The article takes the position that the primary function of the police throughout American history has been to enforce the class, racial, sexual, and cultural oppression that has been an integral part of the development of capitalist society. As a result, any effort to strengthen police powers or to allow the police to become more efficient and sophisticated in their methods must be seen as contradictory to the interests and needs of the majority of the population. This article contends that the police have enforced the oppressive social and personal relations of capitalist society by defining crime by and on behalf of the people who benefit most from capitalism and by selectively enforcing the law against certain segments of society while failing to prosecute other types of law-breakers. This article concludes that the only way to find an enduring solution to the problem of crime is to struggle for a society that can meet people's basic needs, thereby attacking the underlying economic and social roots of crime. 19 notes