I've been doing a lot of research on the relationship between slavery, immigration, and policing for my second novel, Restive Souls, which takes place in an alternative timeline where slaves were emancipated by Cromwell after the British defeated the colonial rebels, and a large African majority nation later rises on the East Coast of America.
My sources are almost too vast to present here, but I'll try - so many bookmarks I almost don't know where to start.
But I consider Eastern Kentucky University to be one of the best historical sources on policing in America. Gary Potter and Victor E. Kappeler there have done a substantial amount of legwork. You can see some of their stuff here:
https://plsonline.eku.edu/insidelook/brief-history-slavery-and-origins-american-policing
and here:
https://time.com/4779112/police-history-origins/
They're both just digests. I had some links to much longer works somewhere from EKU but they're eluding me at the moment, and I have a work deadline. The university dedicates entire coursework to this topic.
Most of the colonial era slave codes derived from the Barbados Slave Code, a heinous code that was adopted and adapted by such states as Virginia (https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/an-act-concerning-servants-and-slaves-1705/), which encouraged the formation of night watches, whose sole intent was to hunt down escaped slaves, or slaves gathering in groups, and punish them accordingly.
Similarly, New York, in the 1700s, prohibited the gathering of more than three slaves in one location and riding of horses, among other things. These were typically enforced by vigilantes, militiamen, night watchmen, or any combination of the three.
There's a nice summary of the evolution of the police state from the American Bar Association here:
A more whitewashed version is here:
https://www.britannica.com/topic/police/Early-police-in-the-United-
It's not an entirely useless article in that it delves a bit into the ancestry of the British constable and some tie ins to American policing as urban metropolitan police agencies began to sprout, but it needs a Howard Zinn historian to redo the bit about how Americans became fed up with urban violence and demanded action. The real issue was that wealthy Americans were freaked out about immigrants.
Most modern histories of policing in America delve into the watches that were created to control slave and indigenous populations.
As for where I got my information on the influence of American policing on other nations, I'll quote a New Yorker article here,which also goes into the evolution of American policing:
"It is often said that Britain created the police, and the United States copied it. One could argue that the reverse is true."
The article has some good sources and links: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/07/20/the-invention-of-the-police
So yeah, in a sense, of course, there have always been "police." The ancient Greeks actually used slaves to do much of their policing, but they also resolved many disputes through mediation.
The Romans also relied on slaves and lower caste members of society to do common policing. The notion of Roman centurian guards as the bees knees really just comes from the Praetorian Guards (and forces like them), who guarded the emperor and senate. Regular policing was a low-brow affair that typically focused on keeping open-air markets safe.
But I would argue that in Europe, police patrols typically aren't looking for trouble. They don't pull people over for having stuff dangling from their rearview mirror, for example.
Europeans in the 18th century focused greatly on mediation in the tradition of the Greeks.
I don't really know what the complete answer is now, because Americans are armed to the teeth. So we can't disarm the police. It wouldn't be fair to them.
I do think we need to rethink their purpose. Stop pulling over people for minor traffic violations, for one thing.
And somehow start enforcing a rule that doesn't allow them to pull someone over for driving while Black. How? I have no idea. It's stuff we all need to keep talking about.
I've never had to throw my hands on a steering wheel when getting pulled over. It's messed up that I can say that, and others can't.
If they have to, maybe we need to start throwing some drones into the air and record the speedsters through a combination of drones and radar stations. Tech can help with some of this. I could go on forever.
So I'll stop now. Regarding that link I sent you: I thought about you immediately when I saw that because it was exactly what you are talking about in your article! I thought that was pretty cool.
