Stagecoach West1960

[first lines]

[ruffians pull down the statue of Justice from atop the town hall]

Reider:
They say, Reverend that it was rotten at the base.

Reverend Williams:
I'm glad it's down. It's been dead for a long time.

Reider:
Now if it were as simple to put a rope around this town, you and me and all of us in it, and do the same the air might be cleaner to breathe. If I were a minister, Reverend, I think I might preach an interesting sermon on Sunday.

Reverend Williams:
And what would you say?

Reider:
I don't know exactly. I think I'd tell a story... a parable, you'd call it. I'd preach a story about a town that had been presided over by a statue of justice that had become an object of mockery and derision. One day the people pulled it down and when they looked at it they saw it was rotten at the base... and the rain hadn't done it, nor the wind or the snow... it was the people themselves who destroyed it.

Reverend Williams:
For my part, Mr. Reider, I could say if I were a newspaper editor, and my paper were coming out tomorrow, I'd print that parable. I know you won't do it as well as you know I won't preach it because we're both afraid.