PBS documentary covers courts from Spanish rule to today
PBS traces the rule of law in New Mexico, from Spanish rule, Billy the Kid to today, highlighting the importance of the state’s courts
Almost any retelling of New Mexico history will highlight at least one exploit of Billy the Kid. Taming New Mexico does not dawdle.
The new PBS documentary program opens with the Kid’s notorious escape from the Lincoln County courthouse, in which the outlaw, weeks from his scheduled death sentence, slipped his cuffs and killed a guard and deputy sheriff before fleeing into the dusty wide open.
What follows, though, is not the standard profile of the territorial era’s mythic criminals but rather an exploration of the other side of the coin, the law. Through the lens of the federal court system, the program traces the history of the rule of law, how it transitioned from the Spanish colonial period, when the alcalde would dispense ad-hoc justice from his own home and prisoners could dig free of makeshift adobe cells with little more than a spoon, through the roughand-tumble territorial days, when wily criminals like the Kid tormented law enforcers and fraudulent land grabs were abetted by corrupt officials.
And the history of how judicial systems have come to be is as pertinent as ever, PBS producers and interviewees said, in the context of federal courts’ interventions against several of President Donald Trump’s executive orders.
“It sort of lent a little more resonance to the piece,” Anthony Della Flora, co-director and producer, said of the recent clashes between Trump and the judiciary. “You see how important federal judges are — they are an equal branch of the government, so vitally important to preserving democracy.”
The producers held a showing for lawyers and judges last week, Della Flora added, “and we didn’t even have to really say it — it was
apparent while we were watching — that we thank God we have people in these positions who are doing their job, doing it well, who are willing to stand up for what’s right.”
The hourlong series of interviews with historians, judges, attorneys and writers — set to premiere Thursday, May 18, and re-air Sunday, May 21 — builds to an examination of the federal judiciary in New Mexico, how those courts acted as a civilizing force and ultimately brought the wild New Mexico Territory to heel.
“We don’t sugarcoat the earlier history and how corrupt the courts were, but by the end you get a sense of, ‘Oh my goodness, this is really tough,’ ” said Paul Hutton, a distinguished professor of history at The University of New Mexico who contributed to the documentary.
“We are a nation of laws, and ultimately that’s what the courts stand for,” he added. “They really are our last bastion.”
Over the centuries, New Mexico has seen chaos reign where order should, whether in the assassination of the territorial Supreme Court chief justice by a member of the territorial legislative council, the botched execution of a notorious train robber by inexperienced hangmen, or the anticipation of unjust land seizures that spurred the 1847 Taos Revolt.
In short, establishing law here has never been simple, Della Flora said.
And perhaps more so in New Mexico than in other parts of the West, Hutton said, citing the shifting sovereignty of the area, mentioning in specific the 19thcentury trouble that grew out of the federally appointed politicos and local law enforcement who defrauded the heirs of land grantees.
“No question, the courts were in collusion with the Anglo invader on the water and land questions,” he said.
The program, narrated by former ABC News anchor Sam Donaldson, depicts the arrival of imposing federal district courthouses, after the territory was granted statehood in 1912, as a watershed in the “taming” process; the new state was first a member of the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals, then shifted into the 10th Circuit in 1929.
While the federal judiciary is presented as sober arbiter amid turmoil, there remain, of course, moments when friction within the system threatens a breakdown, or at least exposes how truly human the systems are. As the Taming New Mexico program covers at some length, the situation of immigrants who seek to re-enter the country illegally is one such modern-day crisis.
Robert C. Brack, U.S. District Court judge in Las Cruces, along with District Judge Kenneth Gonzales, sentenced more than 3,000 defendants in 2016, most for illegal re-entry into the country after deportation, the PBS program reports. Brack, in a talking-head interview in Taming New Mexico, describes the “horribly painful” nature of the U.S. immigration system, ruing the way it irrevocably severs families.
“I’d like to think than we’re better than this as a country, as a government, but the proof of it is too rarely seen,” he says on screen.
Law has been well established, in other words, but order can, then as now, prove elusive.
But there was a time when any sort of law was hardly a given, when the Kid could wriggle out of his handcuffs with relative ease, when the vulnerable were at the whims of a local alcalde, when questions about the ownership of land and water were exploited by self-interested officials.
“I have told everybody, if you watch this for no other reason, watch it to get a better understanding of why New Mexico is the way it is today,” Della Flora said.
Hutton, the UNM professor, noted the financial difficulties facing the state court system, which required an emergency funding bill during the 2017 legislative session.
While the PBS program prioritizes the federal district courts, the court system has become “a political football,” Hutton said, to the detriment of the higher ideals of justice.
The PBS program was funded in part by the U.S. District Court of New Mexico’s bench and bar fund; Michael Kamins, codirector and producer, said the funders had no say in the content of the program.
Kamins said the throughline from New Mexico’s earliest colonial days to the present legal system is the individual’s cry for justice, the societal need for checks and balances on power.
“Without that [balance], we run into problems,” he said.
“A civilization is an ongoing process,” Kamins added. “I think this program points out how important it is to have that ability to be heard, to have the branches of government working together to do the right thing.”