders, and Personal Injury in an American Community,” 1B Law & Soc'y Rev. 549 (1984).Google Scholar

8 Merry, Getting Justice.Google Scholar

9 Id. at 175 ff. See also Merry, Sally Engle, “Everyday Understanding of Law in Working Class America,” 13 Am. Ethnologist 253 (1986).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

10 This discussion of the Chinese is based on Jerome S. Auerbach, Justice Without Law? 74–77 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1983).Google Scholar

11 Minow, Martha, “Interpreting Rights: An Essay for Robert Cover,” 96 Yale L.J. 1860 (1987).Google Scholar

12 Brigham, John, “Rights, Rage, and Remedy: The Construction of Legal Discourse,” 2 Stud Am Pol. Development 303 (1987).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

13 Milner, Neal, “The Denigration of Rights and the Persistence of Rights Talk: A Cultural Portrait,” 14 Law & Soc. Inquiry 631 (1989).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

14 Neal Milner, “Rights Talk and the Politics of Harmony” (Manuscript, 1991) (“Milner, ‘Rights Talk’”).Google Scholar

15 Milner, , 14 Law & Soc. Inquiry.Google Scholar

16 Merry, , 13 Am. Ethnologist.Google Scholar

17 Merry, , Getting Justice, 38 (cited in note 4).Google Scholar

18 Neal Milner, “Rights Talk.”.Google Scholar

19 Kidder, & Hostetler, , 24 Law & Soc'y Rev. (cited in note 3).Google Scholar

20 Matsuda, Mari, “Looking to the Bottom: Critical Legal Studies and Reparations,” 22 Harv. C.R.-C.L.L. Rev. 323 (1987).Google Scholar

21 Ka Lahui Hawai'i: The Sovereign Nation of Hawai'i: A Compilation of Legal Materials for Workshops on the Hawaiian Nation” (Hilo: Ka Lahui Hawai'i, no date) (“‘Ka Lahui Hawaiii’”).Google Scholar

22 Melody Kapilialoha MacKenzie, ed., Native Hawaiian Rights Handbook (Honolulu: Native Hawaiian Legal Corporation. 1991) (“MacKenzie, Handbook”).Google Scholar

23 Id. at ix.Google Scholar

24 Describing rights as being retrieved rather than created is a powerful tactic because the retrieval description links Hawaiian demands to a dominant cultural discourse and tradition. See the discussion on pp. 20, 22.Google Scholar

25 MacKenzie, Handbook at ix.Google Scholar

26 Id. at x.Google Scholar

27 For further evidence of this rural-urban distinction, see Engel, 18 Law & Soc'y Rev., and id., “Law, Time, and Community,” 21 Law & Soc'y Rev. 60 (1987).Google Scholar

28 Merry, Getting Justice 147 (cited in note 4).Google Scholar

29 Kidder, and Hostetler, , 24 Law & Soc'y Rev. (cited in note 3).Google Scholar

30 Engel, , 18 Law & Soc'y Rev.Google Scholar

31 On the importance of surveillance and control, see Merry, Getting Justice 181–82.Google Scholar

32 Wisconsin v. Yoder, 402 US. 205 (1972). For a discussion of this decision, see Jill Norgren & Serena Nanda, American Cultural Pluralism and the Law 102–20 (New York: Praeger 1988) (“Norgren & Nanda, Pluralism”).Google Scholar

33 In contrast, the distinctions between Sander County's old-timers and newcomers are exacerbated by divergent views of history. To the old-timers, history develops in a circular way, much the way crops grow. Crops are planted, cultivated, and harvested and then the process starts all over again. The newcomers see history progressing unidirectionally. The newcomers' view reduces the staying power of the old values. See Engel, 21 Law & Soc'y Rev.Google Scholar

34 For a look at what happens when the prevailing culture perceives a religion as a threat to fundamental values, see the discussion of the Mormons in Norgren & Nanda, Pluraiism 71–82.Google Scholar

35 Laura Nader, “The Crown, the Colonists, and Zapotec Village Law,” in June Starr & Jane F. Collier, eds., History and Power in the Study of law 320–24 (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1989).Google Scholar

36 Ka Lahui Hawai'i (Cited in note 21).Google Scholar

37 Minow, , 96 Yale L.J. (cited in note 11).Google Scholar

38 Derrick Bell, And We Are not Saved: The Elusive Quest for Racial Justice (New York: Basic Books, 1987).Google Scholar

39 See the letter by Kanalupilikokolama'ihu'i G. T. Young in Ka Leo O Hawai'i (University of Hawaii newspaper) 15 Nov. 1991, p. 7.Google Scholar

40 Philpson, Ilene, “What's the Big I.D.? Politics of the Authentic Self,” 6 Tikkun, Nov.Dec. 1991, at 51; The author's emphasis.Google Scholar

41 Cruse's comments appear as part of “Roundtable: Doubting Thomas,” 6 Tikkun, Aug.Sept. 1991, at 27.Google Scholar