Date of Submission
Spring 2012
Academic Program
Historical Studies
Project Advisor 1
Mark Lytle
Abstract/Artist's Statement
I argue in 1935, the United States recognized the necessity for a powerful national crime fighting organization resulting in the creation of the Federal Bureau of Investigation because of:
1. Its premature predecessor agency (Bureau of Investigation) formation, leadership and policy changes in the Bureau and in America, J. Edgar Hoover’s appointment as director, his career ambition, his personality and leadership qualities, and his relationship with the media.
2. A rise in crime in America throughout the 1920’s and climaxing in the early 1930’s with the massacre at Kansas City’s Union Station on June 17th, 1933, America’s proclaimed War on Crime against gangsters, and the importance of media influence.
J. Edgar Hoover and the F.B.I. may have at times acted in extra-‐legal and unconstitutional ways that early critics feared, but in general the agency served an essential role in supporting law and order within the United States.
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Creative Commons License
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Recommended Citation
Shubert, Matthew, "A National Police Agency Is Born: The Roles of J. Edgar Hoover, the Massacre at Kansas City’s Union Station, and America’s War on Crime in the Creation of the F.B.I." (2012). Senior Projects Spring 2012. 85.
https://digitalcommons.bard.edu/senproj_s2012/85
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