r/socialism•9 yr. ago

Let's talk about slavery, indentured servitude and the American prison system.

Note: This post isn't meant to be entirely thorough, or a formal essay piece, or anything like that. I'm just compiling common research and arguments in a simple reddit post to begin to outline how much of a problem this is in our society. Do your own research, because what I cover can't even begin to show how amazingly horrifying the private prison system is in America. Ask the people over in r/excon if you want first hand accounts.

"Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction."

Thirteenth Amendments

When you're in school, you're usually taught that slavery was completely abolished in America. This is only technically true; it abolished formal slavery, but not all forms of involuntary servitude. Prior to the Thirteenth Amendment in the colonial era, the terms "slavery" and "involuntary servitude" were not exactly synonymous. Several historians say that the Africans were initially brought as involuntary-indentured servants, rather than slaves. Instead of "buying" or "selling" the person, it was "buying" or "selling" the services for an amount of time, much like a modern contract would work. [1]

It just so happens that because their "managers" held the advantage of being brought up in the right contexts, they were literate & fluent in English, whereas the Africans were not, so these "contracts" ended up being for life. Specifically for those of African descent. In 1640, we see one of the first cases of judicial & legislative differentiation in treatment based on racial grounds with the case of John Punch, an African-American, who was punished along with 2 fellow slaves, white. Punch was punished with a life sentence of servitude while his white counterparts were given only 4 extra years.

The minute language and grammatical nuances of the Thirteenth Amendment have been a point of contention since its ratification, but more specifically in 1789 with the Northwest Ordinance. The Northwest Ordinance was less abstract with its intentions:

There shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said territory, otherwise than in the punishment of crimes whereof the party shall have been duly convicted: Provided, always, That any person escaping into the same, from whom labor or service is lawfully claimed in any one of the original States, such fugitive may be lawfully reclaimed and conveyed to the person claiming his or her labor or service as aforesaid. [2]

Several statesmen argued, as is classic for this subject, that any law trying to prohibit indentured servitude was crossing with state's rights. Several states followed this example by being even more clear with their state constitutions, and fighting for a change in the Constitutional amendment's wording to abolish slavery, but allow indentured servitude as punishment for crimes.

So how does this relate to the prison system today?

When we think about history, we tend to think of it as a series of monolithic events far off into the past, rather than a very real movement of time that is nonstop, constantly leading into what we call the present. We are not disconnected from our history, and it is not so far gone as to say that it does not affect us. Remember, the Civil Rights Movement was just within the last generation's lifetime. Martin Luther King Jr. would be only 88 today were he not assassinated.

Setting aside conversations about how the history of slavery & indentured servitude contribute to the severe wage inequality gap present in America, classism and racism as a whole, and the systemic violence towards the black race for another day, let's talk specifically about the prison system in America as it relates to indentured servitude.

In an 1870 Virginia Supreme Court Case, Ruffin v. Commonwealth, the Court declared that those incarcerated are "civilly dead" by virtue of being incarcerated [3]. This, of course, means that they lose fundamental rights that the rest of us do have. In the 20th Century, Courts refused to acknowledge allegations that slavery was occurring in prisons, because they failed to distinguish between slavery and indentured servitude, and indentured servitude was constitutionally permitted by the Thirteenth Amendment. Various prisoners have taken to the courts to demand that their forced labor without pay in the prison system is slavery, yet courts sided with the prisons and held that they were going to apply the Thirteenth Amendment as it is.

Courts historically have sided against the prisoner when it comes to the subject of "are prisoners human beings?". In capitalism, where human rights and profit collide, profit usually wins.

“One unusual aspect of living in the Arkansas governor’s mansion was getting to know prison inmates who were assigned to work in the house and the yard … using prison labor at the governor’s mansion was a longstanding tradition, which kept down costs.

Hillary Roddham Clinton, It Takes A Village, 1996

It's no coincidence that the Nixon regime's "War on Drugs" specifically targeted the antiwar left and the black community. It was no surprise when a top Nixon aide, John Ehrlichman, stated that the War on Drugs started specifically for the purpose of disrupting those communities [4]. It's no coincidence that America has the highest prison population total, despite not being the most populated country [5]. The system that worked actively against black people fought tooth and nail to continue to use their labour for profit legally. No other society in history has imprisoned more of their citizens. 1 in 100 adults were incarcerated in 2014. 86% of all incarnations are based on non-violent, victimless crimes. The majority of them drug related [6]. When you see Attorney General Jeff Sessions spouting rhetoric about marijuana, it isn't just harsh senile conservatism, but an effort to keep the War on Drugs active and profitable. This isn't some new revelation; this is fairly common knowledge. People have been protesting this since Nixon, and even before then.

Simply googling "corporations that use prison labor" will show you how many major corporations still profit off what is essentially legalized slavery.

50 Corporations Supporting Modern American Slavery

Prisoners are left either without compensation for their labor or left with a meager pay, mere dollars at a time for a full day's labor. In 1979, the Prison Industries Enhancement Certification Program was enacted, which allowed and encouraged the sale, distribution and manufacturing of products made with prison labor [7]. The Program sets out some rules and regulations that must be followed to be eligible for it, but those regulations became significantly more lax by the '90s, when corporations like Walmart, Starbucks, etc joined the fray. The Department of Justice outsourced regulatory oversight to the NCIA, which led to significant abuses & neglect of the Program's rules and regulations.

Various Human Rights groups have denounced the US prison system for not complying to basic human rights, torturing inmates and forcing involuntary labour without proper compensation. This is not normal. This is capitalism.

I worry that this post is getting too long, so I'll just finish off with some further reading you can do to educate yourself;

Prison Labor In America

Textual & Historical Analysis of the Thirteenth Amendment

"It's just dressed up slavery"

Abuse of Human Rights in American Prisons, Human Rights Watch | 2 | 3

Torture in US Prisons | 2

Slavery And Prison - Understanding the Connection

Hillary Clinton, Jeff Sessions and America's Secret Slave System

Citations

[1] https://memory.loc.gov/ammem/awhhtml/awlaw3/slavery.html

[2] http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/nworder.asp, Art. 6

[3] https://www.law.ufl.edu/_pdf/academics/centers/cgr/11th_conference/Tim_Maloney_Rights_of_Detainees.pdf (this paper is really great, outlines the various rights that prisoners do and do not have)