PolackTony wrote: ↑Mon Aug 24, 2020 11:01 pm
Out of curiosity, which families do we have evidence for having both a consiglio/seggia body and an official Consigliere position? In these cases, I'm assuming that the Consigliere also sat on the consiglio?
- Milwaukee definitely did according to Maniaci. He was the one who originally called all of this to my attention and sure enough other examples of this formal consiglio started to pop up all over the 1920s-1960s.
- Antonino Calderone in Catania referred to those on the consiglio as "consiglieri" (plural) and said it included the administration and captains. He says the family also had an official consigliere.
- The St. Louis source said John Ferrara had been one of the "policy makers" on the "council table" and he was later identified as the official consigliere by other sources, so there may have been overlap in him having that position and sitting on the council. That source said the St. Louis "council table" would meet at the boss's funeral parlor after funerals to avoid LE scrutiny.
- Looks like Cavita's Rockford example had the official consigliere also sitting on their "inner ring" which appears to be their consiglio.
- San Francisco had an official consigliere ID'd by Lima during the 1920s, near the time Gentile said they had a consiglio, so I assume there was overlap.
Other notes:
- The FBI believed the Detroit family had a boss, underboss, and then listed three "consiglieri" (plural). They didn't have a member source who could clarify all of the specifics during that time (that I know of), but again it totaled five. I've seen descriptions of Detroit having something like a council/panel beyond the normal administration who dictated policy, which would be consistent with a consiglio. I thought Detroit also had an official consigliere, maybe one of the "consiglieri", though I'm not sure. Maybe someone can clarify.
- I'm almost certain this is what the KC informant referred to as "the Men at the Bakery". He said this was a group of senior figures in the Kansas City mafia who Nick Civella would consult with to dictate policy and make decisions. Civella is alternately referred to as reporting to this group as well as having them "under" him. This would be consistent with a consiglio, which was not subservient to the boss but somewhat horizontal to his leadership. The description of this KC group being a group of elder members who met at the bakery and helped the boss dictate policy fits with other descriptions of the consiglio. Makes sense given St. Louis and other midwest families had it.
- San Jose's council/consiglio had a boss, underboss, two "consiglieri" (plural), and a captain.
- Not much on Pittsburgh, only that Nick Gentile describes contacting the consiglio when he arrived there. In Pittston, a group of members sat on a trial for a member that closely resembled the set-up of a simila trial the San Jose council presided over.
- Calderone said it never included more than one or two captains even if the family has more captains than that. This is very interesting because the US families we know of only included one or two captains at most, though in some cases those were the only captains they had.
- The capo dei capi also presided over the Grand Council / Consiglio Supremo which appears to have had the same function as an individual family's consiglio, but on a national level. This is mentioned in both the Giuseppe Morello letters and in Gentile's memoir. The traditional mafia often has an "as above, so below" sort of approach.
This could/should really be its own thread, but it is relevant to Tampa since it looks like they used it as well.