3), also played a salient role in the encouragement of criminality among certain groups. The objectives of these laws were flatly to avoid interactions that could amplify the obvious differences between the races and lead to open conflict. Of course, the rules went so far as to ban minorities from holding public office or even exercising the basic, inalienable right to vote. The main aspect of these laws that contributed to criminality was, of course, the fact that members of minority groups were denied access to basic resources, whether schools, restaurants, or restrooms. The overarching perception of restriction and inequality led these people to a situation where they often felt obligated to resort to crime as the only available means for elevating themselves above this institutionally asserted and systematically enforced privation and …show more content…
For example, Willie’s father manages to obtain a doctoral degree while jailed: despite his outlaw roots, he turns himself into a success, albeit a transitory one. It is the ultimate irony that Willie—who grows up in an even more liberal, accepting culture—ends up as one of the most vicious criminals in the history of New York State, having committed hundreds of armed robberies and dozens of stabbings before reaching the age of majority. Ultimately, the reader is left appalled, even haunted, by the intimation that Willie could have ended up as so much more had he taken the positive lessons from his father’s life and simply discarded the negative: easier said than done, to be sure, but, nothing ventured, nothing