Temperance

Mrs. Kearney faced a dilemma with respect to her daughter's performance and lack of pay. There was no clear indication that the contract with her daughter had been broken, but the stalling appeared to her as though it would. In this situation, she was faced with either allowing her daughter to be ripped off, or faced with her daughter's musical career ending. The musical career may or may not have had much future value. Mrs. Kearney's action scuttled any potential future for her daughter, however, for the sake of a few guineas and principle

Mrs. Kearney, by virtue of her decision, had placed principle on a higher value scale than the money, either present or future. With respect to temperance, however, she did not display much calm. While there were certainly reasons to be concerned with respect to payment, the time and place for such discussions was not at the concert. There was an expected formality to such proceedings that was simply not followed. As such, the situation essentially became out of control for both Holohan and Mrs. Kearney. The collateral damage that Mrs. Kearney was causing was not adequately taken into consideration, nor was the blowback. She was in the right to insist on proper payment for her daughter in accordance with the contract. However, her behavior was consistent with being right for the sake of being right. She did not consider that pushing the issue at the time would cause considerably more damage than necessary, and to many more people.

Had she played the situation better, Mrs. Kearney would have either recovered the money or come out looking the victim. If Holohan was ultimately wrong, then he would have looked it should the payment not have been delivered. His lack of savvy with respect to contracts had put him in an awkward position but he was not compelled to resolve it by means he was willing to accept. Mrs. Kearney's lack of temperance, therefore, allowed the situation to become far worse than needed. It also caused her to look far worse than she should have, given that it was Holohan who was in the wrong.