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3 Panel [i] (1925)

handle is hein.journals/panelmbu3 and id is 1 raw text is: THE PANEL MONTily Ilu.RTIN or li ABspCIATiON or GaAND JunoEa, NEW YORK COUNTY. Vol. 3 JUN, IS Ne 1 THE CRIME COMPLEX By f Mafe. EofrimGE W. Ki Schoowlf, I.o.D., Hfead of the P)<partment of Criminologly, New York School of Social Work The nrw psychology, as it loses to be c died, h..s inven c.1 a new term to describe an old state if mind A complcx ' is what we used t Ca I an obsession a fixuv emo- tional state wh:ch masquerade- as an article of faith and is liable to burst furith. sone_ t rres in irra i, nil crmduct, more often, hap- p ly, in irrational talk or ritiomal cttrrs to tie newspaperS. It is my firm belief that the scare-heads and the scare- alk that we -er and hear i wrala.. a'- at thc preak1w of -imw* in or mist are of this character It 1. not to be. den:td that there is a supeirabi:i lance ,f crime .n our otherwise fairly decen* m liza' w0. and that is surely a ina'tsr of wl'ich we should be made and kept aware Wit the constant exaggeration aid drama tiung of this fact can do oply harm. It criavcs a panicky state of the public mind which not only tends to make the idm nis- t ation of cr-minal justice a mat er of vin- dictive ermoti n instead of reasoned judg- ment, but which also puts out of sight and fut of mind the imperatise socal duty of seeking out the causes of crime and of deal- n;: aiti ;t in the only way in which it can be controlled, that is. by prevntibe methods. Le. us rencember that it is not the ndis dual criminal, but crime, that is the tienrins Now, what are the facts? The first is that there isn't the least statistical Cuiderne to support the prevalent belief that crime is on the increase. In fact, the figures are al the other way The crime waie of tr tas few years, when it came out of the news- papers to the test of police and court sta- tiics, simply faded away There hase been less, rather than more, murders, burglaries, hold-up and the like. The increasing use of the autumoble to make a get away has adld a picturesque touch to certain types .f crime, but that seems to be about all Perc *s to the crime wave. In the second place there is no adequate evidence that the ratio of t.y and girl criminals is increasing. Crime has always been the sport or the occupation of you:h. b% hen I was at Sing Sing ten years ago, I found that fifty percent of the inmates were under twen 3%e years of age, and nearly a hurided scars ago a report of the foard of Inspectors A the Fastern Ptnitenary of 'ensylban a deplored the fict that such a large priprtion of ;he prist ners in that .ni tutsan wArt un!rs twesnty-one years of age In the third place, thN rc i no basis of act (or the current upictsri t it the char- ater of our recent immigration has had the effect if increasing the normal crime rate n this country There ire a few small alien gr, ups. it i tiuc, that contribute more than the r fair share to the recordi, but these are h st in the general statistical average. At S:ng Sing in 1916 the immigrant population of New York Ci y was represented by a J fhily snalTer proportion oh inmates than c general population. Whit this all comes to is the sober con- clusion that it is not the imaginary increase of crime L.it the tragic fact of its per- Ristence and the futility of our efforts to master it by our present haphazard methods that should claim our interest and direct our efforts. The factors that make for criminality must be studied and the stream of vicious hivng ,apped at its source-tapped and carefully conducted into channels of useful living. Digitized from Best Copy Available

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