Harper Lee's novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, was published in 1960 during a time of racial strife: the Civil Rights Movement was at its prime and tumultuous events evolved into violence, spread into states across the country and entered the American conscience. The novel emphasizes the virtues of courage, understanding and empathy; furthermore, these qualities are paralleled in works of other prominent voices of the 1960s. One salient voice of this time, John F. Kennedy, questions the courage of the American people in his "Report to the American People on Civil Rights " (1963). He gave this speech in response to the U.S National Guard being sent to protect two African American students enrolling at the University of Alabama. Joe South, another imperious icon of the sixties, was an American singer-songwriter who touches on the importance of understanding in his single "Walk a Mile in My Shoes ". Robert Kennedy, John F. Kennedy's brother, was a politician who served as a United States Senator for New York. While breaking the news of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King's assassination to a large group of African Americans in Indianapolis, Kennedy reveals his empathy for the community, for he had been in their exact position just five years prior. Harper Lee's novel, along with other prominent voices of the time, suggests that one develops a true sense of right, wrong and fairness by stepping into someone else's shoes and by practicing the virtues of courage, understanding and empathy.
Courage is the mental or moral strength to venture, persevere and withstand danger, fear or difficulty. The importance of this strength while walking in someone else's shoes is a recurring theme in Lee's novel. One central character of the book, Jem, destroys the garden of Mrs. Dubose, a sick elderly women, in response to her harassment of him and his sister, Scout, when their father undertakes an African American's court case.
