The History of Policing

The history of policing in the United States is broke rarify into three gen seasonl eras they are the political era from 1840 to1930, the reform era from 1930 to 1980 and the residential district era from 1980 to present. As we look at these eras we find that close to of the maneuvers and policies that were efficacious in one era were quite inefficient in another or in contrast that some tactics that were thought ineffective are now being considered necessary for an effective and productive police force.In the political era incumbents were appointed by politicians and would remain loyal to those who appointed them. In this era military officers provided several serve that would include running soup lines, helping immigrants find jobs and establish themselves, the officers would at times allow new immigrants temporary housing in the send off house.The main means of guardling their beat was on foot. These officers would in addition live in the realms that they patrolled this would prove to be both beneficial and detrimental. The beneficial part was that they knew their nearness they had a personal stake in maintaining order.The detrimental part was that they had a tendency to keep those who did not belong or strangers out of the neighborhood by using Curbstone justice this often upshoted in discrimination. In the reform era the public grow tired of the corruption, brutality and unjustness of police forces and wanted to follow J. Edgar Hoovers reform of the Bureau of Investigation.Those that wanted these changes became cognize as reformers and they demanded change, they saw politicians as the problem with policing and wanted to remove the ties among politics and police. These reformers began to get changes do across the country things similar gracious service exams, making it illegal for an officer to live in the field that he patrolled and making changes to how the chief of police was hired or fired.Changes were also made to the why office rs did their jobs and purge what their jobs were. Police focused on lawfulness enforcement and controlling crime all of the other duties became Social work. This system upstage foot patrols and wanted officers to be distant and removed from the communities they served, the belief was that this would enable them to administer the law in an objective manner.In 1967 the Presidents Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice ratified this orientation heretofore, Police had been conceptualized as an agency of urban government the Presidents Commission reconceptualized them as part of the poisonous Justice System. The community of interests era started in the 1980s however the research that a lot of this era is based on began in the late 1970s in places like Flint Michigan were foot patrols were brought back throughout the city.The city even voted twice to raise taxes in order to maintain the foot patrols. The result of the foot patrols were reduced fear, increased cit izen satisfaction with police and increased esprit de corps and job satisfaction of the officers. Other programs like the Safe and Clean neighbourhood Program in New Jersey had similar success.Research also showed that increasing other types of patrols that focus on police-citizen interactions also had similar results. These studies protract to a new way of policing referred to as community policing. This new tactic put officers back in the communities and changed what was expected of them. Officers were now tasked with maintaining order, negotiating conflicts and solving community problems these tasks require neighborhood and community involvement.Community policing encourages people to bring problems to an officer or to a local police billet and gives the officer and the station the ability to devise and implement solutions, it is also a strategy that allows officers to acquire what is expected or wanted by their community then gives the officer the ability to deliver results t hat leave alone meet these expectations.The intension is to deliver on what the community wants and in turn gain the trust and cooperation of the community, this trust and cooperation will in turn reduce crime and gain effective reading from the community when needed to solve crime.The history of policing in the United States has bygone through several changes since the political era of the 1840s. With wide spread changes made in the reform era of the 1930s that took police away from the community and unploughed them distant from those that they served.It took research conducted in the late 1970s and early 1980s to discover that intermit information on crime and criminals could be obtained by police from citizens and that patrol officers were in the best position to obtain this information. This research has lead to the community policing that we see in todays police departments.