Evening star., 1936-05-09
BY LEMUEL F. PARTON.

is fairly steady roar Of gunfire as
the G-men practice craftsmanship
with Tommy" guns, automatics and
other weapons. The tarket is the
likeness of human figure, slung on
cable and moved near or farther
away by push-button.
The Federal agents work hard,
keeping up with their shooting, as
they are sharply lacked up on it every
once in a while. The submachine
guns shoot 600 bullets minute The
criminals steal them from armories
and other legal repositories. Eight
agents have been killed. The war
goes on.
The dummy. dangling from the
cable at the end of the shooting alley,
is fairly easy to hit. A germ would
be harder. and the truth is that the
G-men are also cunning for germs
the virus of crooked politicians, fixers,
shyster lawyers and slack and venal
law enforcement generally. The OBJ
servation needs a hasty qualification
j. Edgar Hoover is no reformer. 1t
is merely that he finds the law mired
in political slough as it moves to-
ward the enemy. Without invoking
any particular political or sociological
doctrine, he proposes to crash through
by police work so sound and aggres-
sive that it can't be hamstrung by any
lawyer-in- ordinary to a regal public
enemy.
Between Crime and Legality,
When Oman takes a pot-shot at
a gangster, at some Wisconsin or
Oklahoma crossroads, he is likely to
agitate the gold watch fob on the
paunch of sheriff, a postmaster, a
bank official or an eminent, if shifty,
lawyer miles away. There is in the
Federal Bureau of Investigation files
a thick dossier on these dwellers in
the no-mans land which lies between
crime and legality. 1t needs no
elaborate clinical diagnosis to show
that the G-men are fighting crime in
the national bloodstream as well as
crime on the highway.
Mr.. Hoover doesn't want a national
police force. He doesn't like the idea
of a bureaucratic outreach in any
direction. What then? The answer
affords another illustration of the
fact that the F. B. I. plan and pro-
cedure is something new in law en-
forcement, and it stakes out some
high ground of Federal and State CO.
operation which might well be
pondered by those who are concerned
with the yell over States rights, with
nothing said about States responsible
tiles.
First off, the States batting aver
age in putting away public enemies
isn't so good If anybody gets a
really tough egg like Dillinger, Al
Capone, Barker, Karpis, Pretty Boy
Floyd or Waxy Gordon, it is usually
the Federals. State impotence, pos
sibly finding reflex in the national
economic muddle at Washington, is
clearly revealed in the inadequacy of
municipal and State law enforcement,
dragging its own boot of political cor
ruption.
A less tactful man than Mr.. Hoover
might start high-hatting the home
town cops and take on some big-time
totalitarian ideas. Nothing like that
His entire achievement is built on an
exactly opposite base. First. co-opera-
ton and coordination, and second the
mobilization at Washington of the best
possible organization and techniques
always instantly available to any law
enforcement officer in the country.
Cleanup Instructions.
Out on the Job, Mr.. Hoover and his
men have found many police officials
Of intelligence. competence and in
tegrity. They all tell the same story
criminals sprung" by shysters, poll
ticians or professional witnesses. The
F. B. I. has learned a lot about how
to meet this problem, as its record OF
convictions shows. They invite mu-
nicipal housekeepers to come on over
and get Uncle Sans fumigating
formula.
They are coming. The above Simpli-
fication sounds less impressive in the
telling than it is when you see it work.
ing out. I saw the second annual ses-
sion of the F. B. 7. Police School in
session. The major police departments
Of the country are invited to send men
Of all ranks, but those who attend are
mainly officers of the administrative
type. The class looks like luncheon
group of big-town business men-more
particularly an athletic club group. A
fit, alert, springy looking lot they are
with never a bulge around the midriff
They are not only physically fit, but
II their eager interchange in the class
room discussions could be clocked by q
psychologist, he would give them a
high rating on mental reactions. MOI
is there anywhere on hand any proto-
type of the slouching, drawing old
county sheriff, or the slick, big-city
political cop. They are few in number
but they are teachers as we'll as pupils
Their effectiveness lies in their train
ing and competence in renovating and
educating their own police departments
and in handing on to their own per-
sonnel what they CLEAN in Washington
In the curriculum, the old-line staples
of police work come first-the trim
mings, such as psychology and crime
prevention, later. Here, as in every
activity of the bureau, there is a con-
centration on the main business of a
policeman-to get evidence, to make
arrests and to get convictions if the
evidence is sound.
The police undergraduates are trained
to observe They are sent out to locate
persons or houses on meager descrip-
ton. They are schooled in hand
writing Identification, police photog-
raphy, solving cryptograms, bringing
out invisible ink. Their studies include
ballistics, firearms, poisons and their
bodily chemistry, criminal psychology