The
Texas Rangers are the earliest form of state law enforcement in the United States, becoming an American law enforcement force following the annexation of Texas to the US in 1845. They were originally organized by
Stephen F. Austin in 1823 for settlers in what was then the Mexican state of Coahuila y Tejas. The first ranger force consisted of ten men charged with providing protection from Native American attacks. Though the rangers of this era are today considered law enforcement officers, they rarely wore badges and were little more than volunteers; the Mexican military was officially in charge of law enforcement for the area. The Rangers later served as a paramilitary force during the
Texas Revolution which led to the creation of the sovereign country of the Republic of Texas, under which they served from 1836 until annexation by the US in 1845. They then continued their role for the state of Texas, serving especially on the U.S.-Mexico border, and in several armed military conflicts, including the
Mexican–American War and the
American Civil War. They continued to fill basic law enforcement and frontier protection roles until the close of the "wild west" era. In the early 1900s, they transformed into a criminal investigative agency. The history and legacy of the Texas Rangers has spawned numerous depictions in popular culture. The colloquial image of a Texas Ranger "always [getting] their man" has likewise made the Rangers a revered and highly competitive agency within law enforcement, with fewer than 1 in 100 applicants being considered for a single position. The
Pennsylvania State Police (PSP) force emerged in the aftermath of the
anthracite mine strike of 1902, in
Pennsylvania. The passage of legislation on May 2, 1905, did not provoke controversy because it was quietly rushed through the mine-owner dominated legislature, but the strike-breaking role of the new police elicited strong opposition from organized labor, who likened them to the repressive
Russian
cossacks under the
tsar. President
Theodore Roosevelt, himself a former President of the
New York City Police Commission, noted that the
Pennsylvania State Police were intended to replace the
Coal and Iron Police, a private
company police used primarily to counter union organizing: Roosevelt's assertions notwithstanding, the Iron and Coal Police continued to operate in increasing numbers into the 1930s. The formation of the
New York State Police (NYSP) force on April 11, 1917, was done amidst controversy and public debate, and the legislation creating it passed by only one vote. Proponents of a proposal to establish the
New York State Police depicted state police as the policemen-soldiers of an impartial state in labor disputes, and saw in them no
gendarmerie, intimating that labor's opposition was "un-American". Instead, they were to be more like the
trooper police of
Australia, both of which had a much more respectable reputation than the maligned forces evoked by
trade unionists. Outside of Pennsylvania, the new state police were also established to free up the
National Guard from strikebreaking duties, which was extensive in the later 19th century and early decades of the 20th. The strikebreaking demands on the New York state police decreased over time and their mandate modernized with the creation of the inter-state highway system and proliferation of the automobile. While the early "state troopers", as the name implies, were
mounted troops, by mid-century they were fully motorized police forces.. Two years later on June 19, 1919 the newly formed
West Virginia State Police (WVSP) was formed to combat and put down the in the coal and mining industry. 3 West Virginia State Troopers were killed in the two years it took to put down the uprising. The WVSP was also used very heavily during the
prohibition era for hunting down and destroying
moonshine stills/operations throughout the mountainous and rural areas of
West Virginia, which resulted in some deaths of WVSP Troopers. WVSP is the 4th oldest State Police agency in the United States of America. Governor
John Jacob Cornwell was insistent upon having a State Police force which he said, "was mandatory in order for him to uphold the laws of our state." Part of the compromise was the name of the organization: "West Virginia Department of Public Safety" was the official name until 1995 when the name was changed to "West Virginia State Police" during the legislative session. The federal government in the 1920s was generally distrustful of southern states establishing state police, fearing the agencies would be used to oppress black citizens from voting and exercising their civil rights. Additionally, southern states were non-union and had little need for such state police, as did some northern mining states. During this time the
Ku Klux Klan (KKK) was also on a resurgence. In response, the southern states established agencies to regulate the increasing problems related to motor vehicles and highway safety, such as licensure compliance, vehicle registration, speed enforcement, vehicular equipment safety, vehicle insurance laws and drunken driving. Over time, these agencies were vested with general police powers, but remained focused primarily on highway and vehicular law enforcement.
North Carolina for example established a DMV motor vehicle theft investigations unit in 1921 to combat a rising problem with car theft, but the state realized a need for a larger, uniformed highway patrol agency to solely enforce traffic laws statewide. Local NC sheriffs did not have the personnel, resources or training to do so during that era, but did not want their powers usurped by a per-se state police agency. Thus, the
NC State Highway Patrol was established on July 1, 1929. Its original command staff was sent to the Pennsylvania State Police Academy for training. Upon completion, these lieutenants and a captain returned to NC and started the SHP with a training camp for new recruits at Camp Glenn, a WW1 abandoned army post in Morehead City. Chartered to enforce traffic laws only, in the early 1930s the NCSHP had added in its charter that it had powers to deal with among other crimes, bank robbery. This was done at the request of the federal government, so that local states could assist the FBI during the rash of bank robberies in the gangster era of the Great Depression in the 1930s. During this time, the FBI issued 100 spare Thompson .45 caliber sub-machineguns to the NCSHP, to prepare NC troopers to help the FBI combat the rash epidemic of bank robberies at the time. The expected scores of bank robberies never occurred in NC, instead being an epidemic confined to the sparsely-populated and vast areas of the Southwest, Midwest and Great Plains states from Texas to Minnesota. The guns were kept in the main SHP armory in Raleigh and never issued. The weapons were returned to the Federal government in the mid-1980s. In 1919
Virginia established a motor vehicle enforcement agency and it was established as state police in 1932. Kentucky established a highway patrol in 1935 and it was established as state police in 1948, but these states, located on the border of the previous Civil War south, were more under the watchful eye of the federal government than were deeper southern states. The only deep south, former Confederate State to have a true state police agency is Louisiana. The
Louisiana State Police also first started out as a highway patrol agency but in 1936 it was established as a state police, at the desire and influence of the late Governor
Huey Long, who used the troopers as a powerful body guard force. Long is often called one of the most powerful Democratic politicians in US history. ==Types of state police agencies==