Conference will Offer a Rare Look at Chicago Homicides from 1870
to 1930
CHICAGO --- "Amundson, Alfred, 24 years old, shot dead, 361 Austin
Av., by Adolph Nelson, a carpenter contractor" (May 27, 1899). "Arnold,
Earl, col'd, 22 yrs., fatally shot in assignation house by Edward
J. Korney, in quarrel over a colored woman, Alice Grant" (Sept. 24,
1899). Amblo, Louis, killed by highway men, Harvey, Ill." (June 26,
1900). "Artman, Mrs. Emma, murdered, throat cut with razor by her
husband William V. Artman Arrested sentenced Feb. 20, 1905 to Chester
Penitentiary for Insane Criminals" (Oct. 9, 1904). "Rodriguez, Viviana
í age 50 í Burned to death in a fire of incendiary origin at 30 So.
Canal St. The Coroner recommended the arrest of one Mike.' Teletype
Message out for one Miguel Bernadet, alias Mike Magil. 19 dist. Five
others dead." (Dec. 8, 1926).
Those entries from a little known and recently resurrected data
set will be the centerpiece of a symposium, "Learning from the Past,
Living in the Present: Patterns in Chicago Homicides, 1870 to 1930,"
that will be held Friday, Nov. 17 at Northwestern University School
of Law, 357 E. Chicago Ave. (The schedule follows.)
A handwritten data set of homicides was maintained by Chicago police
for 60 continuous years and in recent years meticulously preserved
on microfilm by the Illinois State Archives. The availability of the
data set presents a rare opportunity to see a historical period through
the lens of the criminal justice system.
The conference will bring together criminologists, cultural studies
and law professors, a journalist and a Chicago alderman to discuss
the implications of these reports. They will share research that relates
to the database, capturing the culture of homicides during a tumultuous
period in Chicago's history. The papers from the conference and essays
from other scholars will be published in a special issue of the Journal
of Criminal Law and Criminology at Northwestern University School
of Law.
"The highly stylized penmanship and rhetorical flourishes seen in
the individual entries are expressive of a period when Chicago was
known as the crime capital of America, when Al Capone and wily politicians
such as Big Bill Thompson reigned," said Leigh Buchanan Bienen, conference
organizer and a homicide specialist at Northwestern University School
of Law.
The data set represents the official records of police, who played
a critical role in this culture, over six decades of war, peace, prosperity
and financial panic, during enormous economic and political change.
The records began shortly after the Chicago Fire and continued until
the depression period of 1930 when the police changed their methods
of recording homicides.
"During the period covered, for example, the killing of several
policemen exploded into the highly publicized Haymarket Affair," said
Bienen. "And Chicago's own Clarence Darrow was defending clients such
as Leopold and Loeb, whose victim appears as an entry in the database."
With her research associates, Bienen transcribed, systematized and
translated into a quantitative data file more than 11,000 homicide
cases. The project received the support of the Gun Violence Program
of the Joyce Foundation and the faculty research funds of the Law
School. Transforming the handwritten records into quantified data
has taken almost two years, with more than 25 students from area law
schools and colleges working as coders over the summer. The quantified
data set uses standard criminological categories, such as circumstances
of the homicides, age, race and gender of defendant and victim. It
also uses specially designed variables to capture the peculiarities
of the time period. A variable for excessive violence that might pertain
to prohibition or civil unrest was created to capture the perception
and character of murders at that time and place.
"The decade of the 1920s is of particular interest to researchers,
and these data will contribute importantly to several ongoing debates
in the field of criminology," said Bienen. Using the quantified version
of the data set for the first time, researchers will address a host
of questions. Does the data set indeed contain all the homicides committed
in Chicago from 1870 to 1930? Were there parts of the city which were
beyond the reach of the police? What were the racial and ethnic patterns
for victims and defendants, and for the police? Is the sharp increase
in homicides in the 1920s attributable to the way homicides were counted,
a demographic effect, or attributable to an increase in automobile
accidents?
Was the availability of guns a factor in the increase in homicides?
Did laws regulate the possession and sale of weapons, and did they
affect the incidence of gun homicides? Can the large increase in incidence
of homicides be accounted for by a change in the way homicides were
defined by the police? How do the patterns seen in this data set compare
with other contemporaneous records, such as the report of the Chicago
Crime Commission of the 1920s or coroners' reports of the period?
Or is the large increase in incidence associated with prohibition
and the rise of gang-related activities?
What about time lapses between the dates of the homicides and the
coroners' and judges' decisions in the cases? "Many of the cases were
dismissed or what they called stricken off' several times," said
Bienen. "My suspicion is that some of these cases involved serious
problems with the prosecution."
Other issues of due process, including allegations involving bribing
of jurors or police, have been raised. In many cases the availability
of dates for critical legal dispositions, such as decisions by the
coroner and the grand jury, in addition to the date of sentencing,
creates a rare opportunity to analyze the stages of criminal prosecution,
a topic difficult to address in a systematic way for historical periods.
"Learning from the Past, Living in the Present: Patterns in Chicago
Homicides, 1870 to 1930" is the Third Annual Faculty Conference at
the Law School. The faculty conference is designed to bring leading
authorities in a public forum to discuss important academic and public
policy issues.
"The conference offers a great lineup of scholars who promise an
exciting as well as intellectually challenging look at Chicago's colorful
past," said David E. Van Zandt, dean, Northwestern University School
of Law. "This is exactly what we had in mind when we created the faculty
conference."
The schedule follows:
9:30 a.m. í Welcome -- John P. Heinz, Owen L. Coon Professor of
Law, Northwestern University School of Law
10 a.m. í Panel I: Seeing Through a Glass Darkly.
Moderator, Steven Lubet, professor, Northwestern University School
of Law.
Topics of panelists:
"An Overview of Major Trends in the Data Set" (Leigh Buchanan Bienen,
senior lecturer, Northwestern University School of Law; Brandon Rottinghaus,
graduate student, political science, Northwestern)
"Patterns in Chicago Homicides in Comparison to Contemporaneous
Data from New York and Other Cities" (Eric Henry Monkkonen, professor
of history and policy studies, University of California, Los Angeles)
"Patterns of Race and Ethnicity and Changes in Weapons Use and the
Relative Prevalence of Gun Homicides in Comparison to Present Levels"
(Darnell Felix Hawkins, professor, department of criminal justice,
and head, department of African-American study, University of Illinois
at Chicago)
"Ethnic Violence, Neighborhoods and the Geography of Homicide" (Dominic
A. Pacyga, tenured faculty member, liberal education department, Columbia
College).
1 p.m. í Panel II: Homicides from the Inside Out.
Moderator, Dorothy E. Roberts, professor, Northwestern University
School of Law.
Topics of panelists:
"Infanticides During the Period" (Richard McCleary, professor of
social ecology, University of California, Irvine)
"Children as Victims, with Implications for the Abortion Cases"
(Michelle Oberman, professor of law, DePaul University College of
Law)
"Gender and Violence, Women Who Committed Murder Between 1875 and
1920" (Jeffrey S. Adler, professor of history and criminology, University
of Florida)
"Firearm Deaths, Gun Availability and Legal and Regulatory Changes:
Suggestions from the data" (Gregory S. Weaver, assistant professor
of criminology, Auburn University)
Commentator, James R. Grossman, director, Dr. William M. Scholl
Center for Family and Community History, The Newberry Library
3:30 p.m. í Panel III: Images of Violence: The Twenties, Prohibition
and the Mob.
Moderator: Leigh Buchanan Bienen, senior lecturer, Northwestern
University School of Law.
Topics of panelists:
"Practicing Law in the Criminal Courts of Chicago in the Twenties"
(Thomas F. Geraghty, associate dean for clinical education, professor
of law and director, Bluhm Legal Clinic, Northwestern University School
of Law)
"The Mob, the Culture of Violence and Murder in the 1920s" (Charles
Madigan, writer and editor, The Chicago Tribune)
"The History and Culture of the Chicago Police Department During
the 1920s and Judicial Corruption Scandals of the Period" (Edward
M. Burke, alderman, 14th ward, and chairman, City Council Committee
on Finance, City of Chicago).
5 p.m. í Reception.
10/16/00
