QUESTIONS FOR LANE CHAPTERS 5, 6

CHAPTER 5
     Lane argues that in the South the gains lost in the Civil War were won back through an interracial social policy based substantially on homicide in the post Civil War era. Explain. Do you agree or disagree? Name a couple of examples of illustrating that policy. What were the regional economic factors, and features of the federal government that contributed to the success of this policy?
     In what ways did labor violence of the late 1800s build on old ethnic and political cleavages?
     How did the situation surrounding the Molly Maguires illustrate "familiar elements of midcentury American homicide"? (p. 159).
     Lane argues that if a crime appears to be a threat to the social order, the criminal justice system, including juries, react harshly. Do you agree or disagree? Can you think of an alternate way of explaining the fate of the Haymarket 8?
     What was labor violence around strikes like in this period?
     What was behind the single largest mass execution in our history?
     What does the cjs reaction to the Rock SPrings (WY) incident demonstrate?
     What were the causes of "murderous gunfire" in the West?
     Who were the Wobblies, what did they want, and why were folks so concerned about them?
     Despite "an often murderous conflict" between labor and capital in this period, homicide rates went down. Why? (ps - it was worldwide)
     What is the suicide/murder ratio and how does it link to cultures of "dignity" and "honor"?
     The "urban industrial city's insistence on peaceful behavior" (p. 195) brought about what changes in the cjs and in juries?
     How did the police mission change around the turn of the century?

CHAPTER 6
     What were the causes of the race riots around WW I?
     How did the cjs response to Leopold and Loeb illustrate thinking at the time about random violence?
     What did the Sacco and Vanzetti case show about the cjs response to violence at the time?
     What features of homicide reported in Brearly's 1932 study sound familiar today?
     What was happening with urban AFrican-American households at this time?
     Why does Lane argue there was no real increase in the homicide rate from 1906 - 1929 (see p. 239), and in fact it was probably coming down? "Why, then, all the publicity about the lawless decade?" (p. 241).