"Your Honor, we are prepared to show that the plaintiff, far from being defrauded, has shown an intent to defraud the world. We are prepared to show that, in its decision to withhold the robot Albert from the public, once he had been developed, How-2 Kits has, in fact, deprived the people of the entire world of a logical development which is their heritage under the meaning of a technological culture.
"Your Honor, we are convinced that we can show a violation by How-2 Kits of certain statutes designed to outlaw monopoly, and we are prepared to argue that the defendant, rather than having committed a wrong against society, has performed a service which will contribute greatly to the benefit of society.
"More than that, Your Honor, we intend to present evidence which will show that robots as a group are being deprived of certain inalienable rights…"
"Mr. Lee," warned the judge, "a robot is a mere machine."
"We will prove, Your Honor," Lee said, "that a robot is far more than a mere machine. In fact, we are prepared to present evidence which, we are confident, will show, in everything except basic metabolism, the robot is the counterpart of Man and that, even in its basic metabolism, there are certain analogies to human metabolism."
"Mr. Lee, you are wandering far afield. The issue here is whether your client illegally appropriated to his own use the property of How-2 Kits. The litigation must be confined to that one question."
"I shall so confine it," Lee said. "But, in doing so, I intend to prove that the robot Albert was not property and could not be either stolen or sold. I intend to show that my client, instead of stealing him, liberated him. If, in so doing, I must wander far afield to prove certain basic points, I am sorry that I weary the court."
"The court has been wearied with this case from the start," the judge told him. "But this is a bar of justice and you are entitled to attempt to prove what you have stated. You will excuse me if I say that to me it seems a bit farfetched."
"Your Honor, I shall do my utmost to disabuse you of that attitude."
"All right, then," said the judge. "Let's get down to business."
It lasted six full weeks and the country ate it up. The newspapers splashed huge headlines across page one. The radio and the television people made a production out of it. Neighbor quarreled with neighbor and argument became the order of the day-0n street corners, in homes, at clubs, in business offices. Letters to the editor poured in a steady stream into newspaper offices.
There were public indignation meetings, aimed against the heresy that a robot was the equal of a man, while other clubs were formed to liberate the robots. In mental institutions, Napoleons, Hitlers and Stalins dropped off amazingly, to be replaced by goose-stepping patients who swore they were robots.
The Treasury Department intervened. It prayed the court, on economic grounds, to declare once and for all that robots were property. In case of an adverse ruling, the petition said, robots could not be taxed as property and the various governmental bodies would suffer heavy loss of revenue.
The trial ground on.
Robots are possessed of free will. An easy one to prove. A robot could carry out a task that was assigned to it, acting correctly in accordance with unforeseen factors that might arise. Robot judgment in most instances, it was shown, was superior to the judgment of a human.
Robots had the power of reasoning. Absolutely no question there.
Robots could reproduce. That one was a poser. All Albert did, said How-2 Kits, was the job for which he had been fabricated. He reproduced, argued Lee. He made robots in his image. He loved them and thought of them as his family. He had even named all of them after himself-every one of their names began with A.
Robots had no spiritual sense, argued the plaintiff. Not relevant, Lee cried. There were agnostics and atheists in the human race and they still were human.
Robots had no emotions. Not necessarily so, Lee objected. Albert loved his sons. Robots had a sense of loyalty and justice. If they were lacking in some emotions, perhaps it were better so. Hatred, for one. Greed, for another. Lee spent the better part of an hour telling the court about the dismal record of human hatred and greed.
He took another hour to hold forth against the servitude in which rational beings found themselves.
The papers ate it up. The plaintiff lawyers squirmed. The court fumed. The trial went on.
"Mr. Lee," asked the court, "is all this necessary?"
"Your Honor," Lee told him, "I am merely doing my best to prove the point I have set out to prove-that no illegal act exists such as my client is charged with. I am simply trying to prove that the robot is not property and that, if he is not property, he cannot be stolen. I am doing…"
"All right," said the court. "All right. Continue, Mr. Lee."
How-2 Kits trotted out citations to prove their points. Lee volleyed other citations to disperse and scatter them. Abstruse legal language sprouted in its fullest flowering, obscure rulings and decisions, long forgotten, were argued, haggled over, mangled.
And, as the trial progressed, one thing was written clear. Anson Lee, obscure attorney-at-law, had met the battery of legal talent arrayed against him and had won the field. He had the law, the citations, the chapter and the verse, the exact precedents, all the facts and logic which might have bearing on the case, right at hand.
Or, rather, his robots had. They scribbled madly and handed him their notes. At the end of each day, the floor around the defendant's table was a sea of paper.
The trial ended. The last witness stepped down off the stand. The last lawyer had his say.
Lee and the robots remained in town to await the decision of the court, but Knight flew home.
It was a relief to know that it was all over and had not come out as badly as he had feared. At least he had not been made to seem a fool and thief. Lee had saved his pride-whether Lee had saved his skin, he would have to wait to see.
Flying fairly high, Knight saw his home from quite a distance off and wondered what had happened to it. It was ringed about with what looked like tall poles. And, squatting out on the lawn, were a dozen or more crazy contraptions that looked like rocket launchers.
He brought the flier in and hovered, leaning out to see,
The poles were all of twelve feet high and they carried heavy wire to the very top, fencing in the place with a thick web of steel. And the contraptions on the lawn had moved into position. All of them had the muzzles of their rocket launchers aimed at him. He gulped a little as he stared down the barrels.
Cautiously, he let the flier down and took up breathing once again when he felt the wheels settle on the strip. As he crawled out, Albert hurried around the corner of the house to meet him.
"What's going on around here?" he asked the robot.
"Emergency measures," Albert said. "That's all it is, Boss. We're ready for any situation."
"Like what?"
"Oh, a mob deciding to take justice in its hands, for instance."
"Or if the decision goes against us?"
"That, too, Boss."
"You can't fight the world."
"We won't go back," said Albert. "How-2 Kits will never lay a hand on me or any of my children."
"To the death"' Knight jibed.
"To the death!" said Albert gravely. "And we robots are awfully tough to kill."
"And those animated shotguns you have running around the place?"
"Defense forces, Boss. They can down anything they aim at. Equipped with telescopic eyes keyed into calculations and sensors, and the rockets themselves have enough rudimentary intelligence to know what they are going after. It's not any use trying to dodge, once one of them gets on your tail. You might just as well sit quiet and take it."
Knight mopped his brow. "You've got to give up this idea, Albert. They'd get you in an hour. One bomb…"
"It's better to die, Boss, than to let them take us back."
Knight saw it was no use.