he's interviewed by samuel buyler of the urban institute. >> host: with high profile spikes in violation in milwaukee, chicago, washington, d.c., the question and the issue of violent crime has acquired a national salience that it hasn't had since the 990 -- 190s. barry latzer has written a new book. barry, what inspired you to reinvestigate the issue of violent crime? >> guest: no one had really studied in a comprehensive way the history of violent crime, and i felt that that needed to be done especially because, as we both know, the violent crime rates had skyrocketed in the late '60s and really became a major concern for the entire nation for the next several decades, two and a half decades really. so i felt, given the significance of violent crime in the postwar period, a major work on that needed to be done. >> host: now, you do something really unique in this book. most people when they talk about violent crime, they really start in the '60s and '70s with the first spike. you start your story in the 1940s. what made you decide that you wanted to take a longer perspective on violent

he's interviewed by samuel buyler of the urban institute. >> host: with high profile spikes in violation in milwaukee, chicago, washington, d.c., the question and the issue of violent crime has acquired a national salience that it hasn't had since the 990 -- 190s. barry latzer has written a new book. barry, what inspired you to reinvestigate the issue of violent crime? >> guest: no one had really studied in a comprehensive way the history of violent crime, and i felt that that needed to be done especially because, as we both know, the violent crime rates had skyrocketed in the late '60s and really became a major concern for the entire nation for the next several decades, two and a half decades really. so i felt, given the significance of violent crime in the postwar period, a major work on that needed to be done. >> host: now, you do something really unique in this book. most people when they talk about violent crime, they really start in the '60s and '70s with the first spike. you start your story in the 1940s. what made you decide that you wanted to take a longer perspective on violent