If Al Capone had been cured of syphilis, which ruined his brain and led to his death at age 48 what would happen?
in 1942 or earlier after served his sentence for tax evasion, would be welcomed with open arms in Chicago or would end up like Colosimo?

Who were his supporters and who his enemies?

On one hand, I want to say that he'd gradually take a step back and allow the natural rise of Nitti, Accardo & co.

However, with Al Capone being Al Capone, I think he'd want the complete power until death, which was inevitable(premature death, that is).

I hate to say it, but I think Capone would've probably been hit if he'd have made it out of prison healthy.

When the Combination requested that he report for jail duty, they already knew who would be running the show on the streets of Chicago while the Big Guy was in the can. And it's not like the mafia to be "nice" to someone to let them slide on doing a bid on a gun charge to let the heat blow over. The heat wasn't going to blow over if Capone ever got out, which is why he was probably going to be hit.

Good question by the way.

No question he would have been hit.
He was not made ! and he would have never taken a back seat while he was is sound mind and body.
Things changed quick in the sort of time he was away for that life..

[/quote]
How is Capone not made. He sat on the commission for Chicago from its inception until his conviction. His successor is Ricca, is he considered made? Both came up during same period.

Its known that both dealt with New York as equals and were undoubtly recognised as such by New York families.[b][/b] [/quote]
I find that rather weird as well I have never heard anything that would suggest Capone not being made. Hmmm.

+1

Serp could you elaborate?

And these 'What if' threads are rather pointless tbh.
Anything could've happened.
"Insert here" your favourite ending.

Edit: nothing directed at Furio. You're a valued contributer in my book.

The Chicago organization was recognized as a seperate "family" on every possible national mob meeting or commission in the past. Dont forget that being "made" in the Chicago Outfit was never the same as being "made" in the rest of the national Cosa Nostra families, not untill the late 1970's.And thats why the Chicago mob always had non-italians as members of the organization. Even in the late 70's and early 80's they had a non-Italian boss on the ruling panel.

As for Capone, we can never know for sure what would've happened. Nitti has done worst, and he didnt get whacked because of it.Instead he killed himself. During Ricca's control over the Outfit, he never ordered the murder of any boss and they all made big mistakes during their careers.Looks like Ricca played by the rules

Al capone went into semi retirement before he went to alcatraz and they was still sending his envelopes to florida. If he wouldn't have gotten sick he would have a front boss until he felt like officially retiring

. Sorry for the confusion. This is what I was talking about ...

Capone was essentially finished as Outfit boss when he went away on the double-digit-sentence tax rap. None of his biographers (and he's had two excellent ones) has said he exerted any control over the Outfit while he was away. In fact, Alcatraz was designed, in part to completely isolate the most high-powered criminals from their associates--only Capone's immediate family was cleared to visit him.

As for the Commission: One of Charlie Luciano's most brilliant moves was to name Capone (rather than himself) as "chairman." He did it to bring the Outfit into the Commission even though it wasn't an official Mafia family at the time. He also did it to try to curb some of the Outfit's most blatant excesses. The St. Valentine's Day massacre, for example, brought unwanted heat down on the Mob, and Luciano wanted to prevent any further missteps. Luciano also named Bonanno as "secretary" of the Commission--an attempt to bring the old-line Sicilians around to supporting his view of accepting non-Sicilians (and even non-Italians) if they could be helpful.

But wasn't Vincenzo Mangano the chairman? Don't remember where I first read that though. Or was he named chairman only after Capone went to jail?

The chairmanship of the Commission might have rotated. So it was a shared duty that different bosses might have taken on when the last chairman's term was up.

On Capone:

The only way he doesn't get hit after getting out of Alcatraz healthy is to shelve himself. I just can't imagine him returning to Chicago to reign supreme after doing a gun charge bit.

Was he made?

Not until the Commission was formed and he was named a Boss.

So Capone has the distinction of entering the mafia proper as a Boss, not as an associate or soldier and working his way up, or as in Luciano's case...as a Capo or Underboss. This is assuming Luciano was Masseria's number two when he finally entered the mafia.

Vince Mangano was named as first Commission chairman in Bonanno's book and Capone was alledgedly appointed capo by Masseria during the Castellamarese war to enlist Capone's support against Maranzano as, apparently Maranzano was supported by Capone's Sicilian rival Joe Aiello.

Sorry that's a bit of a tongue twister!

Thanks Sonny never knew that ...

So what year was that.
I always thought he was never made, and he was rolling and at the top 20 years before they started the commission.
I did know he came to A.C back in the day but that was right before he got pinched..

Well it was supposedly right at the beginning of the Castellammarese war, so it would have been late 1929 or early 1930. I'm guessing 1930, as that would tie in with the Capone Aiello truce brokered at the Atlantic city meeting, just before Capone went to prison.

Not entirely trustworthy version from the Mary Ferrell site:

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=141904&relPageId=45&search=masseria_AND capone

And another slightly more reliable one:

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=99269&relPageId=5&search=masseria_AND capone

As SonnyD pointed out, Capone was connected to the Masseria clan. Theres also a story that after the murder of Masseria, Maranzano was planning to kill Capone also and so the young turks made an example of Maranzano.

During the Castellammarese conflict Paul Ricca was sort of a “peacemaker” between the warring factions but secretly the Capone gang “supported” the Masseria clan.It was the era of backstabbing games.The Eastern mob found Ricca to be very responsive to their desires to connect with the otherwise isolated Chicago mob.They saw Ricca as a very secretive and shrewd mobster.After the deaths of Masseria and Maranzao, Luciano and Lansky had a big meeting in Chicago with Ricca and Agoglia who was an ex-NY mobster and close confidant of Ricca.

Agreed about the position he held with Masseria, but at that early date...was Capone considered a bonafide member of the nearly all Sicilian mafia at that time? I'm not sure, which is why I pick the date of the formation of the national Commission as Capone's official induction date.

According to Joe Bonanno, and a couple others, like Alex Hortis, Capone was recognized as a part of the Sicilian-American Cosa Nostra, by Joe Masseria during the Castellamarese War, for Capones support during the conflict. It goes back even farther than that though as Capone was from and came up in the same neighborhood and crew as Frankie Yale and his boys, and Yale was a close confidant of Joe Masseria. According to some sources, Capone was already aligned with Masseria, and they knew of each other, well before Capone went had to leave NY for Chicago .

You have to be careful about what you read about al capone from the journalist back in those days,the mafia kept the journalists in the dark about the inner workings and it made the journalists guess a lot just to get the headlines.they also mis-quoted mobsters, the most famous mis-quote about capone camed from guzik, a reporter asked him if Capone will return as boss and the mis-quote that made the headlines was "guzik says that al is as nutty as a fruit cake" when all that guzik said was "you guys think al is as nutty as a fruit cake, you guys think he can't walk a mile without holding someone's hands" it was sarcasm om guzik's part nothing more

I think they would have asked him to retire to Florida. If he didn't then it's lights out. They didn't want all the heat. The new guys in charge like Ricca, Accardo, and Hump didn't want the high profile Capone mob anymore.

It wouldn't surprise me if someone wanted to whack Al Capone, then his allies came up with the gun bit at the conference to please everyone else.

Joe Bonanno was who I had in mind. I was thinking about Bonanno when I made my earlier comments. In the books he published, I don't recall Capone being recognized as a true member of the Sicilian Mafia before he was named as a "father" over the Chicago "family". I seem to recall Joe Bonnano being outraged in his book that someone like Capone could be inducted and acknowledged as a "father". Of course, there is a big difference between alignment, and induction.

ive always had the understanding that al capone was a neopolitan, and not a Sicilian, ive also read he was close to Frankie yale, before his rise.