Some of these posts hae nailed it. Puzo and FFC wanted us to relate to Don Corleone as a kind of Robin Hood figure. He helped the poor paisan against the unjust pezza novante, he obtained jusce when the corrupt courts and police did not deliver it, and he kept the old neighborhoods safe. We don't ever see the seamy underbelly of book making, loan sharking, numbers, and union thuggery in which he was heavily involved.