The Mafia: Wealth and Politics in the 1920 Essay -- Essays Papers

The Mafia Wealth and Politics in the 1920 mafia - a secret association having for its object the illicit control of e very(prenominal) enterprise, legitimate or illegitimate, which it decides to infiltrate (Allen 6). The decade of the 1920s was full of deception, decadence, and degeneration. The very embodiment of these qualities was the institution of the Italian-American Mafia. The syndicate began in Sicily and spread to encompass join States politics and the dry landal economy. The post war era left the nation in a recession and vulnerable to organized crime. Changes in the countrys attitudes and outlooks on the future paved the way for organized crime on a large scale. People were too preoccupied with bootleg booze, sexual promiscuity, and get-rich-quick schemes to celebrate the downward spiral of the governments respectability and integrity. The decadence of the decade and the feel honourable mentality of Americas youth provided opportunities the industr ious underworld leaders sought in order to gain control of the syndicate. The Mafia supplied America with the vices it longed for and in retort America let the Mafia get away with murder. Not unless did the syndicate accumulate power alone also profited financially by dint of prostitution, gambling, and bootlegging. These activities were the foundations of the Outfits financial and political empires. Mafia power soon began to eclipse the power of the law enforcement agencies, and the struggle between responsibility and autonomy began. Governmental corruption was a standard practice in the 1920s. In reference to a question on the underworlds power Don Calo, a Mafia head teacher replied, between the law and the Mafia, the former is not the most to be concerned (... ...h (Allen 14). many a(prenominal) informants are willing to testify to a specific incident but not to the entirety. Their fear of retribution from the Outfit is much greater than their fear of the gove rnment. Even today, the only thing known with any degree of foregone conclusion is that the influence of the Mafia did not end with the 1920s. Works Cited - Allen, Edward J. Merchants of Menace-The Mafia A Study of Organized Crime Springfield, Ill Thomas, 1962. - Bequai, August. Organized Crime working capital Library of Congress, 1979. - Charles Lucky Luciano. http//www.well.com/user/mod79/gangsters/luciano.html (3-25-98). - Contempt of Court. Alphonse Capone, aka. Al, Scarface. http//www.fbi.gov/famcases/capone.htm (3-27-98). - Gardiner, John A. The Politics of depravity New York Russell Sage Foundation, 1970.