The Courthouse in ‘To kill a mockingbird’ is symbolically described by Harper Lee to display the peoples desperate attempts to hang onto ‘Every physical scrap of the past’. This is in terms of the old ideas and beliefs of the old traditions but also laws to do with the discrimination of black people. The representation of law is obvious with the setting of the courthouse, it is built upon not only from ‘Greek revival columns’ but these views clash with the nineteenth century ones presented mostly from the South of America as the colonial start of the slave trade. Implementing the quote of hanging on to every scrap of the past we can see that Harper Lee is trying to show that although the new laws against the possession of slaves many or most of the people around were only made to do this and there views have not changed from the old tradition. These are rusty unreliable ideas compared to even the idealogical justice system put in place by the ancient Greeks that did not favour the people of white ethnicity.