History: How We Got Here
The BOPC system is not a 20th-century Pendergast-era reform. It was created during the Civil War as a Confederate power grab, and every subsequent iteration has preserved that original function: insulating police from the communities they police, specifically communities with large Black populations.
1861: Confederate Control of St. Louis Police
Missouri did not secede from the Union, but its governor, Claiborne Fox Jackson, was a segregationist who actively supported the Confederate cause. St. Louis in 1861 had a Union-loyal mayor, Oliver Filley, and a growing population of Black residents and white abolitionists. Jackson could not tolerate a city government that might protect Black freedom.
In March 1861, Jackson pushed the "Metropolitan Police Bill" through the state legislature. The act created a Board of Police Commissioners for St. Louis — four members appointed by the Governor, with the mayor as a powerless fifth member. It removed all control of the police from the city and vested it in state appointees. Basil W. Duke, a Confederate officer who led cavalry raids into Missouri, was among the first commissioners.
One state representative called the bill "an effort to disenfranchise and oppress the people of St. Louis because they were not sound on the Negro question." One of Jackson's own appointees later confirmed that the Metropolitan Police Bill was "adopted to enable our people to control St. Louis."
This is the origin of the BOPC system. It was designed to ensure that cities with large Black populations and Union sympathies could not control their own police forces. It was a Confederate measure, enacted by a Confederate governor, enforced by Confederate appointees, explicitly targeting Black and abolitionist political power.
Referenced document: local_control.pdf (pp. 720-721)
1874: Kansas City Gets the Same Treatment
Kansas City, like St. Louis, had a higher proportion of Black residents and an electorate more sympathetic to civil rights than the rest of Missouri. In 1874, the state legislature imposed the same police board system on Kansas City. The Governor would appoint the majority of the board; the city would be forced to fund it; and the residents would have no say.
From 1874 to 1932, the system was modified several times but the core remained: state control, city funding, no local accountability.
1932: The First Board Declared Unconstitutional
In 1932, the Missouri Supreme Court struck down the existing Kansas City Board of Police in State ex rel. Field v. Smith. The court held that giving the board unlimited discretion to set its own budget — effectively the power to tax — was an unconstitutional delegation of legislative authority. The statute "as a whole must fall."
The system was briefly dead.
1939: Segregationist Governor Lloyd Crow Stark Revives It
State control was re-imposed in 1939 at the behest of Lloyd Crow Stark, another segregationist Missouri governor. The stated rationale was cleaning up the corrupt Pendergast machine. The actual effect was re-installing the Confederate-era governance structure under new management.
Stark's system was revised in 1943 into the form that exists today — a Board of five Commissioners, four appointed by the Governor, one the Mayor, with the city compelled to fund it up to a fixed percentage of general revenue. The current 25% floor descends directly from this.
1968: Occupation in Black Kansas City
During the Civil Rights Era and the 1968 uprising following the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the KCPD acted as an occupying force in Black neighborhoods — deploying extreme force, tear gas, and military tactics. The community most affected by police violence had the least political recourse, because the state had made sure of it.
Referenced document: 1968_mayors.pdf
The Modern Era
In 2021, Urban League president Gwendolyn Grant filed a lawsuit (Grant v. BOPC) arguing that the state-appointed board violates the Missouri Constitution and the Equal Protection Clause. Her motion to intervene lays out the history plainly: the system was created in 1861 "as a result of the State of Missouri's restrictive view of African-American civil rights," and it has remained in place ever since.
Referenced document: grant_21.pdf
Summary
The BOPC system is not a neutral administrative arrangement. It was created by Confederate sympathizers to suppress Black and abolitionist political power in Missouri cities. It was briefly struck down, then revived by another segregationist governor. It has never been fundamentally reformed. It persists because it works as designed.