Changes

Clearly, Hoover and FDR were on opposite ends of the debate regarding governmental intervention, as was the case with many Americans at the time. Ford makes his opinions known through his scenes of the doctor punching the banker and the crowd in the street cheering and laughing when the banker was arrested at the end of the film. Unlike the characters in ''The Virginian'', where Gary Cooper is handsome in his white hat and defends the town against the external threat of the "bad guy" in a black hat, the characters in ''Stagecoach'' must be defined by the schemas the audience has as to what is "good" or "bad" in a given social context. The Virginian visually defines for the audience what is good or bad and right or wrong, whereas ''Stagecoach'' allows the viewer to adopt his own sense of hero and villain. John Wayne’s character, the Ringo Kid, can be seen as either, depending on the perception of the audience. He is a lone man who has mastered the terrain and frontier and has developed as a person by doing so; which echoes Turner’s “Frontier Thesis.”<ref>Frederic Jackson Turner presented his “Frontier Thesis” in 1893, which posited that the frontier was closed three years prior due to population statistics. He also argued that the frontier was an ideal and not an actual place and that it was what had defined America ''and'' Americans.</ref>He is also seeking moral justice through criminal action. He is in conflict with the ambiguous sheriff who personifies the law officer trying to uphold his duties while doing what is morally responsible. That was a chronic problem in depression era America as police officers had to serve eviction notices to their friends and neighbors while questioning their consciences. In the film, Sheriff Curly was trying to maintain a balance of duty and compassion. In the end Curly enabled Ringo’s moral justice, thus enabling the viewer to determine whether law and order or individual action was the best course of action to right a wrong. The sheriff portrayed in 1939 differed from the villainous presentation of Sheriff Pat Garrett in Sam Peckinpah’s 1973 adaptation of the Billy the Kid legend.

==== ''Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid'' ====