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vinculum_jurisLawrence was born into the lower-middle class home of Cuthbert and Louisa Maynard, first-generation English immigrants in New York. He spent his formative years as an only child, often watched by one of their neighbors in the tenement building or left to fend for himself, as his father worked long hours as a longshoreman and his mother as a domestic servant. Due to the unreasonably harsh conditions associated with his job, Cuthbert was an active member of the Knights of Labor and often participated in demonstrations, an involvement that ignited Lawrence’s interest in law and politics.
An avid reader with a sharp memory, Lawrence was often bored in the low-income public schools he attended. His parents encouraged him to remain dedicated to his schoolwork, however, and in tenth grade he had the good fortune to encounter Mr. Gallagher, a teacher of history and government that bonded with and mentored him. Gallagher gave Lawrence extra assignments and helped him to apply to various colleges in hopes of getting a scholarship. Lawrence managed to receive full tuition from Cornell and moved out to Ithaca, taking courses through the newly founded law department.
Lawrence’s hope was to become a defense attorney and take cases related to civil rights and the labor movement. He received some notoriety within the college due to his high grades and skill in debate, but always felt like a bit of an outsider due to his background. He worked part-time as a clerk at a local railroad office in order to pay room and board, where he became close to his manager Mr. Chapman and had long discussions with him about the workers’ attempts to unionize, insisting that he should support their efforts.
Things came to a head in Lawrence’s fourth year, when a massive strike shut down the railway. Chapman pleaded with him to go talk to the workers and try to open negotiations in his stead, and Lawrence went eagerly, believing he would no doubt be able to move them through appeals to reason. The workers were only made angrier by his attempts, seeing him as just another rich man who didn’t understand their predicament. Midway through one of Lawrence’s retorts, someone in the crowd threw an improvised bomb and the scene erupted into violence. By the time the police and hired strikebreakers broke it up, about thirty people were injured, five were dead, and Lawrence had been rushed to the hospital to have the shattered remnants of his left calf amputated.
The incident jaded him, leading him to see the common man as animal-like and predisposed to violence. Bedridden for months and confined to his parents’ home, he went through a host of books and magazines to pass the time, including some popular science publications that posited ideas of biologically-based racism. Lawrence found them to be a comfort, as they described his own white Anglo-Saxon “race” as more evolved and capable of making moral decisions than the ethnicities he’d seen represented among the strikers. He became convinced that it was more important for men of his race to act in the best interest of those people than to leave much decision-making to them.
Lawrence took the bar exam and began to practice in the Southern District of New York. It was there that he became familiar with Southmoor due to a number of financial cases associated with the island’s burgeoning coal industry, and he went to visit it. Deciding that he liked the local legal system and enjoying the thought of an escape from the family his new views had brought him into conflict with, he packed up and joined the law firm Harper & Sons there. As he began associating with the other legal professionals, he deliberately avoided talking about his background and even adopted a Boston Brahmin accent, hoping he would be taken more seriously if they believed he had always been wealthy.
About six months after his arrival, the councilman of District 4 resigned halfway through his term due to poor health. With the support of some of his colleagues, Lawrence decided to run for the position. His platform included increased police funding, increased industrial regulations, and support for social programs directed at the white population such as more formalized, compulsory schooling. In the midst of growing labor unrest in the slums, his positions resonated with voters, and he was elected by a wide margin.
Lawrence served for a year, the remainder of his predecessor’s two-year term, and during that time he was instrumental in passing a few prominent acts, including the Food and Drug Safety Act (providing for the regular inspection of items meant for consumption), the Public School Tax (providing funding for schools for white children) and a series of Public Defense Acts (providing funding for law enforcement and more standardized training for police officers.) He gained considerable attention in the press due to an incident after the passage of the former, where, following a speech filled with personal attacks given by the economically conservative Gerald Naughton, he glove-slapped the man in the face. This show of boldness also won him points with another one of his colleagues, Eugene Langley, who had been working to weaken the power of Horace Mercer’s corporate empire. He and Lawrence began collaborating due to their similar views in regards to industry.
After his term was completed, Lawrence was elected to a second one. Not long after the ballots had been counted, supporters of Mercer introduced a Voting Rights Bill that would extend the right to vote from all white men to all men over eighteen. The intention was to necessitate redistricting due to the large population of Mercer’s workers that would be included and thereby give him more of a voice in the council. Langley saw the bill as a blessing in disguise and, together with Lawrence, began introducing measures to indirectly limit Mercer’s authority over those workers, including acts that outlawed tests and fees to vote and adjusted the areas police officers were assigned to oversee. He then encouraged Lawrence to support the bill, but Lawrence was uncomfortable with the potential social consequences and agreed only to help him gather votes for it, deciding to personally abstain.
Lawrence’s story begins in the midst of the debates over the bill, while he is giving a speech on behalf of the economically liberal faction of the council during a community fair. In the middle of that speech, a smoke bomb is set off in the crowd, and while there are no casualties, the police jump into action and arrest a number of possible troublemakers. Lawrence follows up after a few days and finds not only that the investigation has not moved forward, but that one of the individuals in custody is a Jewish woman with no real evidence against her. Incensed at the officers’ disregard for proper procedure, he bickers with them until they agree to release the woman, who sees compassion in him even as he claims he’s only protecting the law.
She is Elisheva Shafir, and she is about to change his outlook on the world.
An avid reader with a sharp memory, Lawrence was often bored in the low-income public schools he attended. His parents encouraged him to remain dedicated to his schoolwork, however, and in tenth grade he had the good fortune to encounter Mr. Gallagher, a teacher of history and government that bonded with and mentored him. Gallagher gave Lawrence extra assignments and helped him to apply to various colleges in hopes of getting a scholarship. Lawrence managed to receive full tuition from Cornell and moved out to Ithaca, taking courses through the newly founded law department.
Lawrence’s hope was to become a defense attorney and take cases related to civil rights and the labor movement. He received some notoriety within the college due to his high grades and skill in debate, but always felt like a bit of an outsider due to his background. He worked part-time as a clerk at a local railroad office in order to pay room and board, where he became close to his manager Mr. Chapman and had long discussions with him about the workers’ attempts to unionize, insisting that he should support their efforts.
Things came to a head in Lawrence’s fourth year, when a massive strike shut down the railway. Chapman pleaded with him to go talk to the workers and try to open negotiations in his stead, and Lawrence went eagerly, believing he would no doubt be able to move them through appeals to reason. The workers were only made angrier by his attempts, seeing him as just another rich man who didn’t understand their predicament. Midway through one of Lawrence’s retorts, someone in the crowd threw an improvised bomb and the scene erupted into violence. By the time the police and hired strikebreakers broke it up, about thirty people were injured, five were dead, and Lawrence had been rushed to the hospital to have the shattered remnants of his left calf amputated.
The incident jaded him, leading him to see the common man as animal-like and predisposed to violence. Bedridden for months and confined to his parents’ home, he went through a host of books and magazines to pass the time, including some popular science publications that posited ideas of biologically-based racism. Lawrence found them to be a comfort, as they described his own white Anglo-Saxon “race” as more evolved and capable of making moral decisions than the ethnicities he’d seen represented among the strikers. He became convinced that it was more important for men of his race to act in the best interest of those people than to leave much decision-making to them.
Lawrence took the bar exam and began to practice in the Southern District of New York. It was there that he became familiar with Southmoor due to a number of financial cases associated with the island’s burgeoning coal industry, and he went to visit it. Deciding that he liked the local legal system and enjoying the thought of an escape from the family his new views had brought him into conflict with, he packed up and joined the law firm Harper & Sons there. As he began associating with the other legal professionals, he deliberately avoided talking about his background and even adopted a Boston Brahmin accent, hoping he would be taken more seriously if they believed he had always been wealthy.
About six months after his arrival, the councilman of District 4 resigned halfway through his term due to poor health. With the support of some of his colleagues, Lawrence decided to run for the position. His platform included increased police funding, increased industrial regulations, and support for social programs directed at the white population such as more formalized, compulsory schooling. In the midst of growing labor unrest in the slums, his positions resonated with voters, and he was elected by a wide margin.
Lawrence served for a year, the remainder of his predecessor’s two-year term, and during that time he was instrumental in passing a few prominent acts, including the Food and Drug Safety Act (providing for the regular inspection of items meant for consumption), the Public School Tax (providing funding for schools for white children) and a series of Public Defense Acts (providing funding for law enforcement and more standardized training for police officers.) He gained considerable attention in the press due to an incident after the passage of the former, where, following a speech filled with personal attacks given by the economically conservative Gerald Naughton, he glove-slapped the man in the face. This show of boldness also won him points with another one of his colleagues, Eugene Langley, who had been working to weaken the power of Horace Mercer’s corporate empire. He and Lawrence began collaborating due to their similar views in regards to industry.
After his term was completed, Lawrence was elected to a second one. Not long after the ballots had been counted, supporters of Mercer introduced a Voting Rights Bill that would extend the right to vote from all white men to all men over eighteen. The intention was to necessitate redistricting due to the large population of Mercer’s workers that would be included and thereby give him more of a voice in the council. Langley saw the bill as a blessing in disguise and, together with Lawrence, began introducing measures to indirectly limit Mercer’s authority over those workers, including acts that outlawed tests and fees to vote and adjusted the areas police officers were assigned to oversee. He then encouraged Lawrence to support the bill, but Lawrence was uncomfortable with the potential social consequences and agreed only to help him gather votes for it, deciding to personally abstain.
Lawrence’s story begins in the midst of the debates over the bill, while he is giving a speech on behalf of the economically liberal faction of the council during a community fair. In the middle of that speech, a smoke bomb is set off in the crowd, and while there are no casualties, the police jump into action and arrest a number of possible troublemakers. Lawrence follows up after a few days and finds not only that the investigation has not moved forward, but that one of the individuals in custody is a Jewish woman with no real evidence against her. Incensed at the officers’ disregard for proper procedure, he bickers with them until they agree to release the woman, who sees compassion in him even as he claims he’s only protecting the law.
She is Elisheva Shafir, and she is about to change his outlook on the world.
