The Dark & Bloody Ground

By 1974, many Americans, especially those in what Nixon called "the silent majority" were getting pretty leery of well-heeled do-gooders. Think Bill Ayers, whose father Thomas Ayers was the CEO of Commonwealth Edison (and chairman of the board of my alma mater, Northwestern University). Think Jane Fonda. Think Leonard Bernstein, who famously hosted a cocktail party for members of the Black Panthers.

Was Beth Davenport, Rockford's lawyer and erstwhile flame, the writers' stand-in for radical chic? In "The Dark & Bloody Ground" her character was not attractive. Cute, but not attractive.  She was portrayed as privileged, manipulative, and willing to cheat her hard-working friend on behalf of her pet cause -- in this case an impoverished, friendless woman accused of murdering her husband. So a rich do-gooder stiffs a working man out of his hard earned wages to help the poor. I wonder if Governor Reagan was a fan of the show?

Beth's role in the episode was to serve as both a comic and a dramatic foil for Rockford, and it played well. When she approaches Rockford, who is fishing on the beach and makes her wade into the surf in her suit to make her pitch, she mentions that she is donating her representation. Rockford responds that she can afford to because she "picked the right grandfather." He is not so fortunate. ("I don't take charity cases. They're not part of my survival kit.") When Beth protests that her client is innocent, he clearly regards her as naive. ("I spent five years in prison. While I was there I never met anybody who wasn't innocent.")

The plot must go on, of course, and Rockford is sucked into the case. This confirms a pattern established in the pilot and repeated throughout the series. Rockford is initially skeptical about his clients and their cases. He is sympathetic, up to a point, but realistic about his own interests. He sidles into things reluctantly, and often against his better judgment. And he often only really gets interested in a case after someone beats him up or tries to kill him. (In this episode, a society party-planner named Eliot tries to run him off the road in a Mack truck.) This pattern fits pretty comfortably with a popular perception Americans have of themselves and their country. (Apropos of nothing, a 50-year old viewer of "The Dark & Bloody Ground" would have been 15 or 16 years old on December 7, 1941.) 

Beth's lack of concern over his interests sets up a classic Rockford tirade, as they quibble over his expenses. 

BD:  "You're angry!"
JR:   "Why would I be angry? You hired me to do a job. I almost get killed in the process. The highway patrol are looking for some fun-loving kid. My father wants an autographed picture of the truck, and you're so torn up you're arguing over a tube of toothpaste!  (Door slams.)

Rockford strikes a blow for the working class when he pins the murder on Eliot, who Beth seems to know (or know of) from traveling in the same social circles. ("Old money would never marry Eliot.")

BD:  "He's not the type..." (to commit murder).
JR:   "Because he went to the right schools?  He's the type."

As the series continued, Beth became less the caricature of a precocious limousine liberal, and more of the tough, independent career woman. There were no further references to old money or lost causes. Beth might have been an interesting "frenemy" (ala Angel Martin), but her character evolved into more of a clear-eyed Rockford defender, instead. The later Beth would never have tried to cheat Rockford out of his expenses for car repair by arguing that he was negligent for not locking the hood of his car:

JR:   "There's no lock on the hood."
BD:  "You should have one installed. This must happen all the time in your line of work."

In addition to the class warfare, there is a very brief "Okie from Muskogee" moment that sets the cultural tone of the show. The murdered husband had been a writer, and when Rockford interviews the accused in jail she says he had been out "listening to the country." Rockford offers her a subtle but expressive look that in a fraction of a second tells us exactly how he feels about someone who would describe bumming around as "listening to the country." 
 
"The Dark & Bloody Ground" also marks Rocky's first pitch for Jim to consider a career in truck driving, which he considers a safer and more respectable line of work. Jim, of course, has heard it all before and pays no attention. Rocky's bewildered reply tells us a great deal about what we'll see over the rest of the first season and the life of the series:  "For a man who doesn't like getting stomped on, you're in the wrong line of work."