Subject Matter
According to creator Reginald Rose, "the law is the subject of our programs: not crime, not mystery, not the courtroom for its own sake. We were never interested in producing a 'who-done-it' which simply happened to be resolved each week in a flashy courtroom battle of wits." And unlike Perry Mason, which also ran on CBS, victory was "far from certain on The Defenders—as were morality and justice."
Topics featured in the series included capital punishment, "no-knock" searches, custody rights of adoptive parents, the insanity defense, the "poisoned fruit doctrine", immigration quotas, the Hollywood blacklist, jury nullification, and Cold War visa restrictions.
A 1962 episode entitled "The Benefactor"—in which the father-son legal team defended an abortionist—was the most controversial; all of the series' three regular advertisers refused to sponsor the episode, necessitating a last-minute replacement.
Read more about this topic: The Defenders (1961 TV series)
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“In my experience, persons, when they are made the subject of conversation, though with a Friend, are commonly the most prosaic and trivial of facts. The universe seems bankrupt as soon as we begin to discuss the character of individuals. Our discourse all runs to slander, and our limits grow narrower as we advance. How is it that we are impelled to treat our old Friends so ill when we obtain new ones?”
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