National Affairs: Industrialists v. Twins

CORRUPTION Industrialists v. Twins

Twins, notable since the oozy dawn of civilization, are Crime and Corruption. They frolic now from Shanghai to Paris, unashamed. Occasionally, they rear their heads up into the light and scare some, shock others. Sometimes they pop up in Washington, but their favorite modern playgrounds are in manufacturing cities where sprawling factories belch and whistle, where grimy alleys creep between frame hovels, where workingmen need stimulation Saturday nights. The so-called “better element” becomes excited only on occasions when the Rockefeller Foundation calls Detroit “the vilest city in the country,” or when a newspaper publisher is murdered in Canton, Ohio (TIME, July 26). However, there is one town which has recently raised the visceral tension of the righteous about once a month. That town is Cicero, Ill., a Utopian nook for the twins. Here on the western fringe of Chicago is a polyglot population of 62,000—Irishmen, Italians, Sicilians, Slavs and many another tribe. The Western Electric Co. employs thousands of them; other industries are near and plentiful. But it is to the gangs of the Bad Lands that Cicero owes its headline glamor. Up and down its streets, fiery Sicilians and raucous Irishmen playfully squirt machine guns at each other. On other days they go zooming into Chicago with truckloads of beer. And then, when the day’s labors are done, they have their 60 “soft drink parlors,” their brothels, and their roulette wheels. The Bad Lands have their king, “Scarface Al” Caponi, alias “Al-phonzo Brown,” who has been on the throne since 1922. Never since the days of “Big Jim” Colosimo (the man with the diamond complex) has the underworld had so potent an organizer. “Scarface Al,” except for the old razor gash on one side of his face, might easily be mistaken for a fat, prosperous baker. King Caponi does not bake. With his brothers, Ralph and James, he keeps the beer route flowing and the political machinery of Cicero running. At the last election 20 workers of the anti-Caponi party were kidnaped, slugged, hidden away. Many voters were beaten up as they entered or left polling places. Street fights were staged. Half a dozen ballot boxes were stolen. Clerks and judges of election were intimidated with revolvers. Two men were killed, and finally, at 6:00 p. m., when all was beginning to be calm again, ten car loads of detectives from Chicago descended upon the town, dashed down a street crowded with factory workers, opened fire on James Caponi, killed him.

Cicero has written history under the Caponi régime. There was the day when the Duncan Sisters, famed baby-talk gurglers of musical comedy, put on a street fight with two Cicero policemen, and later sued the town for rough treatment. There was the story of a young, able newspaper editor who refused to leave town. So, members of the Caponi gang beat him up at a busy street corner, and kidnaped his brother for a few days. There was the killing of Assistant State’s Attorney William McSwiggin last April, a crime that has not yet been solved. Then, a fortnight ago, a black armored car roared down Cicero’s main street, spattered the Hawthorne Hotel with machine gun bullets, but missed King Caponi who was standing on the front porch. After such events, “Scarface Al” puts on his light tan shoes, picks up his cane, leaves town.

Industrialists decided several months ago that the performances and sideshows of King Caponi’s regime were interfering with both the efficiency and nerves of their workers. Two vice presidents of a corporation were despatched to Washington to appeal to the Federal Government. Secret Service agents returned to wander around Cicero’s grimy nooks. Suddenly, last week, a Federal grand jury indicted “Scarface Al” Caponi and his brother Ralph; Joseph Z. Klenha, president of the town of Cicero; Ted L. Svoboda, chief of police, and 75 others, for con-spiracy to violate the Volstead Act. Federal agents say they have evidence that the gangsters profited $15,000,000 by their liquor business in three years.

And after the trial of the Ciceronians is over, the famed twins will again return to their nooks, unashamed, unafraid. If

Cicero becomes too tame a play ground, there are other places. . . .