Cities and Crime

1. Cities and Crime BY: Alan David Stuart Omar

2. Rural and urban life • Before the 1920’s 51.2% of Americans lived in communities with populations of 2,500 to more than 1 million. • Then America changed drastically between 1922 and 1924. • A lot of people migrated to cites. Nearly 2million people left their farms and towns each year. • The small rural towns began to loose their hold on the American mind as the cities rose to prominence.

3. Leisure activities in cities • “Cities were the place to be, not to get away from” • Every night people crowded into ornate movie theaters and vaudeville houses offering a live variety of shows. • The city was a world of competition and change. • Cities tolerated drinking, gambling and dating. Back In towns these were considered shocking and sinful.

4. Reasons for prohibition • Considered alcohol prime consideration of corruption. • Thought that drinking led to crime, wife and child abuse, accidents on the jobs and other serious social problems. • People considered drinking a sin. • Support of prohibition came largely from the rural south and west.

5. Reasons for poor enforcement • Government failed to budget enough money to enforce the law. • There wasn’t enough police officers to enforce the law. this led to many crimes. • Criminals bribed police officers into letting them break the law.

6. Prohibition leads to crime • Prohibition leads to crime, cause they banned alcohol. • Made illegal saloons were they wood sell the illegal alcohol. • Hidden saloons or night clubs were known ass speak easies. • There was a password that you need it to know in order to get into the speakeasies.

7. speakeasies • Were illegal underground night clubs or saloons where alcohol was sold illegally. • They were called speakeasies, cause once inside people had to talk quietly or “easily” to avoid being detected. • Speak easies could be found everywhere, in penthouses, cellars, office buildings, roaming houses, tenements, hardware stores and tea rooms. • Inside you would find a mix of fashionable middle class and upper middle class men and women.

8. Al Capone • By age 26 Al Capone headed a criminal empire in Chicago. He controlled his empire through the use of bribes and violence. • 1925 to 1931 Capone bootlegged whiskey from Canada and had control of 10,000 speakeasies and he also operated illegal breweries in Chicago. • 1927 Al Capone or “Big Fellow” as he liked to be called, was worth $10million • Later in 1931 the big gangster was arrested for tax evasion. • He was put in jail and later put in liberty. He died when he was 48.

9. 21st amendment • The 21st amendment annulled the 18th amendment. • The 21st amendment was passed by Congress on February 20, 1933. • The 21st amendment allowed the states to choose and set their own alcohol laws. • 21st allowed drinking in all states according to their states laws.