Helping Law Insure Order

...Ahern applauds the arrangement in New York City, where the police commissioner's five-year term does not coincide with that of the mayor, and opposes the community-control doctrine as a false panacea unlikely to contribute to meaningful reform...

...In some respects the military model troubles Ahern, too, for he considers the present pseudo-military police command structure an obstacle to professionalism...

...He held that post during the city's 1970 May Day rally protesting the murder trial of Bobby Seale, later served on President Nixon's Commission on Campus Unrest, was a consultant to this year's Democratic National Convention, and remains a member of the Democratic National Policy Council...

...Second, in pre-demonstration training he drilled his men to see themselves as referees between two conflicting social groups, and not as participants in the battle, regardless of whatever abuse or objects the protesters might throw at them...

...Much like the Army, this society-within-a-so-ciety provides friends, psychological support and livelihood...

...Two points in particular stand out: First, he organized his men into eight-member squads, small enough for each officer to know and watch the others, thus insuring the kind of accountability whose absence had contributed to the "police riot" at the 1968 Chicago convention...

...Ahern's own refusal to allow politicians to make police personnel decisions eventually led to his resignation as New Haven's chief...

...There is no easy answer, but he does seem to find the military model helpful, without ever invoking it by name...

...He wants basic policy set by the mayor, who would be held accountable, while at the same time the chief of police would retain some degree of independence and operational control...

...His book details all the steps he took to avoid the violence that had been predicted...

...But the true villains of Ahern's story are the local politicians and big-time criminals whose corrupting influence is felt in all parts of the country...

...Although he tried many innovations in New Haven, most of the specific proposals Ahem advances here are neither new nor controversial...

...Now, with Police in Trouble: Our Frightening Crisis in Law Enforcement, he offers many fresh and valuable perspectives on the problems besetting the nation's law forces...

...Reviewed by Elliott Abrams James F. Ahern joined the New Haven police department as a patrolman in 1954, rising through the ranks to become police chief in 1968...

...Some of his positions, however, reflect one side of a continuing debate: Foot patrolmen, whom he calls a "walking anachronism," are not so easily dismissed by other police administrators...

...This book, like his earlier record in New Haven, refutes both the charge that Ahern has been "soft on crime" and the idea that the rulings of the Warren Court have made effective law enforcement impossible...

...In Ahern's view, President Nixon's reaction to the report of his own Commission on Campus Unrest proved that the panel had been appointed merely to cool public anger after the Kent State shootings...

...Police departments operate with the wrong people, undereducated and poorly trained...

...Again and again, Ahern emphasizes the importance of improved recruitment, training and deployment of patrolmen...

...Ahern is particularly enlightening when he shows how every dedicated police chief is forced to compromise the goal of professionalism with the demands of his various constituencies—the politicians, the department's top brass as well as its rank and file, the racial and ethnic minorities—each more concerned about its immediate interests than the long-term improvement of the police force...

...Until this situation is rectified, there can be no hope of improving American law enforcement...

...The critical difference is in the area of civilian control, exercised publicly by the President and Congress over the military, but left to secret influence-peddling in the case of the police...

...Similarly, the Justice Department's failure to attempt a single prosecution after the Kent State or Jackson State incidents was only another indication that politics rather than justice takes first priority...

...Other observers have already pointed out the waste of police time on clerical work, the lack of managerial skills in the upper echelons of department hierarchies, and the need to decriminalize activities like gambling and homosexual behavior...

...Ahem's skillful handling of the May Day rally provides an object lesson in what police professionalism can accomplish...

...Throughout Police in Trouble, Ahern is sensitive to the everyday problems of the patrolman and his commanders, yet his outlook is in no way constricted by his police experience: He is equally sensitive to the demands of ethnics, politics and constitutional law...

...He calls organized crime a "pervasive force that paralyzes police," and argues that illicit political influence is the single greatest threat to fair and effective law enforcement...

...Noting that there is no professional organization in the field of law enforcement dedicated to raising standards and studying needs, Ahern suggests that an equivalent to the American Bar Association or the American Medical Association might be established...

...Good officers, instead of being promoted to desk jobs for which they are unfit and that waste their talents, should be induced to stay on the streets with increased salaries and responsibility...

...Ultimately, in fact, it is elected officials and not private groups who must be held accountable for representing the public interest...

...The history of the AMA leads one to wonder, of course, whether the public interest is best served by this kind of private group...

...The vulnerability of police to political manipulation is largely the result of their isolation from the public, making them what Ahern calls "The Closed Fraternity...

...To this end, Ahern recommends that police departments lend money to patrolmen to pay for their college education, writing off part of the loan for each year they remain on the force...

...The crisis in law enforcement," he concludes, "can be characterized in one word: people...

...He observes, for example, that in the military officers make most of the decisions and the enlisted men simply follow orders, whereas in a police force commanders have nothing approaching the enormous discretionary power exercised by street patrolmen...

...Police in America and those who would help them," Ahern says, "face a dramatic dilemma: how to eliminate illegitimate political and criminal influence in police departments and yet strengthen democratic controls on police...