The Unwritten Law: Individual results may vary

Yet another item for which I have no citation data. I think this is from the Chicago Tribune though. “Drummer” here refers to a traveling salesman, not a musician.

“I will blow your liver out”

Chicago Tribune, January 4, 1851. It’s been a while since we’ve run an Unwritten Law drama. This one’s pretty intense, starting with that quality bad-guy dialog from murdered libertine Abraham Redden.

Case closed

Detroit News, May 10, 1931. Okay, we’ve solved the slaying of “dime-a-dance hostess” Virginia Brannen: She was bumped off by the mob for talking to the law. And the going rate in gangland for killing a prostitute in 1931 was $300.

Saps, rising

Detroit News, March 28, 1931. “Yeah, gettin’ wise, see? And the boss don’t like it, see?” Observe how subtly the cartoonist has captured the signature phrenological traits of the constitutional criminal. No sign of our old friend Merciful Percival though. Perhaps even he finally got wise and they had to rub him out, see?

Death Wish 2

Detroit News, March 26, 1931. Here’s our friend Merciful Percival again, he of the soft hands and softer heart. It’s amply clear he’s just in this for the rough trade, no? I’m not sure this cartoonist is earning his paycheck though.

Pencil neck

Detroit News, April 3, 1931. Michigan was debating whether to reinstate the death penalty in the Thirties, in response to the gangland murders that had become a part of daily life under Prohibition. On the editorial page of the News, the anti- side was invariably represented by this long-haired, po-faced, pencil-necked, bleeding-heart little douchenozzle. Fair and balanced coverage decades before Fox News.