CHAPTER 7

CRIMINALITY OF THE NEGRO IN THE NORTH

Reason for Greater Criminality in the North Than in the South-Reasons for Greatest Criminality in the West-Reason for Existence of Great Crime Center in Chicago-Paramount Importance of Bad Environment As a Cause of Negro Crime

HE criminality of the Negro is much greater in the North than in the South, for the reason that in the North the Negro generally lives in cities where the temptations to and opportunities for crime are many, whereas, in the South, the Negro generally lives in the country where the temptations and opportunities are fewer. Some overzealous friends of the Negro have denied this, but in so doing have closed their eyes to both statistics and reason.

Crime is everywhere more common in cities than in rural districts, and the Negro race is no exception to this rule. That the Negro commits more crime in the North discredits neither the North nor the Negro. It merely illustrates the truth that black and white alike are influenced unfavorably by the city environment.

The criminal tendency of the Negro can be measured only by comparing the quantity and kind of crime committed by him and by white people in the same or similar environments.

In Chicago the Negroes constitute only 4.5 percent of the population, but are responsible for 13.1 percent of all convictions for felonies, and 17.1 percent of the indictments for murder. In 1919, the police records show, nearly three times as many Negroes as whites were arrested in proportion to their respective numbers in the population, the Negro percent of arrests being 11.5. For the six-year period ending January 1, 1920, Negro arrests for misdemeanors, according to police records, averaged 8.20 percent and for felonies, 11.13 percent." Of the total convictions for misdemeanors, the Negroes average 8.5 per'Haynes, The Negro at Work in New York City, New York, 1912. 'Report, Chicago Commission on Race Relations, p. 330.

'Ibid., p. 335.

'Ibid., p. 336.

cent and of felonies 13 percent." The records of the juvenile court show that Negro boy offenders constitute over twice the proportion of Negroes to the total population, and that Negro girl offenders constitute three and one-half times the proportion of Negroes to the total population. The kind of offenses committed by Negro boys does not seem to differ notably from the kind committed by white boys, except that the Negro boys take the lead in larceny."

The records of the criminal court of Chicago for 1917-18 show that the Negroes are responsible for 12.6 percent of the sex crimes. “The sex offenses of the Negroes were committed for the most part only against Negroes, and the specific charges were rape, attempted rape, accessory to rape, crimes against children, indecent liberties, contributing to delinquency, incest, adultery, murder by abortion, bigamy, crimes against nature, seduction and bastardy." 8

The figures above quoted, however, can be taken only as throwing some light on the sex criminality of the Negro and not as accurate statistics, for the reason that they include only cases passing through the social service department of the criminal court.

In the state prisons of Illinois the Negroes constitute twenty-three percent of the inmates. The high percentage of Negroes in these prisons, as compared to their percentage of convictions as indicated by the police records of Chicago, may be accounted for by the longer terms of sentence and the fewer paroles of Negroes, as compared to white prisoners. As to the behavior of Negroes in prison, the records indicate "that Negroes are less amenable to discipline than the whites, but that their violations of rules are not so grave. The percentage of Negro inmates whose conduct was marked satisfactory was smaller in all institutions than the percentage of whites." 10 In the Chicago House of Correction for adult misdemeanants, the Negroes constitute twenty percent of the total inmates. In the state school for delinquent boys (St. Charles), the Negro boys constitute 12.5 percent of the inmates,12 In the state school for delinquent girls, the Negro girls constitute 18.5 percent of the inmates.

11

"Report, Chicago Commission on Race Relations, p. 336.

The criminality of the Negro, and also of the whites, in Chicago, is much greater than the records indicate for the reason that the police records are very incomplete.13

14

In the report of the Chicago Commission on Race Relations there is evidence of a general effort to attribute the excessive crime and vice of the Negroes of that city to the recent migrants from the South," but this effort seems to be supported only by sectional prejudices. The statistics show that whereas the Negro population doubled from 1914 to 1919, the Negro crime rate for the period increased only fifty percent.15 If the migrants from the South were more criminal than the Chicago-born Negroes the increase of crime would at least have kept pace with the increase of the Negro population. While the imputation of high criminality to the migrant Negroes is indefensible, there is reason to believe that the criminality of Negroes in Chicago, as also of the whites, at all periods, is swollen by the constant incoming of vicious classes from every direction.

However it is very unfair to judge of the criminal tendencies of the Negro by looking only at the statistical data. If we go behind the statistics we shall find much to lessen their significance and much to mitigate the offenses which the statistics record.

17

In the first place, Chicago is the most criminal city in the civilized world. It harbors 10,000 professional criminals,16 and has more murders per annum than England and Wales with their 38,000,000 population. It has 2,146 more burglaries than London, and twenty-two robberies for one in London. As to what extent the criminality of Chicago may be due to incompetence and corruption in the administration of justice, I am unable to form an opinion, but a residence of one year in that city led me to think that the citizens generally were a superior type physically and morally, and that they had a reputation for crime which they did not wholly merit, because of the exceptional facilities for entrance and exit which the city offers to the criminal class. In any other large city, for instance New York City, the places of ingress and egress are limited, so that it is difficult for a criminal to enter or depart without apprehension by the police. But Chicago is the greatest railway center in the world, and its railways radiate in all directions,

and each of them has from half a dozen to twenty stations where passengers may get off and on a train within the city limits. Hence, a criminal has thousands of means of entering or leaving the city by rail. The same relative facility exists for entering and departing by automobile, for the reason that the number of highways radiating from Chicago exceeds the number of any other city. When we add to these railway and highway entrances and exits those afforded by water transportation, we can see why looking for a criminal in Chicago is like looking for a needle in a haystack, and why the worst criminals for a thousand miles around flock to Chicago to commit crime.

As Chicago tends to attract white criminals from the regions round about, so also it attracts Negro criminals. Thus a considerable amount of crime committed by both whites and Negroes in Chicago is due to the criminal drainage from other sections.

Other facts which need to be taken into account in explanation of the criminal statistics of Negroes is that Negroes are more easily arrested, identified, and convicted than white people.

But to whatever extent the Negro is criminal, the most important cause, and the one which ranks ahead of any racial trait, is the bad environment in which he lives. In Chicago, as in other cities, because of the residential segregation, crowds of the Negroes, good and bad, are obliged to live in the same district, and often in the same tenement. Hence the better element of the Negroes is always being contaminated and dragged down by the worse. Then, too, in Chicago the Negro quarter and the vice quarter have always been close together, and in spots interblended.18 The Vice Commission report of 1911 said:

"The history of the social evil in Chicago is intimately connected with the colored population. Invariably the large vice districts have been created within or near the settlements of colored people. In the past history of the city every time a new vice district was created downtown or on the South Side, colored families were in the district moving in just ahead of the prostitutes. The situation along State Street from Sixteenth Street south is an illustration." 19 In 1912 the vice district designated by the police contained the largest group of Negroes in the city, with most of their churches, Sunday schools, and societies. The Vice Commission report further said "that practically all of the male and female servants, connected with houses of prostitution in vice districts and in disorderly flats in residence sections, are colored." 20 "Report, Chicago Commission on Race Relations, p. 342. 20 Ibid., p. 343.

19 Ibid., p. 343.

The vice resorts of white people tend to gravitate toward the Black Belt because in this district there is less likelihood of effective interference either from citizens or public authorities." 21 On the other hand, the Negroes gravitate toward the vice centers because of the low rentals resulting from the undesirableness of the neighborhood.22 The high percentage of vice among the Negro women of Chicago is in keeping with the extraordinarily bad surroundings in which they have to live and the precariousness of their employment. The manager of a big concern in Chicago told a member of the Commission on Race Relations "that his plant had dismissed more than 500 Negro girls for business reasons. These girls, it was stated, could not easily find reemployment, and were therefore probably exposed to certain necessities and temptations from which white girls of comparable status are exempt."

"23

A difference between Negro and white criminals is that the former more generally act on impulse and act alone; the latter act more generally upon premeditation and in partnership with others. Leroy Steward, Chief of Police of Chicago, says "that the Negro criminals work as individuals. I only recall one instance where there was a gang of colored men that came to my attention but I know of

"Ibid., p. 344.

Ibid., p. 344.

Ibid., p. 332.

"Ibid., p. 346.

many white gangs.'

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