1960's Law and Justice | Juvenile Delinquency

A Rising Tide.

By the 1960s the term juvenile delinquency had come to mean any sort of antisocial act committed by a young person. It included not only criminal acts but also behavior perceived as harmful to society and destructive to the people involved. While the first few years of the decade represented a continuation of trends established in the 1950s, by the late 1960s the nation faced a significant increase in youthful violence and drug use. Even more alarming was the accompanying social disaffection and overt challenges to political and social institutions.

Modern Problems.

In part these developments were symptoms of an expanding society growing less personal and less integrated. In the smaller, traditional communities most people knew one another personally. Black sheep children were less likely to become a criminal statistic. Instead, their family and friends would exert pres-sure to conform and...