OCR Text |
Show THE CRIME INDUSTRY. Crime is now one of our most flourishing industries an industry which, is unaffected by hard times or taxes or any of the other banes of legitimate business. Likewise, it is a publicly-owned in dustry, to the degree that the public pays the bill which is said to total $16,000,000,000 a year, according to the Committee on Youth Outside the Home and School in a report to the White House Conference on Child Health and Protection. The criminal population is estimated to be 1,000,-000, 1,000,-000, and it is unquestionably growing. grow-ing. The state of Illinois alone has 23,- 000 laws designed to prevent crime, and many other states probably equal or exceed this record. Every year witnesses wit-nesses a flood of new legislation. And, in the meantime, the criminal class goes evenly about its business, seemingly growing more prosperous and secure. It is not a coincidence that "the criminal age" is likewise the age in which law-passers and crime reformers have flourished to an unprecented degree. Like all our other problems, that of crime will eventually be decided by the public. The people, through their vote, determine whether wo j shall have a constantly increasing volume of laws, or whether we will go back to fundamental laws that prosecute the criminal without putting put-ting good citizens at a disadvantage. The past few years have proven that 1 restrictive, sumptuary legislation is, j more often than not, a boomerang. |