Organized crime was the subject of a large number of widely read articles in several major newspapers and magazines in 1949."Records of Senate Select and Special Committees, 1789-1988," In Guide to Federal Records in the National Archives of the United States: Bicentennial Edition, National Archives and Records Administration, 1989.Thompson, Gambling in America: An Encyclopedia of History, Issues, and Society, 2001, p. 207. Several local "crime commissions" in major cities and states had also uncovered extensive corruption of the political process by organized crime. Many cities and states called for federal help in dealing with organized crime, yet federal law provided few tools for the U.S. government to do so. In particular, many cities and states were concerned with the way organized crime had infiltrated interstate commerce, and how it threatened to hold the American economy hostage through labor racketeering.
