HELP

“well,” he says, “there’s excuse for picks and letting-on, in a case like this; if it warn’t so, i wouldn’t approve of it, nor i wouldn’t stand by and see the rules broke—because right is right, and wrong is wrong, and a body ain’t got no business doing wrong when he ain’t ignorant and knows better. it might answer for you to dig jim out with a pick, without any letting-on, because you don’t know no better; but it wouldn’t for me, because i do know better.” the meaning in this excerpt is

Was the civil war inevitable? could anything have been done through compromise to stop it, or did it have to happen?

Were the common crimes brought before the suffolk county court? what were the common sentences for convictions what? why type of punishment did the court prefer to inflict?