Blog #84 – Convict Leasing and the New Jim Crow
“Work, warden Cain posits, is an important part of the rehabilitative process. Prison labor provides a way to pay society back for the costs of incarceration.”
If embed doesn’t work, use link to watch Angola for Life: http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/09/prison-labor-in-america/406177/
Between the film, Slavery by Another Name, and the article in the Atlantic, “American Slavery, Reinvented,” we have seen how African Americans have been systematically affected by prisons. After Reconstruction, as we saw in the film, prison acted as another form of social control that arbitrarily put black people behind bars and forced them to work in dangerous conditions. This was known as convict leasing. Many black prisoners helped rebuild the South after the Civil War by working in mines, factories, and other industries. It was industrialist John Milner from Birmingham, Alabama who envisioned the convict leasing system as a way to help industrialize the South after the Civil War. Prisoners had little economic value, unlike the previous slavery system, because these prisoners could be replaced if they are overworked, died, or injured on the job. Prisoners were allowed to be whipped, and the bottom line, as always, was about productivity and profits. These prisoners were 50-80% cheaper than paid labor, so it made economic sense for the industrialists to lease convicts. Morally, however, that’s a different story. Harvest time saw an increase in arrests for trumped-up charges, the most notorious being vagrancy or loitering. And because Black Americans represented over 30% of the prison population, higher than the demographic average of 12% of the American population, Black Americans came to be associated with crime and danger. We still see this today with the shooting of Trayvon Martin and other African Americans who are killed in circumstances where whites doing pretty much the same thing somehow survive.
Debt peonage, or debt slavery, had been outlawed in America in 1867, but was used by landowners as a cheap source of labor after Reconstruction.
“The most corrupt and abusive peonage occurred in concert with southern state and county government. In the south, many black men were picked up for minor crimes or on trumped-up charges, and, when faced with staggering fines and court fees, forced to work for a local employer would who pay their fines for them.”
When President Teddy Roosevelt cracked down on debt peonage, hundreds and hundreds of Black Americans wrote to him asking for his help in freeing relatives. The Alabama cases appeared to be examples for the rest of Southern landowners, especially when TR pardoned the men on trial.
Today, prison has been called the new Jim Crow because of its adverse effects on Black Americans. See the chart below to get an idea of how many people of color are imprisoned vs. white people.
Today, there are more Black people involved in the criminal justice system than were enslaved in 1850, according to Michelle Alexander, the author of The New Jim Crow. Felons who have served their time can be discriminated against in housing, voting, education, and employment, all because they’ve been in jail and have served their time. Some of the laws of the 1980s and 1990s that cracked down on the crack cocaine and crime epidemics during those decades adversely affected people of color more than it had whites, especially in the prosecution of crimes involving drugs. For instance, the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 had stiffer penalties for crack cocaine use than for powdered cocaine, which came down hard on black communities more than it did white communities. Alexander believes that prison works as a new racial caste system that replaced Jim Crow laws outlawed in the 1960s by the Civil Rights Movement.
In the article, “American Slavery, Reinvented,” it describes how prisoners who are deemed healthy enough by the prison physician can be put to work. If a convict refuses to work, he/she can be thrown into solitary confinement, losing the opportunity to visit with their family, and loss of good time served. 2.2 million people are incarcerated, the highest number in the world, according to the article, and some of them work in jails that had been prison “farms” or “plantations” after Reconstruction, like Angola in Louisiana or Parchman Farm in Mississippi. Some of these convicts are employed in call centers, and also do work for military manufacturers or sewing clothes for Victoria’s Secret. Nor is any of the prisoners’ work covered by any existing laws that prevent free workers from being exploited by employers. Also, being mentally ill increases your chances of being in prison. And, factors like illiteracy, poverty, mental illness, and drug addiction increase your chances of going to jail. These are issues that transcend prison and cross over into the social and public health realms.
But should we feel sorry for these prisoners and ex-cons? The Atlantic article talks about how “prison labor provides a way to pay society back for the costs of incarceration, as well as a pathway to correct deviant behavior and possibly find personal redemption.” Because that’s what prison is for, right? Rehabilitation? Or is it to lock up those members of our society deemed too dangerous to be out among society? Are all the 2.2 million in prison irredeemable people? Are some of them innocent? Another argument for prison work can be seen in this quote:
“Why should prisoners sit with idle hands when the rest of us must work to put a roof over our heads and food in our bellies? Perhaps the low-to-no-wages paid to incarcerated workers are a form of pay garnishment, a sort of compensation for the costs of [prison] room and board?”
Or. to take it one step further, why do criminals deserve our sympathy? Should prisoners get humane treatment, especially if they’re “murderers, criminals, and all manner of sinners and deviants”? The 8th Amendment prohibits cruel and unusual punishment, but that usually applies to the death penalty and other forms of abuse. Shouldn’t prisoners have their freedoms restricted b/c they have broken the law? We are not following the Hammurabi code of an eye-for-an-eye, but there is a feeling out there that prisons are for punishment and not rehabilitation.
Your informed opinion matters. Please make sure that you read the Atlantic article and take some time to watch the 13 minute video on life at Angola prison in Louisiana. My questions are:
- Should we reform our prison system to make it more responsive to those who have mental health issues or are petty criminals? Why or why not? Feel free to use the article’s arguments or your own.
- Has prison really changed from what we saw in Slavery by Another Name? Why or why not?
Due Thursday, March 10 by class. 300 words minimum.
More info on the school-to-prison pipeline: https://www.aclu.org/fact-sheet/what-school-prison-pipeline
1. Absolutely. I believe it is indispensable that the United States reforms our prison system to help accommodate for those with mental health issues and become more flexible to those who have committed petty crimes. Our nation is incarcerating people left and right and many of these people are fighting mental disabilities. According to “The Atlantic”, the majority of the people currently incarcerated have mental disabilities. Prisons are becoming more like mental facilities or asylums because they’re housing so many with mental disabilities. Mentally ill people are being charged for crimes such as murder that because of their disability, they had either less control or no understanding over the act they were committing. As opposed to being incarcerated, these people need help. We need to figure out a way to aid those who are ill without punishing them and treating them as if they are criminals. A divide between the mentally ill and criminals is a necessity. Punishing people who break the law with full control and knowledge of the act they are committing and punishing people without control of their actions is completely unjust. A different issue on the table is how to deal with those who commit petty crimes and the affect race has on ones sentencing. A constant trend throughout America’s history, is to stereotype. Most frequently based upon race. Blacks are more likely to receive a harsher sentence than a white man that has committed the same crime. This type of sentencing is not only immoral, but is a slap in the face towards everything our country has put so much effort in for more than 100 years. Equality. Abraham Lincoln set our nation on the right track towards achieving equality for everybody, but by sentencing blacks and whites differently due to the color of their skin is an act we could see occurring in the 19th century, certainly not the 21st. Not only do we need to make sure race is not a factor when sentencing those who’ve commit petty crimes, we also need a separation between those who’ve shoplifted and those who have murdered their families. Clearly these 2 crimes are of completely different levels, so, they should not be put in a prison together. I think several prisons should be made that house people who’ve commit crimes of each level. This would be beneficial because then people that have commit murder will be together and those who’ve shoplifted will be together.
2. I believe that slavery has seen some drastic changes as time has progressed. Even though the video displays prisoners being forced to work, often times for as little as 2 cents an hour, we still see improvements that have been made. In the Angola prison, prisoners have the ability to be rehabilitated. I think that now as opposed to prisons being strictly a place for punishment, they’ve veered towards route centered on rehabilitating oneself and changing themselves for the better. For example, the Malachi dads, from the Angola prison, were able to recreate themselves and be better people for their families. Through the prison experience, they’ve been altered as a person for the better. In the film, Slavery by Another Name, those incarcerated did not every receive rehabilitation, they only were faced with punishment. In todays prison systems, people often have jobs. Back in the 19th century, jobs were used strictly as punishments, whereas in todays prisons, jobs can be used to help prisoners. As John Sheehan explained, he enjoys working because through his work he feels a sense of accomplishment and he feels as though he’s giving back to the community. We certainly are far from having an ideal prison system, but we have made several moves in the right direction.
1. In my opinion our prison system is in dire need of reform to accommodate people with different sentences or different mental health issues. Someone who committed a minor felony shouldn’t be in the same facility as a mass murderer and mentally ill prisoners should definitely be in their own facilities and be able to find treatment. I feel that prison should be used as a place of rehabilitation except in the most extreme of cases. Obviously a man like the one who committed the Charleston shootings last year or extremely violent or heinous crimes against the community and should never be released and you could even argue the death penalty for some but that is a whole other can of worms that shan’t be opened right now. There should be options in prison for people who want to do something to better themselves like learning a trade. This should be an option for all prisoners but if there are special cases this can still be revoked. Rehabilitation should be readily available in all prisons as well.
2. I think that although conditions for prisoners these days are poor and there are many issues in the prison system, it is nowhere near the horrible conditions we saw in the Slavery by Another Name video. In this video people would be arrested and sentenced without even a trial or a fair one and I think it is a stretch to claim that this sill happens today. You simply could not arrest someone nowadays without going through a court and usually courts only punish people if they’re really guilty. Also the labor in today’s prison systems have been greatly reduced as well. In the video we saw prisoners working in mines and being whipped and none of that would fly today. So in my opinion yes the prison system has changed greatly.
1. To treat all prisoners identically in terms of labor requirements, regardless of if the criminal committed a petty crime or a major felony, is inherently injust, and it is further unjust when combined with the facts that racial minorities and those with mental illness are statistically more likely to be falsely incarcerated. In prisons alone, a definite and solid line needs to be drawn separating different levels, if you will, of crime, and these should dictate how said prisoners are treated. Somebody consciously choosing to break the law (e.g. murder, rape) is entirely different from the situation someone is in after committing a minor crime (e.g. shoplifting) while not being entirely intent or aware of doing so (though this may vary depending on the crime itself). False incarceration is yet another problem all too abundant, illustrated not only in today’s disproportionate numbers of black and mentally ill prisoners, but also in a bit of dialogue from the video, Angola for Life, where an inmate is interviewed, explicitly stating he did not commit the crime he was incarcerated for. This, of course, depends on if he was lying or not, but there is regardless ample fact to back up his statement.
2. Like any possible facet of society, prisons have evolved, but there is still massive progress to be made. Convicts are not used for such dangerous labor as coal mining, nor are they bought and sold freely as laborers, however the impacts of false arrest still linger. To me, it’s inherently disturbing that we’re still able to compare “modern,” “civilized” prisons so closely with what was quite literally a substitute for slavery in the later 19th century. While today’s conditions are certainly nothing like slavery, they are harsh and oppressive enough that I believe their very foundation goes against prison’s purpose of rehabilitating criminals.
1. I believe that the prison system should be more responsive to be people with mental health issues and petty crimes, as it simply is not fair. Although the Angola prison appears to have people mainly convicted for things like second degree murdered without parole, I think that it would be considered a cruel and unusual punishment to have someone that stole some groceries from target be picking from the fields from sun up to sun down while he was in prison. In addition, I think it’s important for people to recognize the seriousness of mental illness, and to make sure that the people that have mental illnesses and getting out of prison are healed of that. However, I don’t think that mental illness should be an excuse for one not to get put in prison, for excuses that are inaccurate. There have been many people who are able to develop for the better as a person after leaving prison (Malcolm X for one). This is seen in the film, as they had prisoners not only training fellow prisoners on becoming mechanics, but leaving tools out that would’ve inevitably led to violence if some of those individuals had had their hands on them before being put in prison. There need to be special programs for those mentally ill and incarcerated, or we will continue to live in a society where we have things like sadness, depression, and suicide somewhat glorified in the, or a complete fear of mental illness to the point where we avoid helping individuals with it. .
2. Slavery by Another Name and multiple other resources show that the prison industrial complex is the
New Jim Crow. There similarities are endless. For one, similar to convict leasing after Reconstruction, incarceration affected mainly black populations and little to no white populations, similar to today how Black Americans and Hispanics combined make up 58% of the prison system but only 25% of the US population (from NAACP.org). This shows that not only are these groups targeted more, but also seen as criminals and incarcerated for crimes who’s verdict most likely would’ve gone differently if the roles were switches (the Trayvon Martin case, for example). And while there are prisons out there that aren’t like Angola where the conditions are nicer, it’s most likely that those states don’t have as high of black population to fill the prisons with. In addition, as Burl Cain in the excerpt from the Angola scene, that Louisiana and most likely other Deep South states, have some of the strictest incarcerations in the country. The thing that makes this very similar to convict leasing is the fact that some of the prisoners get payed as little as two cents an hour, which appears very similar to convict leasing and other systems that make it near impossible for someone to get out of it. The prison system all and all, is a reinscribed form of slavery.
I believe that there are definitely ways that prisons could try and help for those who have mental health issues and petty criminals. I believe that those who are put in jail for petty crimes should not have the same sentences as those who committed acts like 2nd degree murder, but I do believe that they need to see the wrong that they have done. This may include a shorter sentence and parole, but it still gets the message to them. For those with mental health issues it is unfair to treat them in the same way as any other prisoner. I say this because if a prisoner had a broken leg you would not make them do the same work as those who have use of both legs, it is the same with mental health, if you mental health is damaged you don’t go and put it to the test. I know it is hard to comprehend some mental health issues, but it is still an issue that people have to deal with even though it may not be physically fixed. I do believe that prison has changed in many ways that do not resemble slavery. I believe that prison are trying to become more of a place for rehabilitation then a place for criminals to just be put away for their life. For example in the Angola prison they have a mechanic shop for those who have shorter sentences can learn how to be a mechanic when they get out instead of stealing what they need. And for prisoners who are in for longer sentences can work their way up to an easier and/or higher paying job. I also believe that while they are forced to work they are not being worked to death or exhaustion. I do believe that they work to learn how to keep a job and work for the food and housing that the government pays for with taxes on citizens. Many things have changed since the 1880’s and mostly for the good.
The ultimate solution to the problem regarding prison systems is to maintain a functioning public mental health treatment system so that mentally ill people do not end up in prisons or jails. I believe that if a mentally ill person is found guilty he/ she should be sentenced to however long in prison. If the person was that ill they should have been helped long before they were able to commit any crimes. In my opinion it also matters how serious the mental illness is, for example, I do not believe depression should be considered a mental illness. With regards to petty criminals, I do not believe that there is such a thing. If you are a criminal, you have committed a crime and were sentenced in response to whatever that crime was. You have earned your place in that prison and the prison system should not change their ways for you. If the man or woman did not want to be in prison they might have thought longer before completing their action; or they knew what they were doing and therefore deserve to be in prison. Prison is known as a terrible center, in many minds the greatest punishment to exist. I firmly believe that everyone understands that and no one wants to end up in prison. Therefore, mentally ill people should be treated and helped before it is possible for them to commit a crime and petty criminals should not be let off easy or treated better. The prison system has greatly changed since “Slavery by Another Name.” Prisoners were treated as animals and considered less of a human because of their lawlessness. They were made to right the wrongs they committed, through physical pain applied in cruel ways, or torture. When in prison their life was also not as strict as today’s.
Honestly i believe we should adapt the prison systems for people who have mental disabilities, depending on their crime, and people who have done petty crimes because those are two things that needs to be discussed in prison. If you go to jail and you have some type of mental disorder then the doctor at the prison should investigate your condition and say if you are able to do such work or whatever you’re doing in prison but if you committed a major crime and you had some type of disorder there should still be some type of punishment that comes to you instead of having the doctor saying that your sentence should be shortened because you are still a liability to the U.S. and we can’t let you go scott-free because of your disorder. Now if you did a petty crime, you should go into jail and serve your time as a petty convict but putting them under work would be unnecessary. Prison has changed but not as much as a big change as people think and i believe we should observe and change a few things about our prison system because to me it’s very hard to believe that all 2.2 million people in jail in the U.S. is just a very bad number to look at and a certain amount of people in jail and what they’ve been put in jail for can be in completely different ranges when it comes to crime and there’s a lot of things that happen between the cell mates and much of the security doesn’t even stop what happens behind bars. This new Jim Crow is really unbelievable also. How is it that 1 in 11 blacks are put in jail but 1 in 45 whites are put in jail? It’s like the darker you get in color the more you have to watch out for things like this and I don’t want to live my life always looking over my shoulders because there’s a 1 in 11 chance of me going to jail or worse yet dying because of the recent cop events.
1. Our current person system is incredibly unfair to minorities, people with mental illness and three poor. Currently, murderers are being locked in the same facility as low level drug offenders and the severely mentally ill. My mother works with kids that are mentally ill and one day she told me a story that solidified my view on this. A couple of months ago, she got a call from a distressed mother. She asked my mom for only one thing: to keep her teenage son out of prison. A couple of weeks before he was in a mental hospital, he was soon turned away for being so mentally ill that the facility didn’t have the resources to care of him and the next stop was prison for this young man if we could not find a hospital willing to handle a boy so sick. He very well might be in prison now, despite the fact that he has never done anything wrong. Other victims of this system are minorities. African Americans and Latino men are imprisoned at a disproportionate rate to white Americans. These groups make up about 30% of our population but around 60% of our prison population. (https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/race/news/2012/03/13/11351/the-top-10-most-startling-facts-about-people-of-color-and-criminal-justice-in-the-united-states/) Most of the people ineed jail are there for small drug offenses.
2. Yes this system is very similar to what we saw in slavery by another name. As I stated above, most minorities are locked up for drug offenses and done so disproportionately to whites as most all races do drugs at a similar rate, whites get away with this use about twice as much. This is similar to in the video when black people were locked up for minute offenses such as loitering. Even though we have made progress and offenses that small are no longer issues, it still is not fair that some people with non-violent drug offenders are serving incredibly long sentences in prisons around the nation, when what these people really need is addiction treatment. This system must be reformed. Currently the US has 2.4 million people in jail according to some estimates (http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2014/09/17/3568232/the-united-states-had-even-more-prisoners-in-2013/). The reforms must be of the prisons, US and state laws, and mental health institutes. On the issue of drugs, there is a system called drug courts which focuses on treating addiction rather than criminal charges and has been proven to work.(http://www.nij.gov/topics/courts/drug-courts/pages/welcome.aspx). As for mental health reform, we need stronger, more capable, mental health treatments both in hospitals and treatment facilities and in out patient services. Only these reforms will ensure our nation’s freedom and democracy.
Should we reform our prison system to make it more responsive to those who have mental health issues or are petty criminals? Why or why not? Feel free to use the article’s arguments or your own.
I feel that our prison system should take a more responsive position to people who have mental issues because those people are in a different situation then someone who has committed a crime knowing what they were doing and not because they were struggling mentally. Also people who are mentally ill should be cared for in a different manner than people who are in good health. Because they might have committed a crime because of their mental illness and someone who is in good health would have done it knowing what they were doing completely. People who suffer from mental issues might also need to be cared or even treated differently because of their illness. Also I feel that people that have committed petty should be housed along with people who have committed more heinous crimes because they have committed a crime no matter how big or small. And hopefully being separated from society will teach a criminal how to be integrated back in society.
Has prison really changed from what we saw in Slavery by Another Name? Why or why not?
I do think the prison system has changed from what we had seen in Slavery by another name. The major disconnect being that slaves had no choice in the position they were put into. They were supposed to what they were told, when they were told to do it, with no extra comments or they were punished accordingly. In prisons, you are put into that type of environment where you are to do as you are told because you have lost the opportunity to govern yourself in a responsible matter according to society because you have committed a crime or breaking the law. While your ethnicity may have something to do with you being accused of committing a crime or doing something illegal, it may also have a correlation to how many other people of your race are being jailed along with you as you can see from the way black were treated after emancipation and how many of their rights were taken away even though they were citizens.
1. Should we reform our prison system to make it more responsive to those who have mental health issues or are petty criminals? Why or why not? Feel free to use the article’s arguments or your own?
For those with mental health issues, I definitely think the justice system needs to be more responsive. The people that have mental health issues need help with their mental illness, something they cant help have, and the justice system isn’t providing them with this help right now. As for petty criminals, I don’t think we have an obligation to be more responsive to them. I understand in some situations we may need to be more sympathetic and understaffing of what’s going on, (Situations like gang life being pushed on young impressionable youth), but overall I don’t see any good reason to cater to the whims of criminals, even if they are petty. If anything it will make them think the next time they go and commit a petty crime. They’ll l see it like this: “Will the reward for this petty crime be greater than the risk?” After seeing what its like for petty criminals in jail, the most logical response to the risk reward question is NO. When I say we shouldn’t be more responsive to them, I don’t mean that we should work them hard or whip them or anything crazy like that, I just don’t support more lenient sentencing for the crime.
1. Has prison really changed from what we saw in Slavery by Another Name? Why or why not?
I think prison has changed since what we saw in Slavery by Another Name. The first thing I want to address is that disparities in statistics do no automatically indicate that something is racist. Just because more blacks are incarcerated every year than whites does not mean the system is racist. If you’re going to push this absurd narrative than you’ll need different statistics. I also think the point brought up about blacks being targeted by the Drug Abuse Act of 1986 is completely ridiculous. If you don’t want to go to jail for a crime than don’t commit one, and don’t blame the system when you go to jail. This mentality is huge problem, take responsibility for your actions. As for jail, I think the fact that if you refuse to work, you get put into solitary confinement, is horrible. This definitely needs to be reformed. The physical labor itself I don’t think is wrong at all. If you are able and willing to work under safe conditions I think it’s a great use of your time in jail (which is being paid for by public tax dollars). Bottom line, jail needs to be a safe place free from discrimination and health hazards. I think jail has changed since what we saw from Slavery By Another Name but there is a lot that we need to do to make the jail system better.
The solution to the problem of prison systems is to maintain a functioning public mental health system so mentally ill people do not have to spend time in a public jail or institution. I think that a mentally ill person should be helped before they have an opportunity to commit a crime. This prevent many sick people from being mixed in with felons in prisons. Most mental illnesses are serious and all should be treated the same, with lots of caution. Petty criminals should see how it is in a prison, so I do not think they should change their ways for them. They should see how the prison life is and change their ways of life so they do not have to return there. Prisons should not change their ways because you ended up in that prison by committing a crime. That is not fair, that person had the choice to make the right decision but chose otherwise and prisons should not change for them. Most people knew what they were doing at the time and still followed through with it and sort of deserve to be in prison. Prison is said to be a greater punishment than the death penalty because of the horrible conditions and the people in confinement. Mentally ill people are to be helped before they have the opportunity to commit a crime and petty criminals should be treated just like a prisoner serving life in prison. Sure, that seems harsh but it will engrave in their minds not to commit a crime again so they will not end up there again.. The prison system has changed a lot since “Slavery by Another Name.” Prisoners would treated like dirt, they had no rights at all and weren’t even noticed. These types of prisons were made to help change the people inside of these prisons, trying to make what they did that was wrong right again. To teach these prisoners, the prisons showed physical pain, which included torture. Today, our prisons are way more secure and strict due to safety precautions compared to the older prisons, which there was a lot more leeway.
The question should we reform our prison system to make it more responsive to those who have mental health issues or are petty criminals is a difficult question. There are arguments for both sides and I believe that both sides have a valid argument. The argument that says that it should be reformed has many valid reasons such as that the people with mental health issues aren’t always at fault for the actions they take. Also, people who commit petty crimes should not have to endure the same punishments as those who commit felonies such as murder. They do need to receive some sort of punishment and for the most part, I do believe that the judicial system does a fairly good job at giving appropriate punishments. In the article they talk about how the prisoners at Angola prison typically serve long, even life, sentences. I believe this shows that in a way, although it may not be ethical, the judicial system bases punishments on the severity of the crime. I believe that prison has somewhat changed from what we saw in Slavery By Another Name because there are not many prisons that do what prisons like Angola do. Although they may be forced to do labor, like in Slavery By Another Name, it isn’t like convict leasing where they can push them to their breaking point and abuse them severely. But there is still lots of change that needs to happen in order for the system to be fair. The ratio of white to black men in the prison system is completely skewed towards black men even though they aren’t committing crimes at a significantly higher rate than white men. Another controversial issue is that about compensation for prisoners for the work they do at the prison. Even though some do hard labor, they are paid as few as two cents per hour. I am unsure of where I stand on this issue because I can see where some people may say that they deserve to earn more while others say that they should not receive pay at all. What I am sure of is that there needs to be a major reform of the prison system.
Scotti P.
1. In my opinion, I believe that people that have committed any form of crime that possess mental illnesses should be allowed to go through certain aspects of rehabilitation before they get incarcerated. I understand that people diagnosed with mental illnesses are not completely dominate and the illness can be to the extent of severity that it can literally control your mind and your physical actions. People that have illnesses to this magnitude, depending on the severity of the crime, should ALWAYS be offered a rehabilitation before they get forced behind bars. Similarly, I believe that all jails should have the same process of being able to diagnose all ill criminals before they get sent into jail. Therefore, they would specifically understand what disease they have, possibly attempt to figure out how to treat the disorder, and depending on how horrible the crime was, decide whether or not once he was been rehabilitated with a medicine or cure for their disease they should send them off with possibly a probation or send them right back to jail.
2. I highly agree with everyone stating that jail cells have progressively improved and softened their living and working conditions over time. In the 19th century, according to the movie we watched, anticipation of black crime was tense. People suspected that blacks were always going to do wrong and that everything they do wrong should be sentenced to prison. Blacks were sent to jail for little things such as vagrancy and debt. I feel like prison conditions have drastically increased because of the lack of enforcement of convince leasing, and the fact that prisoners had no choice but to work long and dangerous shifts of coal mining and metal picking. In addition, the warden of jail cells always keeps the prisoners occupied, whether it is feeding them, or allowing them to work out and pursue minor recreational activities. Jail members have the option of creating and joining clubs, they are allowed to attending therapy seminars, and they are allowed to begin or maintain their religious views.
First, the prison system should be more responsive to people with mental health issues. I understand you may have done something awful, but if something is really wrong with you then that needs to be address. Sometimes people with mental illnesses are more prone to do rash things. That’s why you see mainly white people not going to jail or getting a sentence they deserve because they are called depressed because of something that happened when they were a child. Even though you may be depressed or have any type of mental illness that doesn’t give you the right to go on a killing spree. So, yeah I believe that they should be given the same sentence as a person that did what they did who doesn’t have a mental illness, but should receive treatment and medication to maybe help them out because they still are a human being. Onto petty crimes. I don’t think someone should get 10+ years for having a gram of weed on them and another person get only 3 years for rape, which I have seen happen. I t’s just not logical. First, weed isn’t going to kill you or scar someone for life. Sex offenders should not be allowed to walk the streets ever again. This goes to that school to jail pipeline because you see little black kids ending up going into the prison system for something as petty as stealing something and they never make it out of the system. The only way out is death.
I don’t believe that the prison system has really changed from what we saw in Slavery by Another Name. Yes, there are some changes such as the prison guards can’t beat you with a whip or not feed you, but black people are more likely to be thrown in jail for petty crimes. As we have stated in class the African American race is a minority, meaning we have less people, so why is it that there are more black people in jail than white people when we are the lesser race. Just how it was in the video Slavery by Another Name. Black people are shown as convicts and we see it all the time in pop culture. Is it that white people don’t do drugs or black people are arrested more frequently because they are racially profiled and the police officer comes up with some reason to arrest them. A graph from the Huffington post said that 20% of the white population has tried compared to 10% of the black population in America. People in prison are worked hard and they barely receive any money especially not enough money to try and make a living after they get out of jail. Also, because of these petty crimes that people get arrested for they aren’t able to get a job because they are discriminated against for having a previous run in with the law. Have you ever thought about it someone can’t get a job a job, so they can’t supply the basic needs for their family, so they steal food, then one day they get sent to jail for stealing food for their family and when they get out they can’t get a job so the cycle starts over again.
Skye T.
1. I think depending on how severe the crime or the health issue, every prisoner should be looked at individually. I believe someone who has a mental health issue should not be put in the same place as a healthy person who has done something terrible. This does happen, many people are in innocent and still living a life sentence. In the video Slavery by Another Name we saw many cases of small crimes like loitering being given long prison stays, with harsh work. This was another time, now everyone is watched and many things like cruel and unusual punishment, and peonage are now illegal protecting prisoners. Although people don’t think criminals deserve this there are sick, and innocent people in prison, and everyone deserves the best way to become a better person.
2. I believe prison has changed since Slavery by Another Name, compared to the Angola prison in the short documentary. In the video we watched in class that focused on convit slavery. Convit slavery was the most brutal out of control prison system i have ever heard of. In these convict prisons we learned about from the late 1800s, the prisoners were sometimes worked till death. This is no longer allowed, with all the connections we have today, if someone were to die in prison from overwork many people would know about it quickly. If you take a closer look at the Louisiana Angola maximum security prison you see that, even though most prisoners are there for life, they have started different ways of life. In the Angola prison, prisoners have jobs, participate in religion, and take or teach classes. Most prisons are seen as a glum dangerous place but here prisoners are letting go of the dangerous personalities they once had and becoming new and better people. This completely new and different then the prison life seen in Slavery by Another Name these prisoners had no hope and most had never committed a crime close to what the people in Angola had done.
I believe that we should reform our prison system to make it more responsive to those who have mental health issues or petty criminals. Because being mentally ill increases people’s chance of being in prison, they should be able to get help inside in order to prevent them from coming back if they get out. The help should teach them life skills to use in ordinary life in addition to helping them get jobs, either in or out of prison. Petty criminals or people without violent convictions should also have access to jobs. Because illiteracy and poverty increase your chances of going to jail, people inside should have opportunities to learn and get skills for jobs so they won’t return.
Prison has changed a lot from what we saw in Slavery by Another Name, however some of the most important problems continue today. People are still forced to work in order to stay out of solitary or be able to see their families. They work for almost nothing, the article mentioned that some of them work for as little as two cents an hour. While the living conditions may have changed, the working conditions clearly have not. Another huge problem is the population of prisons. There is still a disproportionate amount of minorities in jails. This shows problems not just in prisons, but also society. Many people are still fearful of other people of different colored skin. Prisons also usually don’t take mental illness into account. It may have been excusable a hundred years ago when little was known about mental illness, but today there is no reason why these people don’t have access to help.
We definitely should reform our prison system to make it more responsive to those with mental health issues and petty criminals. Mental health affects a large portion of our everyday lives, is extremely difficult to live with, and incredibly difficult to treat, not to mention expensive. Putting someone who’s already struggling with poor mental health into an even more stressful environment where they might not even receive the correct treatment is cruel. Also since it’s statistically more likely that people with poor mental health are incarcerated it makes sense that prisons are better suited for those more likely to be serving time. However is our prisons were reformed so that they’re better suited to handle people with mental illnesses, serving time wouldn’t have to be as stressful. Also, petty criminals shouldn’t have the same experience serving time as those who have committed more serious crimes. Prisons should be reformed so there is a different system for those who have committed petty crimes.
Though Prison has better conditions than the debt slavery we saw in the Jim Crow South in Slavery by Another Name, there are still many similarities between the two. For example, being forced to work, and the color of those affected by debt slavery and our criminal justice system. In prison people are forced to work, and if they refuse they are put into solitary confinement. This treatment is especially cruel to people with mental illness and people serving time for petty crimes. Similarly in Slavery by Another Name, we see people forced to work in terrible conditions in order to pay off debt, which sometimes wasn’t even real. Also in Slavery by Another Name, Blacks are mainly targeted and forced into debt slavery, the same happens today with prisons with many more people of color involved in the criminal justice system than whites. In conclusion I believe that even though conditions have drastically improved there are still many similarities between the two.
Blog 84
In my personal opinion, I believe that we should reform our prison systems to better help the inmates that actually have or show signs of mental issues, and or have committed petty crimes. I believe that the prison system is not suitable for people with mental issues because their condition may affect the way they act and or are treated in prison, also I believe that mentally disabled people need to helped or pushed toward rehabilitation. People who committed petty don’t deserve to do time in hard prison, I believe that the government should create a list of petty crimes that permit for prison but not hard prison there should be multiple levels and types of prisons. One for level one crimes, one for level two crimes and so on. This would put the inmates in a better environment than throwing all different types of inmates together. I believe that prison has changed a lot from what we saw in Slavery by Another Name. In that film we saw free black people being taken to prisons every month because companies needed free workers to work for the companies. Nowadays people no longer take free black people to prison strictly for their labor. If someone goes to prison, I believe it is because they committed a crime worthy of going to prison. Also in Slavery by Another Name, the workers were whipped and beat to the point were they almost couldn’t work. Nowadays people still get beat in prison but it is not nearly as bad or as often. Also in prison there are now fair amounts of food and every has a place to sleep even if it is in a cell. The people that are in prison deserve to be in prison as long a they have committed a crime that is worthy of that level of prison.
1) I believe that America’s prison system in need of change, but for the right reasons. Firstly, I was unaware that people with mental illness are subject to time in prison. This is a major issue and slippery slope for a few reasons. #1, People with mental illness can not be accountable for their actions, this can not be compared to someone under the influence of drugs because consuming drugs are classified as your own actions. It is unjust to send someone to prison for doing something they have power over changing. #2, By sending a mentally ill citizen to prison, Americans are invalidating their natural rights given to them by the Declaration of Independence. “all men are created equal,”inalienable rights,”life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” – Jefferson. We take away a mentally ill person’s liberty and right to live as an American citizen despite their disability when they and sent to prison for crimes that can not help doing. #3 Citizens with mental health issues are classified by a minority, and by giving them unjust prison sentences we are discriminating against their inability to take responsibility for their own actions. As America grows older, it is crucial to deeply recognize each individual and who they are because not all rules can apply to everyone and still be classified as justice.
2) Based on the video, it is relevant that the American prison systems and peonage have taken another form. Although prisoners aren’t being been sold off to private companies or whipped, they are still working against their will. In the video, prisoners are forced to work in fields and pick crops. They are paid, but that is irrelevant. The fact that they HAVE to work is enough to claim that peonage is alive today. That being said, prison systems have seen change. They do not work in slavery-like conditions and as said before, they are paid. This is peonage under another name and needs to be changed. Prisoners should not be forced to work, whether they are paid or not.
1. I believe that we should reform our prison system to make it more responsive to those who have mental health issues or pretty criminals. People with mental disorders that affect their senses of reality, personality, or identity and compromise their judgement can’t be blamed for having those disorders and making poor decisions. Mental disorders can impair someone’s ability to make sound judgements. They should be treated with the care that is best for them, although they may be in prison, as their minds may not have been clear. A large majority of those in prison have mental disorders and in some cases cannot be held responsible for the actions that landed them in jail. Instead of being punished for something out of their control they should be given help to assist in them overcoming their disorders or at the very least making it more manageable. Being a criminal and having a mental disorder are two different things and should be treated as such. Petty criminals should not be harshly punished as other criminals are. Sure, they might do something purposefully detrimental again, but for first offence petty criminals they should be more lenient and understanding and go from there. If someone committed murder and someone else was caught dealing drugs, why should they be treated with equal punishment? Yes, they both committed crimes and did something horrible, but that isn’t justification for treating them both poorly.
2. In Slavery by Another Name it show the horrid conditions that prisoners are being put to work in. Although it does have some striking resemblance to slavery, I do believe that the system has changed and come a ways since slavery. Many of the cruel and inhumane practices of the prison system years ago have been outlawed and therefore no longer in use (obviously). Prisoners have access to a lot more, and in some cases even have classes and other things available. However, there are still lots of issues with the system such as working for very little pay, restrictions on visitors, and sexual harassment that still persist. Racism is also a large problem not just in society, but in prisons as well. They are targeted in the system and receive more punishment and harassment than whites. Although (most) the people at these prisons have committed heinous crimes, I think that they still deserve equal treatment. They are, after all, still people, susceptible to pain and suffering like others (like the people they could have hurt from their crimes). That’s no excuse to treat them like their lives mean nothing. Yes, prison is meant to be a punishment and rehabilitate but that doesn’t mean people can treat them so poorly. Though it has come a long way, I believe that there is still room for the prison system to grow and reform.
In my personal opinion, people who are mentally disabled or have an mental illness, should have different treatment than mentally stable individuals. First of all, they should have an extensive set of tests or procedure that must be followed when convicting someone who is mentally ill or mentally disabled, that way the people that decide where a person will be held, is more educated about the specific person. Its about making each case more personable to all parties involved. Because each person is different, there should be the same principle guidelines, but certain rules and regulations followed to insure that the person is put in the proper building with the proper care. Also, although people may be mentally ill or disabled, doesn’t necessarily mean that they should receive different punishment for the same crime that someone who is sane committed. Im not a huge fan of pleading insanity, because in some cases, not all but some, is just a last ditch effort to shorten a sentence. Unless the person who is accused of a crime and pleads insanity is tested thoroughly and right, then it is a reasonable pardon.
Prison has changed, but very slowly. I don’t think you can single out an event in history as “the day that changed prisons,” but with the help of technology and innovation, prisons have changed. Now I haven’t been to prison, nor do I plan on attending, but in the two or three instances in which I have spoken to a cop, been to a prison or seen something about one on television, you see change. Prisoners have jobs in some cases. They can work in various places around the prison such as laundry rooms or in the kitchen. I believe that not only is there better treatment of prisoners, but prisons actually rehabilitate more people than 10, 20 or even 100 years ago, like I believe they should.
P.S. I apologize that this was late.
1.) In my opinion, we should reform our prison system to make it more responsive to those who have mental health issues or are petty criminals, because not every individual was incarcerated for the same reason. Just because a person may be mentally challenged, they can’t be assumed to be a criminal and thrown in jail. Instead they must be sent to a mental ward/facility like an asylum, not a jail. The article has even said that over half of the prisoners in the U.S suffer from a type of mental condition. Yes, one might argue that some killers…honestly most killers suffer from some type of mental disorder that played a factor into their actions. I agree with this and believe then, these types of prisoners should stay in a high security prison. Those who suffer from mental illnesses that play more on emotion like depression, schizophrenia or, suicidal thoughts should go to an asylum. Mixing these types of people in prison with people (not all) who might by murderers, rapists, or other serious offenders can be detrimental to the mental state they are already in. The prison conditions are also unacceptable for those who are mentally ill. According to the Angola Prison labor article, some people feel as though prisoners deserve to be treated poorly since they made criminal and inhuman decisions. But how can this “eye-for-an-eye” concept pertain to those are mentally ill and are classified under criminals? Another question to be posed, is what’s the difference between a person sent to prison for manslaughter and a person being sent for stealing a common model television (or at least an item that’s way less serious than murder)? Today, it seems as though we can’t clearly distinguish the difference, because people who do petty crimes like stealing an item are sent to prisons that hold a mixture of murderers, rapists, and mentally unstable people. Petty criminals, like the mentally ill, should have their own type of correctional facility and not be forced to endure the brutal treatment that more serious criminals deserve. At the same time, these petty criminals and mentally ill prisoners are also put at the risk of danger. They themselves may be beaten, attacked, or killed; especially those who have a mental issue are vulnerable to being taken advantage of.
2.) Yes, I would consider prisons profoundly different from what we saw in Slavery by Another Name in regards to the purpose of correctional facilities and the treatment of prisoners. In the Angola Prison video, we saw a quick glimpse of how the prison functioned. Burl Cain, the warden of the Angola Prison, said that the reason for field work and other alterations he made to the prison was to provide prisoners with a type of rehabilitation and giving back to the community. He Christianized the prison to also help give prisoners the sense that redemption was a plausible possibility in their time their, that prisoners could start to change their lives for the better. This greatly contrasted to the prisons intention in Slavery by Another Name. Here, prisons intended to make profit off of the convicts. They didn’t care whether they felt they were bale to change, be forgiven, or have faith of a better future. Another difference between prisons today and what we saw in Slavery by Another Name is the treatment of the prisoners. In Slavery by Another Name, convicts were treated brutally through convict leasing, which was a popular way to boost the economy. Here, prisoners were loaned out to industries, farmers, and miners to do their work. By using convicts, it didn’t matter how they were treated or, what conditions they were put through. They were beaten, tortured, and even killed by their overseers. Convict leasing was technically slavery by another name. As for prisons today, inside treatments is still unimaginably horrible, but it’s no where near what it used to be back then after the Civil War. A counter-argument to this might be that a sort of convict leasing still goes on by having convict labor. However, when the prisoners work like at the Angola Prison, they have a chance to earn 2 cents per hour. Back then, convicts were the ones who lucked out from any benefits through the system.
Ashley S-S
I personally believe that this country’s prison system is in desperate need of reform, especially as it relates to mental health issues among prison inmates. Much of the prison population suffers from mental health issues that limit individuals’ control of self, affecting their every behavior, interaction and functioning. Instead of warehousing these men and women in prison they should be confined to mental health facilities. These facilities would help these criminals resolve/manage their psychiatric issues and rehabilitate them while still keeping them in controlled custody. At present, we are jailing an excessive number of vulnerable and mentally ill people at tremendous expense. The mentally ill population of prisoners is overwhelming, according to the Treatment Advocacy Center, in 2012 there were approximately 350,000 prisoners with severe mental illness. Decency and common sense requires us to protect our citizens from crime and criminals while treating criminals (mentally ill and otherwise) fairly. The goal of imprisonment should be punishment and rehabilitation. Jailing the mentally ill achieves neither of these goals. Separating the truly mentally ill from the general prison population would save money, resources and help the entire the community. However, overhauling the prison system does not necessarily apply to hardened, violent or repeat offenders who are mentally capable.
Prison today has evolved from what we have seen in Slavery by Another Name. In modern society prisoners do work and are sometimes even employed at laborious jobs, but unlike prisoners of the 1870’s they do not face brutal overwork or lack adequate health care, food and clothing. Today we are fortunate to have more media outputs to raise awareness and cover topics dealing with prisons and correctional facilities. Today we are also stricter on police and guard brutality across the United States. Prisons are now carefully regulated and required to contain certain facilities and maintain strict schedules unlike the 1870’s where working all day with little time to eat or even sleep was common. Is the prison system perfect today? Of course not, but we are making progress to a new standard of living for prisoners around our country.
1) Our prison system is indeed in need of reform- it would make so much more sense to make inmates have better conditions to serve their time. There are still four prisons that use peonage to have inmates serve their time. Many of these people may deserve subservience because some of them have actually done horrid crimes, but only 1 in 1000 eggs contain salmonella…what about the people who were found guilty of misdemeanor, or what about the people who are innocent? What of the minority convicts who were sent to court because of a racist cop and sent to prison because of a racist jury? What of the mentally ill and the wrongly accused minorities that were wrongly incarcerated? I recently heard of a black man with special needs who was convicted of murder, and was found innocent after he was released 25 years later- his lawyer merely explained this as an error in the justice system. Prophet prisons are, again, something that needs to be erased from our justice system…too bad that the only candidate proposing to get rid of them is Bernie.
2) My view on prisons has changed so much after reading the article and watching the video in class. I thought beforehand that maybe congress would have taken care of matters like these back during the Roosevelt Presidency when the trouble with this was at its peak. Apparently not. I understand if there are so many current issues that this might have slipped the legislators’ minds, but for 100 years? It is either seen as insignificant or it is being deliberately ignored. Absurd.