Ray Malone's Commentary

When this nation was young it often took a month for people in Ohio to find out what happened in Washington. It was felt that law enforcement needed to be near the people. After all, the threats were near the people. With the poor communication of the times, a national law enforcement agency could not be controlled.

A local Sheriff could be controlled. At our founding as a nation, nearly all violent crime was locally based. So in every state the chief law enforcement person was the county sheriff. He was elected by the local people and answered to them. It was local people who committed the crime and it was the local law that caught the criminals.

That worked fine up until the automobile. Then criminals started to work over much larger areas. If the criminal could just get out of the county he was out of the jurisdiction of the sheriff who had responsibility for bringing him to justice.

The first attempts as state wide law enforcement came with the creation of State Patrol agencies created to enforce state traffic laws. Traffic laws were state wide and enforcement was done by a state agency.. the state patrol. If the local sheriff had the license number and a radio, the state troopers could get the fleeing criminal.

Efforts were made to foster cooperation among the many sheriff departments and state law enforcement agencies. The FBI and other federal agencies were tasked with providing shared information, cooperation, and training for local law enforcement. That worked pretty well for murderers, robbers, and rapists.

Gradually with new threats came the creation of more national law enforcement. Drug trafficking became a national crime violating national laws enforced mostly by national Drug agents. Immigration laws required a national law enforcement agency. But the many federal law enforcement agencies each handling just one type of crime, made for a communication mess for crimes that involved several national and local law enforcement agencies.

With the car, came wire services and local papers that could print state and national news on a daily basis. Then Radio, Television and long distance phone service cured our inability to know what was happening outside our own community. The state patrol reported to governors and we knew who the governor was and could bring pressure or defeat at the polls if his troopers abused us. Federal agents reported to Presidents. We could keep an eye on them as well and Presidents fear our votes. The reasons for purely local law enforcement are disappearing. The reasons for a broad based single national law enforcement agency have increased. We know more about our president than we know about our local sheriff.

Until just recently our nation has never faced a real national threat to our existence. There has never been a movement or group interested in harming our entire population. Even in World War II, Korea, and Nam there never was a time when the enemy tried to send a significant number of people to the US to kill American citizens.

That is no longer true. The terrorist threat creates an entirely new danger. It is a national threat to our safety as individuals. This is not a Bonny and Clyde robbing banks and running from state to state, or a group selling illegal substances. This is a national threat that requires a national force to combat it.

This is a nation of the people, for the people, and by the people. As long as national law enforcement has to report to the Chief Executive as a Cabinet Agency we are safe enough. Any President who tried to create a Gestapo or any other oppressive force, would find himself impeached and convicted in a heart beat.

Some fear a national police force such as the Gestapo, KGB or Secret Police. For such a force to to exist a nation has to be a dictatorship. It takes a Hitler or a Stalin with unchallenged power to create an all powerful force to control the population. One other factor is the the people have to accept it.

If the German People had not supported Hitler he would have been overthrown. When the people of the Soviet Union wanted Communism to fall ... it fell. Look at what a small effort it took on our part to destroy the Taliban. The Taliban did not have the support of the people, so they were easily toppled.
Saddam had very little support in Iraq. He was easy to topple.

But once it starts it will takes a lot more than local cops to bring killing attacks on our people to an end. Remember how long one man and a boy with an old car and one rifle, could terrorize Washington D.C.? Imagine there were a thousand such Washington D.C. snipers operating in the USA. What would our nation be like? Much like Iraq is the answer.

We have been and are a vulnerable nation with no national police force. We are a nation with thousands of county and city law enforcement officers who are not connected and more importantly not centrally controlled. We were sitting ducks for an orchestrated attack.

But on the other hand we must be doing pretty well. We have not been attacked since 9/11. Either the terrorists are going after easier targets, or they are too busy defending their home ground, or they are unable to penetrate our current defenses. Perhaps some of all three reasons is close to the truth.

One thing seems clear to me

The closer we come to total victory in, Iraq, Afghanistan and Iran the more dangerous it will get in the USA. When the Terrorists have little left to defend they will still have plenty left to attack.

The fear of a national force is not justified. No law enforcement agency can survive with out the support of the people. The rise of a Gestapo came in Germany when the Democratic government was unable to keep the peace. The Weimar Republic in Germany fell when it could not fix the depression or provide security for German citizens. Hitler promised to do both, and a hungry and scared Germany elected Hitler Hitler was a man proposing dictatorship as a solution. The Fuhrer Princip was never concealed. But things were so bad in Germany voters went for it.

Freedom falls when free governments fail to protect the people. No nation's people ever said, "We have peace, prosperity, and law and order... What we need is a Dictator!!!"

Dictatorships and its oppressive force always arises from the failure of existing government to protect its citizens from danger, poverty, and uncontrolled disobedience to the law. The loss of freedom always results from the failure of the existing government to protect its people. That is why governments are overthrown for a more forceful dictatorship.

We face a national threat. We need an aggressive national response.