Well New York City had 5 families. In Chicago if there were 5 families accardo wouldn't have been making as much money. But that's beside the fact. Accardo was a great boss. One of the greatest but there were better bosses than him definitely. Chicago outfit was as strong as new yorks weakest families but I don't know if I would say stronger than new yorks weakest families. The Gambino's and genovese were a lot more powerful than the outfit. And I never really knew this was a big debate. I always thought everyone just assumed NYC was the most powerful. Which they were in my opinion.
I think most would agree that the NY families were always bigger and stronger than the Outfit. But there's always been a number of Chicago posters who get uppity about this. They're very defensive about the "rep" of their hometown crime family. And beyond that, it's taken a long time to wear down the myth that the Outfit is still as powerful as it once was. Just a few years ago we still had a lot of people on the forums thinking the Outfit still had Chicago in an "iron grip" and more or less controlled the entire city. People thought there were 70, 100, or more members and 700 or more associates. When the feds cited 28 members and a little over 100 associates in 2007, many refused to believe it, almost throwing a tantrum. People thought it still controlled things out west even though there's really nothing left to control. And so on. Even now, there are those who equate just about any and all corruption in Chicago with the Outfit in some way.
I would've never guessed that. Chicago has been down for a while. It used to be one of the strongest families in America only behind the 5 families in New York. During both their heydays I would say all 5 families were probably stronger than Chicago. With the more weaker families(even though they were still far from weak, just in comparison to gambino, genovese) being closer to Chicago but still being stronger. And obviously today all the families in New York are a lot stronger than Chicago. Even more so than before.
