Samantha Hoppe – The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance and Hondo Journal
“I know those law books mean a lot to you, but not out here. Out here a man settles his own problems,” says Tom Doniphon to the tenderfoot Ransom Stoddard when he first arrives in Shinbone at the beginning of The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962). He is simply stating that men of the West do not follow the same laws that men from back east do. Committing murder is easily the biggest crime that men of the West commit. As clearly shown in Hondo (1953) and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, the object that aids in this crime, the gun, is essential to all Westerners who call themselves men.
A man who carries a gun automatically brings an essence of superiority, pride, and skill