Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1890-09-14
MUNICIPAL POLICE FORCES.
HOW THEY HAVE IMPROVED IN A
QUARTER OF a CENTURY.
old-Time Policemen Usually Changed
With Each New Municipal
Administration.

old-Time Policemen Usually Changed
With Each New Municipal
Administration.
Exceptionally have American cities ad-
vaneed within the last quarter of century
in the constitution and organization of
municipal police bodies 1t is difficult to
imagine that not many years ago such an
important factor in civilization as per-
manent police force was unknown in the
United States. Yet such is the truth. Up
to within comparatively recent period
policemen in nearly all our cities changed
with the change of Mayor and Councils,
and neither experience nor efficiency was
requisite to obtain promotion to police
command. In this respect the United
States, usually in advance. was remarkably
behind European development, and, in
deed, the earliest organization of uni-
formed police in this country was copied
in essentials from London Just as London's
police force was modelled, with modifca-
tions adapted to English conditions and
temperament, upon that of Paris. Ameri-
cans for long time shrank from the uni
forms which candidates for the brass but
tons now take such pride in donning. The
old watchmen regarded it as a token of
servitude and something akin to the livery
of the footman or lackey. 1t has probably
never been noted before that the war had
a marked influence in efecting a change
of sentiment on this subject The fire.
quent spectacle of soldiers in blue and
brass familiarized people with the use of
uniforms, SO that the policeman in full
dress was no longer regarded with the sur
prise and wonder of former days, and the
adoption of distinguishing attire was
greatly facilitated in those cities where
the reform had not already been accom-
pls ed.
| But the adoption of uniforms did not
make the policeman independent. He
still continued, in most municipalities, to
be the shuttlecock of the politician. He
still depended, in nearly every place out
side of New York, on the pleasure of the
Mayor and Councils, or of the Mayor
alone, for his tenure of Office, and usually
about election time there was a significant
lull in arrests. This system, or lack OF
system, fostered corrupt and unfaithful
conduct, and these were made the pretext
for the organization of police bodies under
State control, and in whose management
the municipality was denied any voice
whatever. After few years State control
was abandoned, and municipal forces again
organized wherever the former had exist
ed. 1t is with the development and pro-
gress of this system that the writer pro-
poses to deal.
1t should be mentioned here that expe-
rience has proved that municipal authority
Will not be respected unless there is body
of men, under municipal direction, capa-
bic of enforcing that authority. The best
police force is that which, while shielded
from the direct influence of politics, is yet
sufficiently within the grasp of local
authority to be used to compel obedience
to that authority lawfully exercised The
Niagara frontier police had an organiza-
tion more efficient than that part of the
State had ever seen before, and yet, as n
body under foreign direction, it did not
command the local respect and sympathy
which a police force ought to possess
And the same may be said of other bodies
similarly organized.
In the larger cities of New York State
the patrolman who behaves himself has
ample protection against removal, and in
New York and Brooklyn this protection
extends also to superior officers. In the
third city of the Bufalo-while
patrolman cannot be removed without trial,
a sergeant may be reduced without hear
ing, and higher officers may be dismissed
at the pleasure of the Board of Police,
consisting of the Mayor and two Commits
sioners. In Pittsburg Pa. the police force
is merely a section of the Department of
Public Safety, and the Chief of that De-
partment, Mr.. Brown, possesses, for the
four years Of his term, despotic powers over
all within his jurisdiction. In Boston
Police Commissioner controls the force, as
in New York. In Providence, r. l., the
Board of Aldermen is the Police Commits
sion, but the Aldermen delegate their au-
thority to committee. In Cincinnati the
control of the police is combination of
State and municipal direction. Justly or
uniustly. the force there does not hold
high reputation for efficiency, and the
merchants have private police of their
own. But in every part of the country
the tendency is toward permanency, con-
ditional on good behavior.
1t was a common spectacle in American
cities few years ago to see drunkards,
male and female, dragged through the
streets to a police station. Nearly all
leading municipalities have of late adopted
patrol wagon and signal service systems,
by which the officer sends summons by
telegraph to the station and a patrol
wagon hurries to the scene. The prisoner
is loaded into the conveyance and carried
to the station house. If the ordinary
crew Of the patrol wagon is not sufficient,
as in case of serious disturbance, the of
ficer telephones the circumstances to the
station and sufficient force is promptly
dispatched to the locality. The system
also is check upon the watchfulness of
the patrolmen, who must report at certain
hours by telephone, or give sufficient
reason for not having done SO.
Altogether while the lot of the police
man may not be happy one, and is not
likely to be while the weather varies and
small boys annoy, the policeman of to-day
is in much better situation, officially,
than his predecessor of twenty-five years
ago, when, in most American municipali-
ties, the patrolman took his club on cleo
ton morning, conscious that the vote of
that day would decide, not only who
should be Mayor or who Councilmen but
whether he should continue to be a po-
hceman.