The answer to the lack of a sufficient number of well-ordered places of recreation and amusement is to be found in the thriving condition of Chicago's cheap dance halls, underworld cabarets, unsupervised movie theatres of the cheaper class and the large number of pool-rooms scattered throughout the city. These establishments are the worst breeders of crime with which this community has to contend and they should be subjected to rigid police regulations on the part of the municipal authorities.
The chief counteracting influences of such places of amusement are the parks, playgrounds and other municipal recreation centers, and there is a great need for the establishment of more of these, particularly in the congested districts.
Psychological.—It is the opinion of criminologists that a "warped" mind is responsible for many crimes. This general condition is true of Negroes as well as whites. But another factor appears in many crimes of Negroes. The traditional ostracism, exploitation and petty daily insults to which they are continually exposed have doubtless provoked, even in normal-minded Negroes, a pathological attitude toward society which sometimes expresses itself defensively in acts of violence and other lawlessness. A desire for social revenge might well be expected to result from the facetious and insulting manner in which Negroes are often treated by officers of the law.
"Infective" environment.—Much of what is said in the Annual Report of the Crime Commission for 1920 regarding the relation of infective environment to crime, can be fairly applied to the congested South Side areas of Negro residence:
Infective environment as a cause of crime is classified separately from problems of home environment because where the latter may be conducive to the proper rearing of children into manhood and womanhood, the influence immediately outside the home may be exactly the opposite. There are, in a great city like Chicago, certain neighborhoods in which influences are at work continuously to produce criminals. While the production of criminals is by no means confined to any one section of the city but is widespread throughout the community, still there are sections in which conditions are such that the growing child is indeed fortunate if he can attain manhood without being led to commit some offense against society.
In Chicago our chief district of this character is, or was until recently at least, "Canaryville" and much of the other territory immediately adjacent to the Stock Yards. It was this section which produced "Moss" Enright, "Sonny" Dunn, Eugene Geary, the Gentlemen brothers and many others of Chicago's worst type of criminals. It is in this district that "athletic clubs" and other organizations of young toughs and gangsters flourish, and where disreputable poolrooms, hoodlum-infested saloons and other criminal hangouts are plentiful.
Often it has been the case that public officials having such constituencies have utilized these conditions to further their own political advantages without making the slightest effort to bring about improvements, in some instances, actually assisting their constituents to violate the law in order to aid the building up of their political machines.... Improvement of districts of this character and the elimination of such conditions within them is highly essential if organized crime is to be reduced.
Vice.—Vice districts and Negro residence districts are now and have long been close together. As late as 1905 a segregated vice district was tolerated on the West Side, on Green, Peoria, Sangamon, Morgan, Curtis, Carpenter, and Randolph streets, and Washington Boulevard. Just north of this district on Lake, Walnut, and Fulton streets, lived Negroes, segregated by public sentiment. Another vice district was along Custom House Place, now Federal Street, near which Negroes lived, similarly segregated by public sentiment. When this vice district was moved southward to Twenty-second Street it had a fringe of Negro residence. Later this district was abolished, and now vice of this kind is scattered and more clandestine and is to be found farther south, largely between Thirty-first and Fifty-fifth streets. More than 75 per cent of the Negro population of the city lives in this area.
