Kefauver hearings
Encyclopedia
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...
which existed from 1950 to 1951 and which investigated organized crime
Organized crime
Organized crime or criminal organizations are transnational, national, or local groupings of highly centralized enterprises run by criminals for the purpose of engaging in illegal activity, most commonly for monetary profit. Some criminal organizations, such as terrorist organizations, are...
which crossed state
U.S. state
A U.S. state is any one of the 50 federated states of the United States of America that share sovereignty with the federal government. Because of this shared sovereignty, an American is a citizen both of the federal entity and of his or her state of domicile. Four states use the official title of...
borders in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. The committee became popularly known as the Kefauver Committee because of its chairman, Senator
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...
Estes Kefauver
Estes Kefauver
Carey Estes Kefauver July 26, 1903 – August 10, 1963) was an American politician from Tennessee. A member of the Democratic Party, he served in the U.S...
.
Genesis of the committee
Organized crime was the subject of a large number of widely-read articles in several major newspaperNewspaper
A newspaper is a scheduled publication containing news of current events, informative articles, diverse features and advertising. It usually is printed on relatively inexpensive, low-grade paper such as newsprint. By 2007, there were 6580 daily newspapers in the world selling 395 million copies a...
s and magazine
Magazine
Magazines, periodicals, glossies or serials are publications, generally published on a regular schedule, containing a variety of articles. They are generally financed by advertising, by a purchase price, by pre-paid magazine subscriptions, or all three...
s in 1949. Several local "crime commissions" in major cities and states had also uncovered extensive corruption of the political process by organized crime. Many cities and states called for federal help in dealing with organized crime, yet federal law provided few tools for the U.S. government
Federal government of the United States
The federal government of the United States is the national government of the constitutional republic of fifty states that is the United States of America. The federal government comprises three distinct branches of government: a legislative, an executive and a judiciary. These branches and...
to do so. In particular, many cities and states were concerned with the way organized crime had infiltrated interstate commerce, and how it threatened to hold the American economy hostage through labor racketeering
Racket (crime)
A racket is an illegal business, usually run as part of organized crime. Engaging in a racket is called racketeering.Several forms of racket exist. The best-known is the protection racket, in which criminals demand money from businesses in exchange for the service of "protection" against crimes...
.
On January 5, 1950, Senator Estes Kefauver introduced a resolution that would allow the Senate Committee on the Judiciary
United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary
The United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary is a standing committee of the United States Senate, of the United States Congress. The Judiciary Committee, with 18 members, is charged with conducting hearings prior to the Senate votes on confirmation of federal judges nominated by the...
to investigate organized crime's role in interstate commerce. However, the Senate Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce
United States Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation
The United States Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation is a standing committee of the United States Senate in charge of all senate matters related to the following subjects:* Coast Guard* Coastal zone management* Communications...
already claimed jurisdiction over the issue. A compromise resolution was substituted which established a special committee of five Senators, whose membership would be drawn from both the Judiciary and Commerce committess. Debate over the substitute resolution was bitter and partisan, and the voting on the resolution extremely close. On May 3, 1950, Vice President
Vice President of the United States
The Vice President of the United States is the holder of a public office created by the United States Constitution. The Vice President, together with the President of the United States, is indirectly elected by the people, through the Electoral College, to a four-year term...
Alben W. Barkley
Alben W. Barkley
Alben William Barkley was an American politician in the Democratic Party who served as the 35th Vice President of the United States , under President Harry S. Truman....
, sitting in his role as President of the United States Senate, cast the tie-breaking vote and the Special Committee to Investigate Crime in Interstate Commerce was established.
Committee work and history
Barkley, as President of the Senate, was empowered to choose the committee's members. They included: Kefauver; Herbert O'ConorHerbert O'Conor
Herbert Romulus O'Conor , a Democrat, was the 51st Governor of Maryland in the United States from 1939 to 1947. He also served in the United States Senate, representing Maryland from 1947 to 1953....
(Maryland
Maryland
Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...
), Lester C. Hunt
Lester C. Hunt
Lester Callaway Hunt was a Democratic politician and dentist from the state of Wyoming. He served as the 19th Governor of Wyoming from 1943 to 1949 and as United States Senator from January 3, 1949 until his suicide on June 19, 1954....
(Wyoming
Wyoming
Wyoming is a state in the mountain region of the Western United States. The western two thirds of the state is covered mostly with the mountain ranges and rangelands in the foothills of the Eastern Rocky Mountains, while the eastern third of the state is high elevation prairie known as the High...
), Alexander Wiley
Alexander Wiley
Alexander Wiley was a member of the Republican Party who served four terms in the United States Senate for the state of Wisconsin from 1939 to 1963. When he left the Senate, he was its most senior Republican member.-Biography:...
(Wisconsin
Wisconsin
Wisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...
), and Charles W. Tobey
Charles W. Tobey
Charles William Tobey was an American politician, who was a Governor of New Hampshire and a United States senator, was born in Roxbury, Massachusetts, the son of William Tobey, an accountant, and Ellen Hall Parker Tobey. His father had moved to Massachusetts from Maine in the 1860s. Charles Tobey...
(New Hampshire
New Hampshire
New Hampshire is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. The state was named after the southern English county of Hampshire. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Atlantic Ocean to the east, and the Canadian...
).
The Kefauver Committee held hearings in 14 major cities across the United States. More than 600 witnesses testified. Many of the committee's hearings were televised live on national television to large audiences, providing many Americans with their first glimpse of organized crime's influence in the U.S. Among the more notorious figures who appeared before the committee were Tony "Joe Batters" Accardo
Tony Accardo
Antonino Joseph Accardo , also known as "Joe Batters" or "Big Tuna", rose from small-time hoodlum to the position of day-to-day boss of the Chicago Outfit in 1947, to ultimately become the final Outfit authority in 1972, until his death...
, Louis "Little New York" Campagna
Louis Campagna
Louis "Little New York" Campagna was a New York mobster and a high ranking member of the Chicago Outfit for over three decades.-Early years:...
, Mickey Cohen
Mickey Cohen
Meyer Harris "Mickey" Cohen was a gangster based in Los Angeles and part of the Jewish Mafia, and also had strong ties to the American Mafia from the 1930s through 1960s.-Early life:...
, Frank Costello
Frank Costello
Frank Costello was an Italian New York City gangster who rose to the top of America's underworld, controlled a vast gambling empire across the United States and enjoyed political influence.Nicknamed the "Prime Minister of the Underworld", he became one of the most powerful and influential Mafia...
, Jake "Greasy Thumb" Guzik
Jake Guzik
Jake "Greasy Thumb" Guzik was the financial and legal advisor, and later political “greaser”, for the Chicago Outfit.-Early life:...
, Meyer Lansky
Meyer Lansky
Meyer Lansky , known as the "Mob's Accountant", was a Polish-born American organized crime figure who, along with his associate Charles "Lucky" Luciano, was instrumental in the development of the "National Crime Syndicate" in the United States...
, and Paul "The Waiter" Ricca
Paul Ricca
Paul Ricca, also known as "The Waiter" , was a Chicago mobster who served as the nominal or de facto leader of the Chicago Outfit for forty years.-Early life:...
. Kefauver became a nationally recognized figure, and the committee enabled him to run for President of the United States in 1952 and 1956 (his runs failed, but he became his party's Vice Presidential nominee in 1956).
Many of the Kefauver Committee's hearings were aimed at proving that an Italian–Sicilian organization based on strong family ties centrally controlled a vast organized crime conspiracy in the United States, but the committee never came close to justifying such a claim. Rather, the committee uncovered extensive evidence that people of all nationalities, ethnicities, and even religions operated locally controlled, loosely organized crime syndicates at the local level. The committee's final report, issued on April 17, 1951, included 22 recommendations for the federal government and seven recommendations for state and local authorities. Among its recommendations were: The creation of a "racket squad" within the United States Department of Justice
United States Department of Justice
The United States Department of Justice , is the United States federal executive department responsible for the enforcement of the law and administration of justice, equivalent to the justice or interior ministries of other countries.The Department is led by the Attorney General, who is nominated...
; the establishment of a permanent Crime Commission at the federal level; the expansion of the jurisdiction of the Judiciary Committee to include interstate organized crime; federal studies into the sociology
Sociology
Sociology is the study of society. It is a social science—a term with which it is sometimes synonymous—which uses various methods of empirical investigation and critical analysis to develop a body of knowledge about human social activity...
of crime; a ban on betting via radio, television, telegraph, and telephone; the establishment of state and local crime commissions; and a request that the Justice Department investigate and prosecute 33 named individuals as suspected leaders of organized crime in the United States.
However, the committee's work led to several significant outcomes. Among the most notable was an admission by J. Edgar Hoover
J. Edgar Hoover
John Edgar Hoover was the first Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation of the United States. Appointed director of the Bureau of Investigation—predecessor to the FBI—in 1924, he was instrumental in founding the FBI in 1935, where he remained director until his death in 1972...
, Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
Federal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
, that a national organized crime syndicate did exist and that the FBI had done little about it. Legislative proposals and state ballot referenda legalizing gambling
Gambling
Gambling is the wagering of money or something of material value on an event with an uncertain outcome with the primary intent of winning additional money and/or material goods...
went down to defeat over the next few years due to revelations of organized crime's involvement in the gambling industry, and more than 70 "crime commissions" were established at the state and local level to build on the Kefauver Committee's work. The Kefauver Committee was the first to suggest that civil law be expanded and used to combat organized crime. Congress responded to the call, and in 1970 passed the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act
Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act
The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, commonly referred to as the RICO Act or simply RICO, is a United States federal law that provides for extended criminal penalties and a civil cause of action for acts performed as part of an ongoing criminal organization...
as a direct response to the committee's recommendation.