"The howl of innocence is never so loud as when raised by crooks, and this includes not only the actual criminals, but their friends and protectors, crooked politicians. How otherwise is it possible for prizefights to be held in New York city, in spite of the earnest efforts of the police to prevent them? How otherwise is it possible for places positively known by the police to be gambling resorts to be conducted, and to obtain injunctions restraining the police from interfering with them?
"The foregoing is far from saying that the police force of New York is incompetent, or not able to cope with the situation. The police force is competent, short-handed though it is. Its activity and efficiency are proved by the very resistance given it by law-breakers, for the better the work done by the police, the more stubborn is the resistance they meet with from law-breakers."
As an example of what the police have to cope with the Commissioner mentions the recent Sunday-closing incident, where a court decision was handed down, and enforced, and the Aldermen straightway amended the law. He then asks: "How then can the police execute the law, when there seems to be so much doubt as to what the law really is?"
Gen. Bingham continues:
"These points are necessary in order that scheming politicians may be deprived of any possibility of summarily getting rid of an honest commissioner and in order that the honest men of the police force may be encouraged. The men of the force to-day are not quite sure who is their real boss—the 'machine' or the police commissioner. If once satisfied that it is the commissioner, with a long term and only removable on publication of charges, they will obey him."
Legislation requiring persons who sell any sort of dangerous weapons to record the date and hour of the sale, and report it, with the name and address of the buyer, to the police, is suggested, as well as a daily report from pawnbrokers, giving the date, hour, and other particulars of their transactions. This, the Commissioner says, is the custom in other large cities.
The following figures of arrests, etc., in the last year are given in the report:
| Arrests Made | |
| By uniformed force | 192,680 |
| Detective Bureau | 11,416 |
| Total | 204,096 |
These figures refer to the Boroughs of Manhattan, The Bronx, and Richmond.
N.Y. Times, Jan. 5, 1908.