African Americans and the Prison System

Slavery has existed since the beginning of time. Slavery was a system put in place that allowed people to be treated property. In most cases, slaves could be bought and sold. People would acquire slaves through capture, purchase, or birth. All slaves were denied the right to leave, refuse work, or any type of payment for their labor. Slavery was a horrible institution, whose purpose was to serve as an economic system and display status throughout Western history.

Slaves were an economic positive but a social negative in history. They helped the economics of the country thrive and grow, but it was also a insult of a race. Africans also had a history that they should have been proud to have. Instead, they were denied their heritage and were made to be ashamed of the people that they were. The development of slavery was the white slave owners ' way to maintain control of the growing population of Africans, socially and industrially. If the slaves were confined to the fields of the plantations for supervision, the whites would remain dominant race and maintain their theory of "white supremacy." It also freed the slave owners from the worries of labor

Officially Abolishing Slavery America’s history shaped our nation into what it is today. Slavery was a major part of America’s history which should not be overlooked. The term slave is defined as “a person who is the legal property of another and is forced to obey them.” (Mariam-Webster Dictionary) The most eminent cases of slavery occurred during the settling and conquering of the United States of America.

An article entitled “Slavery” defined slavery as “social institution defined by law and custom as the most absolute and involuntary form of human servitude” (“Slavery”). Slavery is when a person is forced into labor without pay and usually slaves face inhumane and cruel conditions and punishments. Slavery is thought to be one of the greatest disappointments in human history as humans forced each other into serving them. The article then goes on to explain how slavery was against the Declaration of Independence but was still very prominent in America in the 1800s. Many Northern states had abolished it in their individual states but there were still millions of slaves being forced to worked in the South.

The United States has the biggest prison and jail population in the world not only by population, but also by sheer numbers. Many of these offenders are behind bars for nonviolent drug crimes and statistically more of those non-violent offenders are African American. African Americans are 13% of the United States Population but make up over 40% of the current jail and prison population. A black man is five times more likely to be convicted of a crime than a white man in the United States. How far have we really come sinse the Jim Crow laws? During the Jim Crow Era African-Americans in some states were treated as second-class citizens in every aspect of life from how they interact with White Americans to not having the right to vote. Many

African Americans have had it hard for them since Europeans came to Africa and sold them as property. We are human just like you guys. There is nothing different about us than the color of our skin. People need to see that and recognize it. America does but some people don’t.

needed as workers and were therefore used as so . What are Blacks needed for

There have been 100,000 African Americans in prison since Brown vs Board of education. The article states that the trend will continue, 1 of every 3 African American males are apparently born today can expect to go to prison in their time, 1 in 6 Latino males, compared to 1 in every 17 White males. But for women, it is much lower, but the ethnicity does not change: 1 out of 18 African Americans, 1 out of 45 Hispanics, and finally 1 of every 111 White females, are expected to serve some time in prison. At any given day, 1 in every 13 African American males between 30 to 39 will incarcerated in a state or federal prison on any given day. This compares to the demographics of the group because in communities of color they are not affected only by incarceration but by high

America has the highest prevalence of jailing its citizens. Nearly 2.3 million Americans are behind bars or nearly one percent of the adult population at any given time (Campbell, Vogel, & Williams, 2015). As of 2014, African Americans make up 34% of the incarcerated population. As a result, a disproportionate amount of African American youth will experience a parent’s incarceration. Research has shown that children of incarcerated parents experience emotional problems, socioeconomic problems, and cognitive disturbances (Miller, 2007). In this paper, I will discuss the impact of mass incarceration in the African American community and its effect on African American children.

African Americans now constitute nearly 1 million of the total 2.3 million incarcerated; that is 60% of 30% of the African American population. African Americas are incarcerated at nearly six times the rate of whites. “Between 6.6% and 7.5% of all black males ages 25 to 39 were imprisoned in 2011, which were the highest imprisonment rates among the measured sex, race, Hispanic origin, and age groups." (Carson, E. Ann, and Sabol, William J. 2011.) Stated on Americanprogram.org “ The Sentencing Project reports that African Americans are 21 percent more likely to receive mandatory-minimum sentences than white defendants and are 20 percent more likely to be sentenced to prison.” Hispanics and African Americans make up 58% of all prisoners in 2008, even though African Americans and Hispanics make up approximately one quarter of the US population. (Henderson 2000). Slightly 15% of the inmate population is made up of 283,000 Hispanic prisoners.

The criminal justice system in the United States is evident of several deep flaws relating to the treatment of black men and women accused of committing criminal offenses. It is logical to believe that due to the U.S.’s rather dark past surrounding the treatment of black Americans, systematic racism is included under the guise of the criminal justice system. The U.S. is historically infamous for it’s open racial discrimination against black Americans, up until systematic racism became one of the more dominant forms of discrimination in the most recent years. Systematic racism has been shrouded under societal ignorance and regulated particularly by social and political groups in order to keep the human rights of black Americans frigid and

"We ain’t thugs for the sake of just bein’ thugs. Nobody do that where we grew at N___, duh! The poverty line we not above. So I come in the mask and gloves ‘cause we ain’t feelin’ the love. We ain’t doin’ crime for the sake of doin’ crimes. We movin’ dimes ‘cause we ain’t doin’ fine. One out of three of us is locked up doin’ time. You know what this could do to a N___ mind? My mind on my money, money on my mind. If you owe me ten dollars you ain’t givin’ me nine! Ya’ll ain’t give me 40 acres and a mule. So I got my glock 40 now I’m cool." Jay-Z

Black people are more likely to work in public sector jobs where they suffer due to the disproportionately from the rejections of the public sector that is brought by the universal reduction of government. In the United States capitalism is well looked after and reproduced behind the Black community. The Black men, women, children live and the community are destroyed as custody gives profit through payments that are being transferred to the private corporations for building prisons. In many prisons, the prisoners are not allowed to make a vote and in some they lose their right to vote after they are released. In the year of 2015 there was a case about a victim named Michael Brown.

African American males are overrepresented in the criminal justice and many times are subject to harsher sentences than their Caucasian counterparts. African American males also experience racial profiling and have more negative interactions than any other population in the United States. Ibie, Obie, and Obiyan states, “African Americans have continued to be the repository for American crime and to be treated as amalgamation of presumed group trait rather than as individuals”. This topic is important because African American adolescents are less likely to be referred to rehabilitation or diversion programs and more likely to be sent to juvenile and/or prison. History has not been kind to African Americans and the injustices experienced by African Americans in the criminal justice system is extremely high. According to Weatherspoon, “The Supreme Court condoned and perpetuated many of the present day stereotypical biases concerning African Americans in the landmark decision of Dred Scott v. Sanford”. Over that past few years, with the advent of social media, the world is becoming more aware of the injustices and brutality suffered by African American males in the justice system. Many view this as a new phenomenon, but others know this abuse has always occurred, it is just now there are cameras taping the violence. Many people are waking up to what is occurring, but there are many others who are denial and who refuse to acknowledge the oppression and racism

Slavery in the United States was a form of unfree labor which existed as a legal institution in North America for more than a century before the founding of the United States in 1776, and continued mostly in the South until the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1865. Most slaves were black and were held by whites, although some Native Americans and free blacks also held slaves; there were a small number of white slaves as well.