Making a homefront without a battlefront: The manufacturing of domestic enemies in the early Cold War culture

Abstract

The surge of media interest in organized crime that occurred in the first half of the year should be placed in a double context. Since Prohibition (1920-1933) the press had typically described organized crime as a nationwide conspiracy engineered by foreign criminals—essentially Irish, Jewish, and Italian immigrants. America’s highwaymen and women were presented by federal authorities as former juvenile delinquents produced by the weakening of parental authority, a persistent concern in the traumatic contexts of the Depression and World War II.4 The second important contextual element was the then current debate on the nationwide legalization of gambling. Since the late 1930s Americans’ rising purchasing power (following the end of the depression and simultaneous onset of the wartime economy that restricted the availability of consumer durables into the second half of the 1940s) had mechanically led to an increase in illegal gambling. According to “The Heirs of Capone,” an article published in the January 13 issue of Newsweek, Al Capone’s criminal empire was once again a hotbed of violence. According to this story the Chicago Outfit seemed to be back in business with a vengeance.