Becoming New York's Finest: Race, Gender, and the Integration of the NYPD, 1935-1980

In the postwar years, after excluding women, African Americans, Latinos, and other minorities from its ranks for most of its history, the New York City Police Department undertook an aggressive campaign of integration. This exhaustively researched study provides the first comprehensive account of how and why the NYPD came to see integration as a potent political tool, indispensable to policing. At the same time, it shows how white male rank-and-file cops at the same time came under siege from an increasingly controlling management and critical public. The Policemen's Benevolent Association advocated for higher wages, better working conditions, and more control over policing practices while simultaneously fighting to turn back the tide of integration. Out of a complex and multifaceted story, author Andrew Darien presents here a nuanced but accessible narrative of civil rights in the largest municipal police force in the United States - one that is more relevant than ever as Americans continue to struggle with the fraught interrelationships of race, gender, and policing.