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Chapter 12
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Sun Does Shine, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Discrimination and the Criminal Justice System
Optimism, Faith, and Choice
The Death Penalty
Suffering, Community, and Support
The Power of Stories
Summary
Analysis
Santha sends a copy of her petition to Ray, listing 31 reasons why he should be granted a new trial: they include prosecutor misconduct, racial discrimination, ineffective counsel, and new evidence. Reading the petition, Ray feels a new spark of hope. He passes around the petition and the other inmates are impressed—they, too, realize that Ray is probably innocent.
Santha’s petition reinforces Ray’s belief that he faced discrimination during his trial. Her hard work and support of Ray also contrasts with Perhacs’s lack of effort, and as a result of this support, Ray feels much more hopeful that his appeals process is turning around.
Themes
Meanwhile, Ray continues to leave the row every day in his mind; any time he can get away is a respite. He thinks that humans are not meant to be locked in a cage—it’s a cruel punishment. He knows that most of the other men aren’t innocent, as he is. Many raped women and murdered children. But in the prison, he doesn’t know any monsters. He knows guys with names, many of whom had been abused as children or broken by life.
Ray continues to call into question the morality of the death penalty. While he concedes that not everyone on death row is innocent like him, he also recognizes that many times, the people who wind up on death row are also victims of difficult circumstances and are still worthy of their lives.
Themes
The state denies Ray’s petition and everything that Santha claimed in it. Henry explains to Ray that if Perhacs could have raised something during his trial and appeal but didn’t, the state won’t allow it as a reason for a new trial. Ray concludes that if you couldn’t afford a good defense at your trial or appeal, you could never prove your innocence. Ray does get a new hearing set for April 23, 1991, but soon after the state postpones the hearing. In addition, Santha says she can’t represent Ray anymore because of a new job, but Bryan Stevenson will send another lawyer.
Ray again notes how systemic discrimination affects not only a person’s first trial, but then also makes it even more difficult to point out that discrimination in subsequent trials and appeals because so much of the evidence cannot be reconsidered. Thus, someone who is at an economic disadvantage in their first trial is even more disadvantaged in subsequent trials.
Themes
Since Ray passed around his petition, other men on the row have started to have legal debates. Ray says that his petition states that “the kind of justice a criminal defense has cannot depend on how much money he has.” The men debate this all day. That night, Ray showers next to a guy named Jimmy Dill; Jimmy says that Henry Hays has money from the KKK, so he’ll probably get out. Ray walks back to his cell in shock—his friend Henry is Henry Hays, the man who lynched a black boy named Michael Donald in Mobile in 1981.
Ray’s petition demands a kind of equality under the law that Ray never received. As the quote implies, Ray did not receive the same kind of justice because he had so little money. But Ray—and all of the lawyers with whom Santha and Bryan work—fight so that people with little money do receive the same justice.
Themes
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That night, Ray calls out to Henry, saying that he just figured out who Henry is. Henry is silent for a while before saying that everything his parents taught him about Black people was a lie. Ray says that his mom always taught him to have compassion and forgiveness, and he is sorry that Henry’s parents didn’t teach him the same. Henry says that Ray was really lucky. Ray realizes that in that moment, all of the inmates are a family. They aren’t monsters, and they have more in common than not—they shouldn’t be reduced to the worst thing they have ever done.
Even though Ray is shocked and disgusted at Henry’s actions and ties to the KKK, he still recognizes that Henry is a human being who has since recognized his mistakes. Ray is able to extend empathy to Henry, and their friendship lessens both of their suffering. Ray also emphasizes that Henry isn’t a monster—no one on death row is—and therefore they shouldn’t be put to death because they are human beings like everyone else.
Themes
The next day, at visiting day, Henry gestures Ray over to meet his parents. Ray holds out his hand, but Henry’s father Bennie doesn’t shake it. Henry announces that Ray is his best friend, and then a guard yells at Ray to sit down. As Ray sits, he tells Lester that they just made some wild progress on death row. Ray realizes how much it took for Henry to stand up to his dad and introduce a large Black man as his best friend.
Henry has been so indoctrinated with hate by his parents, as his father’s actions in this passage show. But the fact that Henry can change his mind illustrates that no one is beyond redemption, and that even people whom the outside world views as evil can improve their lives and make different choices. Ray uses this point to question the death penalty, as he argues that everyone’s life is worthwhile if they can find redemption.
Themes
A few months later, Ray’s new attorney, Alan Black, visits from Boston. They go over the case together, and Alan says that they need to get a new ballistics expert. Ray suggests that he get someone from the South to testify, because judges don’t like guys from out of town. That night, Ray tells Henry that he can get over Henry being in the KKK, but not that his life is in the hands of a Red Sox fan.
Even though Ray isn’t sure about Alan Black, Alan, too, is part of the community of lawyers that is working to help Ray. Unlike Perhacs, he is listening to Ray’s suggestions and working with Ray to put on the best defense possible—something that reassures Ray.
Themes
As Ray talks to the guys through the bars, he realizes how much he wants to talk face to face with other people. He yells out that he’s going to start a book club and get real books in the jail. He wants to show the other men that they can escape the row in their mind, too.
Here Ray introduces the idea that stories can help not only him escape death row, but that with books, he can help the other men on death row take their mind off of their fates as well.
Themes
