To remedy millennia of discrimination will obviously requirernsuch long-term programs as cannot benefit any childrenrnalready born. We hear, therefore, from liberals and conservativesrnalike, that a more direct crackdown on crime must be undertaken.rnDepending on their point of view—or who is payingrnthem—the experts recommend more police, more prisonsrnand stiffer sentences, “federalization” of crime control, and disarmingrnthe suburbs. (No one even dreams of disarming thernprojects.) When it is pointed out that none of these methodsrnhas ever made more than a marginal impact on crime rates overrnthe long term, the experts shrug their shoulders and say in almostrnso many words: “Couldn’t hoit.”rnBefore spending even a moment “thinking about crime,” thernaverage American—^by which I mean people who are neitherrncriminals nor criminologists—must dispel a fundamental illusionrnfrom his mind. In matters of human life, of good and evil,rnthere is no science that specializes in the knowledge of evil andrnno class of experts that can solve human problems. The worstrndelusion of the 20th century is that there is some science of societyrn—sociology, psychology, political science, criminology—rnthat can come up with the social equivalent of a cure for therncommon cold. Count, if you like, the number of homicidesrncommitted in Chicago, correlate these numbers with statisticsrnon emplovment, inflation, mean temperature, expenditure onrneducation, etc., and you still come up with nothing. Oh, therernis a superstitious thrill in reciting gibberi,sh that gives us the illusionrnof power—that is what magic is all about—but none ofrnthese statistical mantras brings us any closer to the nature ofrngood or the problem of evil.rnTo light our way through the dark passageways of the humanrnheart, we have only the lamp of experience to guide us. Thernonly sciences that can help us are not the new-fangled disciplinesrnmodeled on the false analogy of the natural sciences (anrnerror that Aristotle warned against), but the very ancient sciencesrnof moral philosophy and theology, and if any man claimsrnan expert status in matters of crime because of his degree inrnvoodoo or sociology, his every word should be disregarded. Barrngraphs and bell curves are about as useful as pins in dolls, andrntheir effectiveness depends entirely on the credulity of thernvictims.rnThis, by the wa, is the great problem of the neoconservati’rnes, who every year seem to have a new theory about Americanrnsociety and a new set of numbers to support their schemes.rnOne cannot rightly blame them for their stupidity; it is unfairrnto expect sociologists to understand evil. That is a job for arnpriest or a poet. The characters of the so-called social so-calledrnscientists have been formed on the corrosive superstition of statisticalrnmorality, the same superstition that led earlier generationsrnof social engineers to forge the engines of destruction thatrnare grinding the little loyalties of everyday life into abrasive powder.rnOf course, they are not alone. We Americans love to thinkrnthere are scientific remedies for the fact that we are human,rnthat we can immunize ourselves against the moral diseases underrnwhich our ancestors labored. The entire welfare state apparatusrnis like a moral SDI designed to shield us from the consequencesrnof folly and the danger of real life.rnIn the godless, cultureless, lawless, rootless worid that is a giftrnof “the science of society,” we can call on neither priest nor poetrnin our hour of need. We do, however, as human beings possessrnsome elementary principles of reason, and as Americans wernshould have seen enough to know that in a very real sense thernliberals are right. We cannot begin to address the problem ofrncrime, much less of juvenile homicide, without first doingrnsomething about the conditions that make it possible.rnFirst, let us ask the most obvious question. Boys will bernboys, so they say, and men men; since the male human animalrnis prone to violence and laziness, is it not strange that allrnsocieties are not as crime-ridden as ours? America, in particular,rnwas not so long ago a very peaceful society, and even if wernsay that our high rate of violent crime is a function of the proportionrnof young black males in our society, we have still notrnsaid anything to the purpose. Young black males have been livingrnin America since the 17th century, but it is only in recentrnyears that they have been killing each other off.rn^ ^ ^ y ^ If you do not likern^ • ^ i crime, do not pay forrnf _ ^ ^ it. In simple terms,rnthis would require: demolition of allrnpublic housing; the rapid end of allrnforms of wealth-transfer, including FoodrnStamps, AFDC, etc.; the disestablishmentrnof public education and the repeal of allrnmandatory school attendance laws.rnElsewhere in this issue, Professor Steven Goldberg suggests,rnsomewhat disingenuously I hope, that we are dealing with thernresidue of slavery, but he does not explain why it is that thernlonger black males are out of slavery, the more violent, thernmore idle, the more criminal they become. We can speculaternall we like on the persistence of tribal folkways across the generationsrnor on genetically controlled behavioral patterns, but wernknow that the problem of black violent crime is a recent phenomenon.rnMost ordinary Americans realize that much of thernexplanation lies with the welfare state, which includes family assistancernprograms, public housing, Food Stamps, minimumrnwage laws, the juvenile justice system, and pubhc education,rnand although the experts are now calling for “welfare reform”rnand even retrenchment, and some of them are even blaming illegitimacyrnon AFDC, they refuse to address the moral facts ofrnAmerican welfare.rnConsider the typical example of a 15-year-old Chicago gangster,rnreared by a mother on welfare, sent to schools where evenrnif the teachers tried to teach, he could learn little by reason ofrnhis low intelligence and disordered family life. He can neverrnhold a real job, first because he is stupid—nature saw to that—rnsecond, because he is lazy and shiftless—his mother and thernschools have done their job all too well—and third, because hernknows he does not in fact have to work. He can always live eitherrnfree or at low cost in the sort of project he grew up in.rnThese projects, built by the taxpayers and dominated by criminalrngangs, have formed his character and taught him that if hernJANUARY 1995/nrnrnrn