This grant provides support to study crime and its linkages to urbanization and industrialization in early America. Specifically, the grant provides support to collect and collate data from public records on persons accused of crimes and their accusers or prosecutors in the justice system of Pennsylvania, 1682-1800, specifically in Chester County and the City of Philadelphia. The data treat their economic and vocational status as well as residence and their previous domiciles. The analysis concentrates on a number of issues related to the etiology of crime, particularly whether the identification of the criminal population changes consistent with shifts in the economic and labor structure of these locales. Also, the evolution of the criminal population in the City of Philadelphia is traced to determine whether it fulfills postulates about the relationship between urbanization and the proliferation of crime. This study deals with central issues related to the etiology of crime, and the richness of the historical data will enable scholars interested in various facets of crime causation to advance inquiry of their own postulates about the interfaces among crime, industrialization, and urbanization. Further, the availability of the sentencing data will provide an opportunity to determine early penal policy in the United States, and gain rich understanding of how the Quakers operationalized their penal philosophy. These data and their analysis provide historical context for advancing debates about the purpose of punishment in the United States.
