POLICE AND CRIME

Urging an improvement in personnel as the foundation of more efficient policing, the current volume published by the Harvard Crime Survey strikes at the roots of the modern problem of organized vice. However, the successful capture of public enemies is of no practical consequence unless it is possible at the same time to revolutionize the present practices of criminal prosecution.

In the current struggle between the officers of justice and the organized forces of crime, the local police departments, ham-strung by the venality of city bosses and the inferior talents of their men, are unable to function with the essential efficiency and coordination. Offering a meagre salary and little hope of advancement without political influence, the police forces are compelled to recruit from the lower strata of society.

The Survey points out that even in this recruiting, the absence of a well-organized personnel department and the method of Civil Service examination make the possibilities of good selection extremely dubious. The efficiency with which the 400 federal officers have mowed down the public enemies during the past few months is a striking illustration of the value of a group of men trained in the necessary elements of crime detection, chosen for service by an impartial commission, and stimulated by the prospects of rapid promotion and increases in pay. Yet any reform in the police agencies must be accompanied by similar reformation of the practices of the criminal prosecutor. This officer has practically sovereign, discretionary power in determining which of the captured criminals shall be prosecuted and how the prosecution shall be managed. He has the dangerous alternative of following up a case with vigor, or allowing it to be deferred and lost in the maze of court routine. Yet this officer remains the puppet of local politicians, subject to their selfish will, and forced by the necessities of reelection to bow to their decisions on the advisability of prosecution in certain cases.

The annals of modern crime are nothing but ugly tales of the inefficiency of local policing and the political intrigue of prosecution. Establishment of a scientific personnel department and elimination of political pressure from the realms of law and order are necessary pre-requisites to efficient criminal warfare.