I 30 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
against the person. From eighteen to fifty years the variations in the first are but slight, and the curve maintains a high level throughout the entire period; up to the age of twenty-five the second curve rises, but then falls quickly. The line marking the share of the unmarried in offenses against the state, religion, and order rises steadily till the age of forty years is reached. This constancy of the course of criminality may be ascribed to lack of respect for property rights and for constituted authority; and this lack of respect is itself to be traced to the lack of an established family life, at a time when the man does not so easily bear the effects of a disorderly existence, and cannot, therefore, so readily support himself by his labor. (Of course this observation would not hold in the case of the habitual criminal.) It is of interest to note in this connection that drunkenness claims the major share of its victims between the ages of thirty and fifty years. The criminality of widowers decreases with advancing age. Their share in crime between the ages of thirty and fifty is notably greater than that of either of the other classes mentioned. Their share in such crimes as murder, incest, false accusation, and false witness at this time is especially noteworthy. It has been said, in attempted explanation of this fact, that widowers are, as a rule, ill situated financially, but there appears to be no satisfactory evidence that this is true. Statistics do not prove that widowers belong to the poorer classes in any unusual degree. Widowers are especially prominent in offenses against property, but they also stand first in the series of those guilty of other classes of crime. The loss of the wife very frequently leads to mental derangement, and it is probably true, as well, that certain types of self-control are peculiarly difficult for this class to exercise. In general, there is a greater decrease in criminality of the married the longer they have been in the married state. This conforms with the fact that the larger share of the births, together with the large outlay incident thereto, fall within the first decade of married life, and we observe further that it is the offenses against property which most rapidly fall away with advancing years among the married. Among the restraints which marriage places upon the criminality of the married man is the fear of bringing disgrace upon the family and lasting shame to the children. The temptation of the married man to indulge in the pleasures of the public house is less than that of the single man, for, while the family very largely furnishes all the wholesome pleasures afforded by the public house, it also demands for its proper maintenance too large a share of the man's income to allow him to spend any considerable sum elsewhere. With the need of defending and supporting a family, there comes, too, increased respect for religion, law, and property — the defending and supporting institutions of society. And last, but not least, to be mentioned among these deterrent effects of marriage upon the criminality of the married male is the influence of the constant and intimate association of the man with a member of the sex the criminality of which is very low when compared with that of his own. — -Friedr. Prinzing, "Der Einfluss der Ehe auf die Kriminalitat des ^IzTmei," Ziilscltrift fiir Socialwissenschaft, II. Jahrg., Heft 2.
Race in the Etiology of Crime. — Although savages possess a very vague notion of crime, still there are tribes which show a greater criminality than other tribes. In India there exists, for example, a tribe whose profession is to steal, while Spencer cites several peoples who are inclined to honesty and truthfulness, and who do not practice the law of retaliation or commit cruelty. The documents which serve to demonstrate ethnic influence upon crime in the civilized world are, however, less uncertain. We know, for example, that a great part of the thieves of London are natives of Ireland or of Lancashire. Again, in Italy there exist criminal centers, and in nearly every province there is some village renowned for having furnished an uninterrupted series of special delinquents. The most famous among these is the village of Artena in the province of Rome, of which Sighele says: "Artena is distinguished by a number of assaults, homicides, assassinations, six times greater than that of the average of Italy, and of highway robberies thirty times greater. The cause is . . . above all heredity." In his Homicide Ferri clearly demonstrates the ethnic influence upon the distribution of homicide in Europe. In Italy, according to statistics of 1880-83, there is an evident predominance of homicide among the populations of Semitic race and of Latin race, compared with those of the Germanic, I^igurian, Slavic, and Celtic races. It is particularly to African or oriental elements that Italy owes the origin of
