Welcome to Hard Times (1967)

Edgar Buchanan: Brown

Quotes 

• Mayor Will Blue : What can we do for you?

  Brown, Territorial Governor's Rep. : It's the other way around. The name's Brown... from the Governor's office. Every time somebody puts a little capital into this territory, I'm called into the office and sent on my way. It don't make no difference that I suffer from rheumatism or that I'm past the age to ride a mule's back. A man who files a claim that yields, it's a town. If he finds grass, it's a town. If he digs a well, it's a town. And I have to charter them all. If the claim pitches out, the grass dies, the well dries out, everybody rides off to form up again. New territory for me to travel. Nobody fixes in this country. Everybody is blowing around with the wind. You can't bring law to a bunch of rocks. You can't make a society out of sand. Sometimes, I think we're worse than the Indians. What's the name of this town?

  Mayor Will Blue : Hard Times.

• Brown, Territorial Governor's Rep. : Now, you going to have a peace officer. You there!

  Deputy Marshal Leo Jenks : Me?

  Brown, Territorial Governor's Rep. : Yeah, you're the only one carrying a gun. You ever kill a man?

  Deputy Marshal Leo Jenks : Well, yessir, I reckon I did.

  Brown, Territorial Governor's Rep. : Good. Here pin that on.

  [Brown gives Jenks a badge] 

  Brown, Territorial Governor's Rep. : You are hereby sworn a Deputy Sheriff. You salary is twenty-five dollars a year, payable next year. Now, you'll take up a collection and build a jail. If you get a serious outlaw that ain't dead, write a letter to the capital and we'll put a circuit judge on ya. So here's the town charter, the census list forms and a petition for statehood. Get people to sign that when you ain't busy.