Thread by @stefmav

The way the Baltimore Police Department is governed is really different from other PDs nationally. The state controls it, not the city. Why?

Since the 1860s, the BPD has been under the control of the MD state legislature. Mayor & City Council lack authority to substantively reform

The reason? To wrest control over Baltimore amidst disagreements between political leaders in the large city and the state capital. But why?

Some context: by the mid 1800s, Baltimore's free Black population was growing and immigrants were continuing to settle in the city.

This is pre-Civil War, but tensions are rising across the country. Maryland, a deeply conflicted state, sits at the fault line.

In Baltimore, like the rest of Maryland, Confederate sympathy ran deep. People had family members fighting on that side. It was personal.

Maryland’s governor was Thomas Holliday Hicks. He was a proponent of slavery, but wasn’t a fan of secession. This was “neutrality” for him.

Let’s talk about Baltimore’s mayors during this period. Thomas Swann (mayor from 1856-1860) began his political career as a “Know Nothing.”

The Know Nothings were a party of white Protestants who were anti-immigrant/Black. They engaged in rampant voter fraud and suppression.

The Know Nothings watched polls, intimidated voters & had homeless immigrants change their clothes from poll to poll to vote multiple times.

They believed German and Irish immigrants were coming to take their jobs (sound familiar?). They eventually rebranded as the American Party.

Swann was a problem. But that didn’t stop him from going on to become Governor (to “restore to MD a white man’s government") AND U.S. Rep.

From 1860 to 1861 (when the first bloodshed of the Civil War occurred on Pratt Street) pro-Confederate George W. Brown was mayor.

You know who else was pro-Confederate at that time (in addition to the mayor)? The City Council and the Police Commissioner. #notcute

He was forced out of office when the Union army declared martial law in Baltimore “for the balance of the war.”

Quick digression on Mayor Brown. He mentioned Johns Hopkins in his memoir and dude made him a trustee of the university to help found JHU. 🙂

That’s the political scene. The Union needed to hold down MD & its largest city for the cause, but it was deeply Confederate sympathizing.

White men in Baltimore were disgruntled over immigrants, the growing free Black population, and the impending end of slavery.

Not to mention, this is all happening in the context of an economic depression in Baltimore. Stress was high.

MD Governor Hicks started talking about “crime and lawlessness” in Baltimore, attributing it to the increase of immigrants and free Blacks.

Then in the late 1850s, the Democrats took control of the state legislature. They were determined to push through bold policies and reforms.

Part of the Dems’ big agenda was “setting limits to the political independence of Baltimore,” rife with Know Nothing + Confederate ideology.

How would they do that? Transferring the Baltimore Police Department to the control of the state legislature and away from Baltimore City.

It wasn’t till more than a century later that Baltimore got a small amount of power back: the ability to hire/fire the Police Commissioner.

That hiring/firing power, which the Mayor oversees, came in 1978 out reflections on the 1968 riots in Baltimore. (.@ar_holter knows more!)

That power is the only direct control the city has over the BPD. Yet the city is its primary funder and pays its legal fees*.

*In recent years, payouts to lawsuits related to BPD police misconduct have far exceeded budgeted estimates.

Major changes to BPD’s policies or structure still must be approved by the Maryland State legislature. The majority of these efforts fail.

The common reaction when I mention city control of the BPD is “it’s not gonna happen.” But why? And why don’t we talk about this history?

We can’t seriously talk about this history like it was race-neutral. Union troops occupied Baltimore for 4 years. Here they are on Fed Hill.

Federal troops deeply distrusted the people and city of Baltimore. It was “neutral” on the surface, but sympathetic to the rebel cause.

I see these pictures and I’m like WOAH. How does this historical reality manifest today via generational memory + trauma for all involved?