Part of The Student Room Group

  • Join over 1.2 million students every month
  • Accelerate your learning by 29%
  • Unlimited access from just £6.99 per month

American West q2

Extracts from this document...

Introduction

The reasons that there was such a high level of lawlessness in the west can be split into five main factors: Geographical factors, political factors, social factors, economic factors and the values and attitudes of people in the west. The main geographical factor is the sheer vastness of the west. It was a large and mostly empty area and travelling was a difficult and time consuming process. Not only was the west mostly vast and empty, but at the time transport methods were slow so any judges or hired officials could take months to reach a town in the west. However, not only did the geography of the west hinder any forms of law enforcement, but it also helped criminals. ...read more.

Middle

This is because politicians simply didn't see the west as an issue worth spending money despite the high rates of lawlessness. Settlers didn't just go to the west from all over the country, but from all over the world. This caused conflicts between the large amounts of ethnic groups. There was also the fact that settlers followed a don't trust anyone philosophy because they didn't know anyone and didn't feel safe. This meant that there many potential sources of conflict. On top of this, following the civil war soldiers returned home with no idea of how to function in regular life again. So instead they decided to put their 'skills' to use and take to a life of crime. ...read more.

Conclusion

The values and attitudes of people in the west also contributed towards the high levels of lawlessness. Almost every man in the west carried a gun and even in the rare cases where there was law enforcement available, people chose to solve problems themselves. With there being high rates of drinking, gambling and prostitution in the west, arguments could break out easily and quickly evolve into violence. With it being legal to shoot a man if he had a gun claiming it was self defence, gunfights were all too common. In conclusion I think that that the combination of lack of law enforcement and the large amount of people that carried, and were willing to use, guns, are the main reasons for the high lawlessness in the west. Joseph Williams 11RW Abertillery Comprehensive School Law and Order in the American West Assignment One Question 2: Why Were Towns in the West Violent and Lawless Places? ...read more.

The above preview is unformatted text

This student written piece of work is one of many that can be found in our GCSE History Projects section.

Found what you're looking for?

  • Start learning 29% faster today
  • 150,000+ documents available
  • Just £6.99 a month

or


Not the one? Search for your essay title...
  • Join over 1.2 million students every month
  • Accelerate your learning by 29%
  • Unlimited access from just £6.99 per month

See related essaysSee related essays

Related GCSE History Projects essays

  1. 'Law and Order in the American West'

    beaver's neared extinction and buffalo meat and buffalo hides became more popular in Europe the buffalo became the Fur Trappers' primary target. The Fur Trappers were not the only ones interested in the buffalo trade but any settlers who saw their potential as a means of earning money.

  2. Arab-Israeli Conflict

    His behaviour also led to war in 1967. However, in 1970, Nasser died, so he couldn't provoke war in 1973. Instead, the Arabs raised the price of oil, thereby affecting the world's economy. For these reasons, I believe that oil was not the only factor which caused the three wars between the Arabs and Israel.

  1. World War 2 Letter

    We sometimes use machine guns, there amazing it fires about 600 rounds a minute. They take six men to run and it has to be on a flat surface. A soldier inside the machine gun died due to the heat that is created.

  2. American West

    made even harder yet as there were no roads to help peoples journey or help them get to where they were needed. Because of the problems with transportation however this problem was later resolved when the first railroad was opened.

  1. swansea and the Blits version 2

    complex (This would have been an obvious focus for the Germans interests. Germans also sent spies out to Swansea to find out about the town. They sent plans over Swansea to take pictures of the area and they purchased maps of the town and edited it into German.

  2. In the time period of 1840-1895, commonly known as the American west, pioneers set ...

    Smith found the plates, and translated them, and created the book of Mormon. It tells the tale of Old Testament tribes moving from Israel to America after Mormon rose from the dead. Whether or not Smith actually encountered this vision, and If his statements were true is very sceptical, especially

  1. Nottingham Castle Q2

    In the model of the castle you can see there was a portcullis. But in the renovated part of gatehouse there isn't a portcullis, but you can see where it was placed, so the model appears to the accurate and I know that castles in medieval times would have had a portcullis to stop enemies getting in.

  2. Portchester Castle Q2

    It was a widely used technique called undermining that brought the plinth into a typical feature status. It was designed to stop attackers from standing with their backs to the walls where the archers inside the keep could not shoot at them as they dug underneath the wall to make it collapse.

  • Over 160,000 pieces
    of student written work
  • Annotated by
    experienced teachers
  • Ideas and feedback to
    improve your own work