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Quote of the Day – Policing
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To prevent crime and disorder, as an alternative to their repression by military force and severity of legal punishment.
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To recognise always that the power of the police to fulfill their functions and duties is dependent on public approval of their existence, actions and behaviour, and on their ability to secure and maintain public respect.
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To recognise always that to secure and maintain the respect and approval of the public means also the securing of the willing co-operation of the public in the task of securing observance of laws.
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To recognise always that the extent to which the co-operation of the public can be secured diminishes proportionately the necessity of the use of physical force and compulsion for achieving police objectives.
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To seek and preserve public favour, not by pandering to public opinion, but by constantly demonstrating absolutely impartial service to law, in complete independence of policy, and without regard to the justice or injustice of the substance of individual laws, by ready offering of individual service and friendship to all members of the public without regard to their wealth or social standing, by ready exercise of courtesy and friendly good humour, and by ready offering of individual sacrifice in protecting and preserving life.
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To use physical force only when the exercise of persuasion, advice and warning is found to be insufficient to obtain public co-operation to an extent necessary to secure observance of law or to restore order, and to use only the minimum degree of physical force which is necessary on any particular occasion for achieving a police objective.
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To maintain at all times a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and that the public are the police, the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.
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To recognise always the need for strict adherence to police-executive functions, and to refrain from even seeming to usurp the powers of the judiciary of avenging individuals or the State, and of authoritatively judging guilt and punishing the guilty.
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To recognise always that the test of police efficiency is the absence of crime and disorder, and not the visible evidence of police action in dealing with them.
– Robert Peel’s Principles of Policing
Robert Peel was the man who created the modern concept of police and policing. Before then, laws were enforced by individuals acting to bring alleged lawbreakers before magistrates or the army. (It could be called out by a magistrate literally reading “The Riot Act” to an unruly crowd.) Some individuals were given the power to enforce court actions, such as bailiffs or sheriffs—or rather shire reeves—but these were not police in the modern sense of the word.
The Bow Street Runners, established in Westminster in 1749, are often called the first police force, but they were more focused on arrest powers than law enforcement. That took Robert Peel, who, as Home Secretary in 1829, established the Metropolitan Police Force for London based at Scotland Yard. He also developed a set of standards to define ethical policing—listed at the start of this piece.
As you read through each point, you probably nodded and thought, “Yep, that is how it should work.” For the rest of the 19th century and into the 20th century that was how it worked in Britain, especially in London. Even in the United States of the period, while there were corrupt and venal police departments in some major cities, Americans viewed Peel’s principles as how policing should work. In many towns and small cities throughout America that was how it did work.
Today? Not so much I fear. The police have been increasingly militarized in this century, behaving more and more like soldiers. (Why should any civilian police officer wear camo or even military-style BDUs while on duty? Yet many officers view this as cool.) Too many officers wish to enjoy the privileges of their position without embracing their corresponding responsibilities.
Renewed adherence to Peel’s nine principles, especially the ninth point, would go a long way to reversing this trend. It would require active cooperation by the police, the magistrates (in the form of elected officials) and the judiciary. (The courts as well as the police need to embrace their responsibilities in law enforcement, instead of pandering to public opinion.) It would be worth it.
Published in Group Writing
Like our Constitution . These principles can only work with a moral populace . If only we had one . Yes , we have lots of moral people still . However , they are drowned out by the immoral and the powers that have taken control . Pity
Yes, Peel’s principles should be observed by not only LE agencies but by political leaders as well. Police forces should not be seen by mayors, county commissioners, governors, and bureaucrats as their own private armies. For example, the executive orders issued during the Covid debacle. Police officers should not be used as bill collectors for parking citations. Police officers should not be used as enforcers for administrative rules in schools. Judges should not issue warrants for violations, bill collection agencies should be used.
A side note on BDU’s. Many police departments wear BDU’s because they are less expensive than formal uniforms, hundreds of dollars less per each uniform.
Duplicate comment.
I wish the modern Law Enforcement organizations did this.
Agree. Those offices fall under the broad category of magistrates. Peel outlines their responsibilities, too, I should have included them along with the police and judiciary as those whose active cooperation is necessary, and will amend the post to do so.
Symbolism is important. One reason Peel dressed his police in blue uniforms of a significantly different cut than military uniforms was to underscore their differences from soldiers. (Who then wore red uniforms in Britain.) If you dress someone like a soldier they tend to associate themselves and their responsibilities as those of a soldier, not a law enforcement officer and behave as soldiers. Two entirely different mindsets are required in the two jobs.
Considering how much money governments waste, dressing police in battledress to cut costs is risible and counterproductive. Especially since BDUs are also formal uniforms – intended for use in combat or near-combat (such as field training) situations. Police should follow Peel’s principle to disassociate themselves from military functions.
(I also find it grating when I see Air Force and Space Force personnel at JSC wearing BDUs, when Johnson Space Center is not a combat posting. Back 30 years ago they were wearing Class A uniforms. That’s a different discussion, though.)
I was told by the Corporate Media that policing was invented to capture runaway slaves. I was not told by the Corporate Media that ancient Rome had a police force 2000 years earlier.
You were also told by the corporate media that Hilary was going to win the 2016 election, that Russian collusion was real and that the Hunter Biden laptop was a hoax.
I hadn’t heard that one, probably because I spend hardly any time listening to corporate media. I wonder where it originated. I can guess, but I’d rather know.
The DOJ Ferguson report (Obama’s ideological praetorian guard trying to find lots of racism and surprisingly failing) found that local government imposing lots of Mickey Mouse fines and using cops as a revenue generator/collector was a bigger source of resentment than any presumption of racism. Also, cops who tried to initiate outreach (e.g., night basketball ) were told not to spend time or money that way.
In our DC neighborhood in the 1960s, we knew beat cops by name. They knew what was normal. Some were coaches and refs in the local boys club sports programs and DC rec. Downtown, they arrested every vagrant when the forecast called for freezing temps and let them go in the morning. They usually caught burglars and prowlers. They were clearly on the side of every community.
I have read recently about some heroically old-fashioned cops who become an integral part of the neighborhoods they serve but my impression is that organizational systemic forces try to make for interchangeable units who are necessarily far more impersonal.
When the community believes cops enforce shared expectations and protect, policing must be easier if for no other reason than being appreciated. When policing is trying to enforce values a community no longer shares must less expects, and the political authorities issue impractical or conflicting priorities, it seems like it would be near impossible to be a cop.
I wish I could like this comment twice. It captures what Robert Peel intended of the police.
This.
In too many places, is this still the case? The powers in control are not on the side of the peoples of their communities. Instead, they stand opposed to them.
I don’t like the trend of so many police organizations dressing in BUD for simple enforcement actions. The BDU’s very clearly distance them from the public that they are to serve. My impression is that by wearing BDU, they are saying they’re “ready for a fight,” which may be appropriate in some situations, but not on most routine situations.
They’ve gone downhill a lot since ADAM-12, Dragnet…
And it’s really their own damn fault if they don’t get the respect they think they deserve.
Maybe part of the problem is too many ex-military becoming police.
Hmm, but ancient Rome had slaves, right?
The citizenry ain’t what it used to be either. Every year 250,000 people from something that went wrong in hospitals. Cops are a 1000 times better, but they get more bad publicity, thanks to neo-Marxists.
My solution is to create national police standards for 5 days of intense training on “protecting and serving”. We spend a lot on police, but do not invest enough on skills.
You might also start with requiring more training for police to start with. Your barber with clippers has more training than a cop with a gun, taser, jail cell, numerous affiliated gang members ready to join in…
Also people don’t usually risk being accidentally killed by a doctor unless there is something already wrong with them. Police often abuse and sometimes kill people who had nothing wrong with them.
It’s as good a way as any to start down the road to a police state.