ons of
European criminologists, that certain individuals are born with a
predisposition to crime, like the alcoholic inheriting a weak will, or
with insane or epileptic tendencies that may lead early to criminal
conduct; but it is not yet proven that a majority of offenders are
hereditary perverts. A stronger reason for crime is the unsatisfied
desire or the uncontrolled impulse that drives a man to take by force
that to which he has no lawful claim. This desire is strengthened by
the social conditions of the present. In all grades of society there
are individuals who resort to all sorts of means to get money and
pleasure, and those who are brought up without moral and social
training, and who feel an inclination to disregard the interests of
others are ready to justify themselves by illegal examples in high
life. Given a tenement home, the streets for a playground, the saloon
as a social centre, hard, unpleasant, and poorly paid labor, a yellow
press, and a prevailing spirit of envy and hatred for the rich, and it
is not difficult to manufacture any amount of crime.

261. =Special Reasons for Crime.=--Certain special circumstances have
tended to encourage crime within the last few generations. The freedom
and natural roughness of frontier life gave an opportunity for
lawlessness and appealed to those who are scarcely to be reckoned as
friends of society. In the mining and lumber camps gambling and
drinking were common, and robbery and murder not infrequent. The
American Civil War, like every war, stimulated the elemental passions
and nourished criminal tendencies. Human life and rights were
cheapened. The brute in man was evoked when it became lawful to kill
and plunder. The moral effects of war are among the most lasting and
the most pernicious. More recently the conditions of existence in the
cities have generated crime and are certain to continue to do so as
long as slums exist.

The liberty that is characteristic of America easily becomes license,
especially if restraint has been thrown off suddenly, as in the case
of the immigrant, or of the country youth arriving in the city for the
first time and dazzled by the opportunities of his new freedom or with
a grudge against society because it has not been hospitable to him.
The amount of crime is increased also by the constant increase of
legislation. The social regulations that are necessary in the city
tend to become confused with the more serious violations of th