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donnay
04-26-2012, 09:45 PM
American Gulag: A Lot More Than License Plates

Lyric Hughes Hale (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lyric-hughes-hale/american-gulag-a-lot-more_1_b_1415459.html)
The Huffington Post
Thu, 19 Apr 2012 11:14 CDT


http://www.sott.net/image/image/s5/100789/large/2012_04_18_ConfederateMemorial.jpg
© Missouri State Parks
Higginsville Confederates Veterans Home

The U.S. Civil War, which was fought to abolish slavery, was not really that long ago. My father tells the story of visiting the Higginsville home for Civil War veterans near his childhood home in Missouri. The Missouri River was a dividing line between North and South, and so when the war was finally over, many families had veterans -- and casualties -- on both sides. My father remembers watching two old soldiers, one Union, one Confederate, each dressed up in the remnants of their uniforms, having an argument that ended up with one attacking the other with a pair of crutches. Hearing this as a little girl was the first time the Civil War seemed real to me. It is a vivid reminder of the close links that bind this country to its history of slavery, which still haunts our national conscience.

As I recently discovered, we maintain what can be only be called legalized slavery today -- the utilization of prison labour for public and private profit. Many, if not most, of these inmates are themselves the descendants of slaves. And they are making fewer license plates and more defense electronics and oil spill cleanups. Today prison labor is a multibillion-dollar business in the U.S. We also have the highest prison population in the world. Are economic incentives at the heart of our sky-high incarceration rates?

History can offer us a guide to answer this question. In Britain, slavery was abolished in 1833, earlier than in the U.S. In spite of its economic lure, it was outlawed, at least in part, because of the persuasive voices of inspired political leaders and artists. The painting The Slave Ship, a J.M.W. Turner masterpiece, depicts the famous episode of the British ship the Zong in 1781. One hundred thirty-two African slaves headed for sale in the United States were deliberately thrown overboard and perished mid-sea, due to a lack of drinking water on board. In his new book, The Zong: A Massacre, the Law and the End of Slavery, Professor James Walvin concludes that this event, and the public outcry against it, was the turning point that resulted in the end of the slave trade in Britain. The U.S. was not so lucky, or perhaps, the entrenched interests were too deep, and so a much bloodier battle that ended 600,000 lives ensued, and it took an additional 30 years to abolish slavery.

It is worthwhile to study this history, and to hold its lessons close, because slavery remains in other forms, if not by name, in the 21st century. Mauritania still has a slave population that is some 18 percent of its population, about a half a million people -- although it is technically illegal. The poverty and harshness of the Western Sahara and lack of economic alternatives make it a difficult practice to eradicate. We might expect this in the Third World, but we have versions of it in the U.S. Beyond the plight of the working poor, in the U.S. the practice of involuntary labor continues in our prisons, without much public scrutiny. This practice has evolved since the Civil War, particularly in the South, for historical reasons. Former slaves were incarcerated on minor or fabricated charges for extended periods of time so they could work as inmate labourers for the profit of the state and its contractors.

"In the nineteenth century, Texas leased its penitentiary (which survives today as the Huntsville "Walls" unit) to private contractors. For a few dollars per month per convict, the contractors were allowed to sublease their charges to farmers, tanners, and other businessmen. It was not long before the inmates began to appear in poor clothing and without shoes. Worked mercilessly, most convicts died within seven years of their incarceration. Escapes and escape attempts were frequent. Conditions were so horrid that some inmates were driven to suicide while other maimed themselves to get out of work or as a pathetic form of protest." - John DiIulio, Jr. The Duty to Govern, 1990

Eventually, the prisoner-for-lease system became such a scandal that it was outlawed 100 years ago. But in the 1980s, conditions were ripe for reversion. The 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution that abolished slavery contains a loophole that allows the exploitation of prison labor:

Section 1: 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.

Today, the U.S. prison system delivers profits to both government corporations and private enterprises in several ways: 1) Through the use of inmate labor to produce goods and services in federal and state prisons 2) Through the contracting of this labor to private companies at below-market wages and 3) By privatization of the prisons and detainment centers themselves. Given these perverse incentives to maintain a high inmate population, is it any wonder that the number of prisoners and the length of their sentences -- Americans comprise 5 percent of the world's total population but 25 percent of the world's prison population -- have skyrocketed since privatization began in 1984?


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Number of inmates. 1920 to 2006.[1][2] (absolute numbers) General U.S. population grew only 2.8 times in the same period, but the number of inmates increased more than 20 times.

One might ask if this population surge could be due to a sudden increase in violent crime in America. A much smaller percentage of prisoners than one would imagine have histories of violence. Just 3 percent of those in Federal prisons, and a third of those in state prisons, have been convicted of violent crimes. A majority of those in city and county prisons are merely awaiting trial and cannot make bail. As any policeman will tell you, much criminality would be eliminated if drug laws were changed. Moreover, of the total prison population, it is estimated that 16 percent are suffering from mental illness, according to Vicky Pelaez in Global Research in Canada. And did I mention, the vast majority are black males?

What is the failure of our society that has led to the forced segregation from society of so many of our citizens, many of whom the descendants of slaves, on this scale? In 1860, the U.S. had 4 million slaves. Now, according to Adam Gopnik in the New Yorker (Jan. 30, 2012):

Mass incarceration on a scale almost unexampled in human history is a fundamental fact of our country today -- perhaps the fundamental fact, as slavery was the fundamental fact of 1850. In truth, there are more black men in the grip of the criminal-justice system -- in prison, on probation, or on parole -- than were in slavery then. Over all, there are now more people under "correctional supervision" in America -- more than six million -- than were in the Gulag Archipelago under Stalin at its height.

America has now created its own Gulag and it makes much more than just license plates. Of the 2.3 million prisoners now being held, more than 100,000 work in federal and state prison industry programs. This doesn't mean the usual cooking, cleaning and peeling potatoes, but work that produces products for sale -- about $2.4 billion dollars annually and has its own trade shows. UNICOR, the trade name of the government-owned Federal Prison Industries, cites the following products on its website:

The government, particularly the Department of Defense, is the biggest customer for the federal prison labor. Most military clothing, furniture, and helmets are made by Federal inmates. It is very likely that they made the furniture at your local post office. Calling directory assistance? You might well be talking to a felon. Clearly, UNICOR has expanded beyond clothing and furniture. Look at just one category, electro-optical assemblies:

Our electro-optical and circuit board assemblies, and electrical connectors are used around the world and have broad applications in missile guidance, tactical combat and emergency communications, radar, and avionic and submarine control systems. UNICOR/FPI is highly proficient in electrical and fiber optic cable convergence technology, which is used in applications requiring faster transmission of signals over longer distance and with less weight. Our electro-optical cable assemblies are used in avionic and missile controls, submarine navigation, and tactical observation and targeting systems in fighter jets, helicopters, tanks and other armored vehicles.

Our expertise in manufacturing electro-optical assemblies is proven in numerous programs, such as the Bradley eye-safe laser rangefinder and the Patriot missile guidance system.

We are talking guided missile components here! UNICOR had revenues of about $900 million in fiscal year 2011, of which 7 percent went to pay inmates. According to my estimates based on their annual report, this averages $3,000 per inmate, at least half of which must be used for fines, victim restitution and family support. Assuming a 40-hour work week, 52 weeks a year (there are no holidays in prison) that would amount to pay of about 75 cents per hour, which "may be spent in the prison commissaries," according to the UNICOR annual report. This puts the federal prison worker on par with his Chinese counterpart. No wonder this labor group is attractive to industry: no unions, OHSA, health care or retirement funds to fret about. As UNICOR boasts on its website: "All the benefits of domestic outsourcing at offshore prices. It's the best kept secret in outsourcing!" Actually, it is even better -- although we will not accept imports from Chinese laogai, or prison factories, there is no U.S. law that prevents export of our prison labor products.

Federal prison workers, however, are the envy of state inmates, some of whom earn nothing for 60-plus-hour weeks. Texas and Georgia offer no compensation at all. (It is no surprise that these states have highly privatized prison industries as well.) In The Nation, Abe Louise Young writes about the use of Louisiana state prison labor to clean up the toxic waste that resulted from the BP oil spill:

Work release inmates are required to work for up to twelve hours a day, six days a week, sometimes averaging seventy-two hours per week. These are long hours for performing what may arguably be the most toxic job in America. Although the dangers of mixed oil and dispersant exposure are largely unknown, the chemicals in crude oil can damage every system in the body, as well as cell structures and DNA.

Inmates can't pick and choose their work assignments and they face considerable repercussions for rejecting any job, including loss of earned "good time." The warden of the Terrebonne Parish Work Release Center in Houma explains: "If they say no to a job, they get that time that was taken off their sentence put right back on, and get sent right back to the lockup they came out of." This means that work release inmates who would rather protect their health than participate in the non-stop toxic cleanup run the risk of staying in prison longer.

This kind of cooperation is enabled by PIE (Prison Industry Enhancement), a program run by the Department of Justice, which allows both UNICOR at the Federal level and state prisons to partner with private enterprise.

It is not just the government prisons that have perverse incentives for maintaining high prison populations. It is the very business of warehousing human beings which was privatized in the mid-80s that is to me the most disturbing. Here is a map of private prisons in Texas created by the website Texas Prison Bid'ness:


http://www.sott.net/image/image/s5/100790/large/2012_04_17_prisonmap_thumb.jpg

It just seems to me that judicial punishment is one of those functions that is uniquely the business of the state, and that somehow it is immoral for anyone to profit from this. In fact, two big players, CCA and GEO, weren't doing all that well until 9/11. Since that time, they have also been building immigration detention centers at a very fast pace. No secret that privatization has therefore had the greatest momentum in the border states, including Vermont. It is hard to forget the awful "Cash for Kids" debacle in which two judges (now themselves recently sentenced to prison) took kickbacks for sending children to for-profit juvenile detention centers. Dave Reutter in Prison Legal News quotes Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research: "Privatization just doesn't work" he stated. "It's a way for politicians to throw business to their friends. "

A compelling economic argument against prison labor is that it competes unfairly with free labor. Diane Cardwell writes in the New York Times that UNICOR is now getting into production of solar panels and other forms of alternative energy.

"This is a threat to not just established industries; it's a threat to emerging industries," said Representative Bill Huizenga, a Michigan Republican who is the lead sponsor of the proposed overhaul legislation. "If China did this -- having their prisoners work at subpar wages in prisons -- we would be screaming bloody murder."

There is now pending legislation to create a wage floor for prison inmates, as well as require basic safety standards. The discussion is not just about protecting inmates. In an era of high unemployment, jobs matter. Congressman Walter Jones of North Carolina has said, "It is simply wrong for the U.S. government to administer a military procurement policy that favors giving jobs to felons over law-abiding Americans. That is especially true during these difficult economic times." There is also concern about quality control for defense-related production. Reportedly, 42 percent of UNICOR's orders overall were delivered late.

What are the benefits to society of prison labor? I have read articles that it helps and doesn't help recidivism. That there are better ways to prepare inmates for life after jail, such as education, training, and addiction counseling. What is the overall impact on the economy? According to Jeffrey Kling and Alan Krueger of Princeton University and NBER, 100 percent utilization of prison inmate labor would result in a rather small economic benefit -- 0.2 percent of GDP at most. Because this is mostly unskilled labor it could, in fact, reduce the wages of high school dropouts in the private workforce by 5 percent -- which would increase the overall rate of poverty. (Note, however, that some estimates suggest that people with wages under $13,000 spend 9 percent of their income on buying lottery tickets.)

Kling and Krueger conclude:

In concert with privatization, we suggest that inmate workers be covered by all relevant labor legislation that applies to private sector firms: including the right to form a union, fair labor standards, and workplace safety regulations.

That is the very minimum that must be done. We need to do some national soul-searching about all of the reasons we have so many people in jail. But it is an election year -- and felons don't vote -- so the probability is high that nothing will be done. But let's begin the discussion. As I finish this article, by weird coincidence, police cars are flashing their lights outside my house. A young man, driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol, crashed into the gate of our driveway as he was pursued by an unmarked car for speeding. I saw him as he was led away in handcuffs, in tears. I hope his parents have a very good lawyer.


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donnay
04-26-2012, 09:50 PM
Epidemic of Incarceration Costs US Taxpayers $63.4 billion Annually
Martha Teichner (http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-3445_162-57418495/the-cost-of-a-nation-of-incarceration/)
CBS News
Sun, 22 Apr 2012 09:23 CDTI


Is it fair to call the United States the "incarceration nation"? That's what some experts say. And even some veteran law enforcement and correction officials think something's gone wrong. Our Cover Story is reported now by Martha Teichner:

At the Gadsden County Jail near Tallahassee, Fla., there are bunks, and mattresses on the floor.

The jail has a capacity of about 150 inmates, but there are presently 230 inmates in the facility right now.

Walter McNeil, president of the International Association of Chiefs of Police, sees the same story everywhere he goes in the U.S.

In one "pod" of Gadsen jail, in which there are 24 bunks, there are 28 inmates - and by the time the weekend comes, there will be five or six more inmates.

That's nothing compared to California. Overcrowding was so bad there, the U.S. Supreme Court called it "cruel and unusual punishment," and last May ordered the state to cut its prison population by more than 30,000.

Nationwide, the numbers are staggering: Nearly 2.4 million people behind bars, even though over the last 20 years the crime rate has actually dropped by more than 40 percent.

But nothing came close to the impact of the war on drugs. When it was announced in 1971, fewer than 40,000 people were incarcerated for drug offenses; now, it's more than half a million.

And here's the elephant in the room: Blacks use drugs at the same rate as whites, but go to prison more - nearly 3 out of 4 people incarcerated for drug possession are African-American.

"It's emblematic of the way in which race is contributing to mass incarceration," said Bryan Stevenson, executive director of the non-profit Equal Justice Initiative, and a professor at New York University Law School.

"How do you answer people who say, 'Well, the people who are in prison are bad people, and if they happen to be African-American, it's because there's a higher crime rate in the neighborhoods where these prisoners have come from'?" asked Teichner.

"I'd say for most, for many offenses, it's simply not true," replied Stevenson. "Drug use is not a problem unique to the African-American community. This problem is as great a problem in white communities, affluent communities, [where] we prosecute it differently.

"In communities of color, you see devastating consequences as a result of our policies. Now, one out of three black men between the ages of 18 and 35 is in jail, in prison, on probation or on parole."

Whatever the crime, if you go to the Equal Justice Initiative website, you'll see the 70-plus 13- and 14-year-olds sentenced to life in prison without parole in this country. Nearly two-thirds are children of color.

Bryan Stevenson appeared before the U.S. Supreme Court last month to argue that, even in murder cases, sentencing kids that young to die in prison is cruel and unusual punishment.

"We can't hide from these problems much longer, we really can't," Stevenson said.

U.S. Senator Jim Webb - ex-Marine and Vietnam War hero - couldn't be called soft on crime. The Democrat from Virginia has tried and failed to get Congress to address the comprehensive reform he is convinced can't wait.

"This is not a political winner, but it's a leadership necessity in my view," Webb said. "If you are a violent career criminal, you deserve incarceration. . . . But we can be much more adaptive in areas of non-violent crime, in length of sentences, and particularly in what we do with people when they begin to re-enter society."

In a bad economy, just the expense of incarceration is beginning to create converts among state legislators faced with disastrous budget problems. In 2011 alone, 15 states passed significant sentencing reform legislation. Democrats and Republicans united in their determination to cut prison populations.

Which is why, not far from Tallahassee, the State of Florida is building a so-called re-entry center for 400 non-violent inmates.

Here they'll cost taxpayers HALF what the state would spend on keeping them in prison.

"This is the smart way of trying to deal with our prison population," said Chief McNeil. "We know that the vast majority of the people in prison are going to return to prison unless we do something different."

Doing something different at the Gadsden County Jail, a few miles away, means teaching prisoners basic skills they'll need when they get out - like how to dress for success, and how to interview for a job.

Wishful thinking? When non-convicts can't even find jobs? Hardliners scoff at the notion that prison education programs lower recidivism.

But criminologists don't. They see education as one tool among many that can help keep people from going back to prison.

At California's formidable San Quentin Prison, inmates are encouraged to enroll in the Prison University Project. In a class on Greek tragedy, every man here took the plays personally.

Henry, an avid reader, says everything that he reads is "one more tool that I have to keep me - I'm not going to say keep me from coming back here, because I'M going to keep me from coming back here."

But here are the statistics, from the U.S. Department of Justice: More than 50 percent of ex-prisoners will be back behind bars within three years.

So, how to keep them from going to prison in the first place, whether by rethinking the old lock-'em-up-throw-away-the-key mentality, or preventing crime with beefed-up policing in high crime areas?

That's exactly what the State of New York has been doing. Between 2000 and 2010, its prison population DROPPED by more than 13,000 - nearly 20 percent. And guess what: The crime rate also dropped, by 21 percent . . . in New York City, by nearly 30 percent.

"No one can really explain exactly why," said Jacobson. "The changing nature of the economy, change in drug use patterns, more targeted policing . . . But one of the things we know going forward, if we want to both continue and drive down crime even further, is that increasing the size of our prison systems will not get you there."

In 2009, the number of inmates in state prisons declined by just under 5,000. It was the first drop in nearly 40 years, since 1972.

Was it merely a drop in the bucket? Or was it the beginning of the end of our epidemic of incarceration?

EDITOR'S NOTE: A transcription error mis-stated the cost per inmate as $47,421 per year. That is the annual cost of an inmate's care in California. The average cost among 40 states surveyed by Vera Institute of Justice is $31,307.

BFranklin
04-30-2012, 08:30 PM
I've had some run ins with the law for STUPID things! Once I got a speeding ticket so I paid it, went to traffic school and thought that was the end of it. I was later driving around and was stopped for a broken taillight and what do you know my license was suspended because the county never got a copy of my traffic school certificate of completion so I was arrested! I got out, cleared it up but then my mugshot was posted online and had to pay to have that removed! Then my mugshot appeared online again on another site. These people have setup the site that posts mugshots AND the site to remove them, making a killing by exploiting people who have been arrested.

Once you get in the system they make it difficult to clear your name and move on. And they wonder why people end right back in the system, I've learned that they want it like that!

Brian Coulter
04-30-2012, 08:49 PM
The U.S. Civil War, which was fought to abolish slavery..

LOL... that's when I stopped reading. Anyone stupid enough to believe this couldn't posslibly have anything else relevant to say.

TheTexan
04-30-2012, 08:52 PM
LOL... that's when I stopped reading. Anyone stupid enough to believe this couldn't posslibly have anything else relevant to say.

good catch

ghengis86
04-30-2012, 09:58 PM
LOL... that's when I stopped reading. Anyone stupid enough to believe this couldn't posslibly have anything else relevant to say.

Saw that too and laughed. But the rest of the article should make you cry.