, 1951-05-16

Far Cry From Piece. Of Fiction
Admirers of crime stories would find plenty to
excite their interest in the 195-page report recently made
public by Senator Kefauver's crime committee. But this
blistering document is a far cry from a piece of fiction.
It discloses a situation which, in the view of the investi-
gators, is a direct and growing menace to American in
situations.
The report gives names, dates and places. Some
of the names belong to men who hold or have held high
positions in government-city, state and Federal. It de-
scribes the sordid tie-up between gamblers, police and
politicians in large American cities. Some of the leading
lights in the gambling business, it says, are veterans of
the old Capone gang. And it charges that the once-famous
Mafia is the binder which ties together the two major
criminal syndicates as we'll as numerous other criminal
groups throughout the country.
A great many people seem to believe that the
bigtime gambler and racketeer now thinks of himself as
a business man and acts like a business manufacturing
paying his proper taxes. The Kefauver group takes a dim
view Of this belief. The gamblers make tax returns, true
enough, but the committee thinks that these returns are,
financially speaking, masterpieces OF understatement.
The government, it alleges "has been defrauded of huge
sums of money in tax revenues by racketeers and gang
sters engaged in criminal activities" It further en-
phasizes, Huge sums in cash handled by racketeers and
~gangsters are not reflected in their income tax returns. y
It is extremely critical of certain tax accountants and tax
lawyers who, it says, assisted the mobsters in defrauding
the government.
One deduction which can be made from this re-
markable, hard-hitting report is that the respectable
gamDlerN-that is, the ordinary clClZen VINO DeCS TWO
dollars now and then with his bookie or runs a handful
of coins through a slot MACHINES making a real and ex-
tremely important contribution to the power and wealth
of the criminal syndicates. He, in fact, is the man who
makes their existence possible. For their revenues come
from the millions upon millions of small wagers that are
made-notf from the activities of a few people who bet
thousands on a roll of the dice or a turn of the wheel.
And so, this citizen makes all the resulting graft and
civic corruption possible as we'll.
The committee offers % specific recommends
tons where the Federal government might aid in crime
prevention. These include Tightening up the immigration
laws to make it easier to get rid Of alien mobsters, a ban
on the interstate transmission of gambling information,
establishment of a Federal crime commission, and so on.
However, it comes to the definite conclusion that crime is
a local problem which must be attacked primarily at
the local level, with supplementary aid, where appro-1
pirate, from state and Federal authorities"
This country has witnessed many a crime in
vestigation, but Senator's Kefauver's committee was the
first to operate on a national scale. It has dredged up an
enormous and shocking amount of information. Now it
remains to be seen what the various units Of government,
and the people, will do about it.
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