The Original Name of The American Police Department the Was The Slave Patrol

[NeighborhoodNomad.]

The key question, of course, is what was it about the United States in the 1830s that necessitated the development of local, centralized, bureaucratic police forces? One answer is that cities were growing. The United States was no longer a collection of small cities and rural hamlets. Urbanization was occurring at an ever-quickening pace and old informal watch and constable system was no longer adequate to control disorder. Anecdotal accounts suggest increasing crime and vice in urban centers. Mob violence, particularly violence directed at immigrants and African Americans by white youths, occurred with some frequency. Public disorder, mostly public drunkenness and sometimes prostitution, was more visible and less easily controlled in growing urban centers than it had been rural villages (Walker 1996). But evidence of an actual crime wave is lacking. So, if the modern American police force was not a direct response to crime, then what was it a response to?

More than crime, modern police forces in the United States emerged as a response to "disorder." What constitutes social and public order depends largely on who is defining those terms, and in the cities of 19th century America they were defined by the mercantile interests, who through taxes and political influence supported the development of bureaucratic policing institutions. These economic interests had a greater interest in social control than crime control. Private and for profit policing was too disorganized and too crime-specific in form to fulfill these needs. The emerging commercial elites needed a mechanism to insure a stable and orderly work force, a stable and orderly environment for the conduct of business, and the maintenance of what they referred to as the "collective good" (Spitzer and Scull 1977). These mercantile interests also wanted to divest themselves of the cost of protecting their own enterprises, transferring those costs from the private sector to the state.

So we see from the beginning, from being called "the slave patrol" to "police" the sole purpose of "law enforcement" was to protect the interests of the businessmen and keep workers subordinate.

Being that a Law of Nature is the root always feeds the fruit, how can there ever be peace or between The Black Community and the police?

There will never be progress if we refuse to accept the truth. We have been dealing with this same system for centuries. THE SYSTEM IS NOT BROKEN. It's doing exactly what it was designed to do. Oppress. The ONLY solution is to build a "new" or alternative system. Before we build, we may have to dig. Before we plant, we may have to uproot.

Many civilizations lived and thrived without prisons or police. There were rules established where the "criminal" would be dealt with immediately by the community. We don't need police. We need culture. We need to remember, create or recreate, Our culture, Our own rules, regulations and codes of conduct. Of course all culture starts at home, so that might be a whole other thread.

There will NEVER be true justice from an organization rooted in injustice.

 

[IceBergTaylor]

I recently dedicated a whole series of facebook posts to this. It amazes me how most people dont know this probably because most people dont care to even think about the origins of the police.

This video here is the icing on the cake

 

[NeighborhoodNomad.]

I recently dedicated a whole series of facebook posts to this. It amazes me how most people dont know this probably because most people dont care to even think about the origins of the police.

This video here is the icing on the cake

Damn

 

[The Lonious Monk]

I think this is some revisionist history. I'm not saying there are no ties between the police and the slave watch, but to imply the police came into existence to catch slaves strikes me as BS. Agents of the law have existed for thousands of years. Are people really trying to claim that law enforcement in America only exists because of the desire to keep slaves in check?

 

[NeighborhoodNomad.]

I think this is some revisionist history. I'm not saying there are no ties between the police and the slave watch, but to imply the police came into existence to catch slaves strikes me as BS. Agents of the law have existed for thousands of years. Are people really trying to claim that law enforcement in America only exists because of the desire to keep slaves in check?

They're saying slave patrols originated to catch runaway slaves and police departments came from slave patrols. It was also created to maintain the "collective good" and the policies of the commercial elite.

Past civilizations may have had their own culture, rules and regulations, even soldiers, but not patrolling policy enforcers.

 

[jono]

I think this is some revisionist history. I'm not saying there are no ties between the police and the slave watch, but to imply the police came into existence to catch slaves strikes me as BS. Agents of the law have existed for thousands of years. Are people really trying to claim that law enforcement in America only exists because of the desire to keep slaves in check?

Because it is. Slave catchers are more akin to bounty hunters not police officers. They're job was to catch runaways and return them for the money offered by the master/owner of property. No different than someone posting a picture of their missing dog.

"Law enforcement" is a big umbrella term and slave catcher falls under it because it enforced property laws but to say there was no policing or patrolling is to say nobody was responsible for watching out for simple crime like stealing and assault which we know is untrue.

 

[SneakDZA]

I think this is some revisionist history. I'm not saying there are no ties between the police and the slave watch, but to imply the police came into existence to catch slaves strikes me as BS. Agents of the law have existed for thousands of years. Are people really trying to claim that law enforcement in America only exists because of the desire to keep slaves in check?

It's pretty easy to verify this as true at least in the case of the U.S. (particularly the south).

Also I'm not sure why it's so hard to believe considering their basic charter hasn't actually changed very much...

Slave patrols had three primary functions: (1) to chase down, apprehend, and return to their owners, runaway slaves; (2) to provide a form of organized terror to deter slave revolts; and, (3) to maintain a form of discipline for slave-workers who were subject to summary justice, outside of the law, if they violated any plantation rules.

 

[The Lonious Monk]

No one is disputing the fact that there were slave patrols. What I'm disputing is the idea that the modern police are derived solely from those slave patrols as if there was no law enforcement entities back then. I mean the Sheriff system that was used in the West during that expansion certainly wasn't developed from slavery given that by that time slavery had already been abolished.

 

[Splackavelli]

The KKK founded the police in Miami Florida. It's true because I've read it in the archives

 

[Jabu_Rule]

The watch system was composed of community volunteers whose primary duty was to warn of impending danger. Boston created a night watch in 1636, New York in 1658 and Philadelphia in 1700. The night watch was not a particularly effective crime control device. Watchmen often slept or drank on duty. While the watch was theoretically voluntary, many "volunteers" were simply attempting to evade military service, were conscript forced into service by their town, or were performing watch duties as a form of punishment. Philadelphia created the first day watch in 1833 and New York instituted a day watch in 1844 as a supplement to its new municipal police force (Gaines, Kappeler, and Vaughn 1999).

Augmenting the watch system was a system of constables, official law enforcement officers, usually paid by the fee system for warrants they served. Constables had a variety of non-law enforcement functions to perform as well, including serving as land surveyors and verifying the accuracy of weights and measures. In many cities constables were given the responsibility of supervising the activities of the night watch.

In 1838, the city of Boston established the first American police force, followed by New York City in 1845, Albany, NY and Chicago in 1851, New Orleans and Cincinnati in 1853, Philadelphia in 1855, and Newark, NJ and Baltimore in 1857 (Harring 1983, Lundman 1980; Lynch 1984).

These "modern police" organizations shared similar characteristics: (1) they were publicly supported and bureaucratic in form; (2) police officers were full-time employees, not community volunteers or case-by-case fee retainers; (3) departments had permanent and fixed rules and procedures, and employment as a police officers was continuous; (4) police departments were accountable to a central governmental authority (Lundman 1980).

@"The Lonious Monk"

In the Southern states the development of American policing followed a different path. The genesis of the modern police organization in the South is the "Slave Patrol" (Platt 1982). The first formal slave patrol was created in the Carolina colonies in 1704 (Reichel 1992). Slave patrols had three primary functions: (1) to chase down, apprehend, and return to their owners, runaway slaves; (2) to provide a form of organized terror to deter slave revolts; and, (3) to maintain a form of discipline for slave-workers who were subject to summary justice, outside of the law, if they violated any plantation rules. Following the Civil War, these vigilante-style organizations evolved in modern Southern police departments primarily as a means of controlling freed slaves who were now laborers working in an agricultural caste system, and enforcing "Jim Crow" segregation laws, designed to deny freed slaves equal rights and access to the political system.

http://plsonline.eku.edu/insidelook/history-policing-united-states-part-1

 

[Max.]

Yeah shit like this causes dumb ppl to get mad

 

[Stiff]

So if a white guy killed another white guy in virginia in 1831 who handled that

 

[IceBergTaylor]

All yall have to do is google the origins of police, the shit is all the same.

 

[NothingButTheTruth]

Translation: You're living behind enemy lines.

The ball is in your court, what's the next move? Do you remain a house nigga your whole life and hope your name doesn't come up, or do you lock in and start working towards the goal of creating your own land, a land and system that isn't deep-rooted in your destruction?

 

[mrrealone]

The institution of slavery and the control of minorities, however, were two of the more formidable historic features of American society shaping early policing. Slave patrols and Night Watches, which later became modern police departments, were both designed to control the behaviors of minorities



Could've stopped right there. This is still relevant to this very day. Nice read tho...

I recently dedicated a whole series of facebook posts to this. It amazes me how most people dont know this probably because most people dont care to even think about the origins of the police.

This video here is the icing on the cake

Dope. Didn't know this, but won't doubt her one second. They do this all the time by placing these statues of "his-story" right in front of you. Like this human butcher...

 

[NeighborhoodNomad.]

State police agencies emerged for many of the same reasons. The Pennsylvania State Police were modeled after the Phillipine Constabulary, the occupation force placed in the Philipine Islands following the Spanish-American War. This all-white, all-"native," paramilitary force was created specifically to break strikes in the coal fields of Pennsylvania and to control local towns composed predominantly of Catholic, Irish, German and Eastern European immigrants. They were housed in barracks outside the towns so that they would not mingle with or develop friendships with local residents. In addition to strike-breaking they frequently engaged in anti-immigrant and anti-Catholic violence, such as attacking community social events on horseback, under the pretense of enforcing public order laws. Similarly, the Texas Rangers were originally created as a quasi-official group of vigilantes and guerillas used to suppress Mexican communities and to drive the Commanche off their lands.

 

[NeighborhoodNomad.]

I think this is some revisionist history. I'm not saying there are no ties between the police and the slave watch, but to imply the police came into existence to catch slaves strikes me as BS. Agents of the law have existed for thousands of years. Are people really trying to claim that law enforcement in America only exists because of the desire to keep slaves in check?

Because it is. Slave catchers are more akin to bounty hunters not police officers. They're job was to catch runaways and return them for the money offered by the master/owner of property. No different than someone posting a picture of their missing dog.

"Law enforcement" is a big umbrella term and slave catcher falls under it because it enforced property laws but to say there was no policing or patrolling is to say nobody was responsible for watching out for simple crime like stealing and assault which we know is untrue.

Give us some examples of civilizations who policed/patrolled their people, or were "watching out for simple crime" as you put it.

 

[jono]

I think this is some revisionist history. I'm not saying there are no ties between the police and the slave watch, but to imply the police came into existence to catch slaves strikes me as BS. Agents of the law have existed for thousands of years. Are people really trying to claim that law enforcement in America only exists because of the desire to keep slaves in check?

Because it is. Slave catchers are more akin to bounty hunters not police officers. They're job was to catch runaways and return them for the money offered by the master/owner of property. No different than someone posting a picture of their missing dog.

"Law enforcement" is a big umbrella term and slave catcher falls under it because it enforced property laws but to say there was no policing or patrolling is to say nobody was responsible for watching out for simple crime like stealing and assault which we know is untrue.

Give us some examples of civilizations who policed/patrolled their people, or were "watching out for simple crime" as you put it.

Nigga everyone. You think there was no crime until slavery?

 

[jono]

So if a white guy killed another white guy in virginia in 1831 who handled that

No one apparently. The first prison in the US was constructed in 1770s but I guess people loved the hospitality so they went willingly.

 

[NeighborhoodNomad.]

I think this is some revisionist history. I'm not saying there are no ties between the police and the slave watch, but to imply the police came into existence to catch slaves strikes me as BS. Agents of the law have existed for thousands of years. Are people really trying to claim that law enforcement in America only exists because of the desire to keep slaves in check?

Because it is. Slave catchers are more akin to bounty hunters not police officers. They're job was to catch runaways and return them for the money offered by the master/owner of property. No different than someone posting a picture of their missing dog.

"Law enforcement" is a big umbrella term and slave catcher falls under it because it enforced property laws but to say there was no policing or patrolling is to say nobody was responsible for watching out for simple crime like stealing and assault which we know is untrue.

Give us some examples of civilizations who policed/patrolled their people, or were "watching out for simple crime" as you put it.

Nigga everyone. You think there was no crime until slavery?

Other civilizations had warriors who were about defending the people, but there were not organizations or groups of people that were crime watchers. When an offense happened in a nation, tribe, etc., the people would bring them to trial though the rules of their culture by the people, chiefs and priests and would be dealt with accordingly.

Now give us a few or several examples of civilizations who policed/patrolled their people, or were "watching out for simple crime" as you put it. Since you say it's everyone, these examples should be easy for you to produce.