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In the New Jim Crow, Michelle Alexander makes it clear that the majority of individuals in jail are criminals in the United States, but because they are mainly targeted and stopped police due to the color of their skin. Alexander declares that there are several individuals who are white and are criminals and sell drugs but they are rarely targeted by police because throughout history they have been portrayed in a positive lights, whereas African Americans are portrayed in a negative light. The supreme Court are at fault for the rise of mass incarceration of African Americans. The United States Supreme Court assists law enforcement by ignoring the fourteenth Amendment against unreasonable searches and seizures. If the police thinks a person
Prior to the 1950s, very little research had been done on the history and nature of the United States’ policies toward and relationships with African Americans, particularly in the South. To most historians, white domination and unequal treatment of Negroes were assumed to be constants of the political and social landscapes since the nation’s conception. Prominent Southern historian C. Vann Woodward, however, permanently changed history’s naïve understanding of race in America through his book entitled The Strange Career of Jim Crow. His provocative thesis explored evidence that had previously been overlooked by historians and gave a fresh foundation for more research on the topic of racial policies of the United States.
Vann Woodward's The Strange Career of Jim Crow. In 1955, C. Vann Woodward published the first edition of his book, The Strange Career of Jim Crow. The book garnered immediate recognition and success with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. eventually calling it, “the historical Bible of the civil rights movement.” An endorsement like this one from such a prominent and respected figure in American history makes one wonder if they will find anything in the book to criticize or any faults to point out.
In the months following the Brown v. Board of Education decision C. Vann Woodward wrote a series of lectures that would provide the basis for one of the most historically significant pieces of nonfiction literature written in the 20th century. Originally, Woodward’s lectures were directed to a local and predominantly southern audience, but as his lectures matured into a comprehensive text they gained national recognition. In 1955 Woodward published the first version of The Strange Career of Jim Crow, a novel that would spark a fluid historical dialogue that would continue for the next twenty years. Woodward foresaw this possibility as he included in the first edition, “Since I am…dealing with a period of the past that has not been adequately investigated, and also with events of the present that have come too rapidly and recently to have been properly digested and understood, it is rather inevitable that I shall make some mistakes. I shall expect and hope to be corrected.” Over this time period Woodward released four separate editions, in chapter form, that modified, corrected, and responded to contemporary criticisms.
Michelle Alexander in her book "The New Jim Crow" argues that Mass Incarceration is similar to Jim Crow; Alexander believes that caste systems such as Jim Crow and slavery are similar to the existing system of mass incarceration. In addition, Alexander accuses the U.S. criminal justice system, implying their laws undividedly target African Americans through the War on Drugs and racial limitation. In comparing mass incarceration with Jim Crow, Alexander points to compelling parallels regarding political disenfranchisement, legalized discrimination, and symbolic production of a race. Alexander, moreover, effectively offers a rebuttal to the counterargument that the New Jim Crow does not carry the same level of racial hostility as the Old Jim
C. Vann Woodward wrote The Strange Career of Jim Crow for a purpose. His purpose was to enlighten people about the history of the Jim Crow laws in the South. Martin Luther King Jr. called Woodward’s book, “the historical Bible of the civil rights movement.” (221) Martin Luther King Jr.’s quote revealed the true importance of Woodward’s book. Woodard’s book significance was based on it revealing the strange, forgotten facets of the Jim Crow laws. Assumptions about the Jim Crow’s career have existed since its creation. Woodward tried to eliminate the false theories as he attempted to uncover the truths. Woodward argued the strangest aspects of Jim Crow’s career were, it was a recent innovation and not created in the South
The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness is a book by Michelle Alexander, a civil rights litigator and legal scholar. The book discusses race-related issues specific to African-American males and mass incarceration in the United States. Michelle Alexander (2010) argues that despite the old Jim Crow is death, does not necessarily means the end of racial caste (p.21). In her book “The New Jim Crow”, Alexander describes a set of practices and social discourses that serve to maintain African American people controlled by institutions. In this book her analyses is centered in examining the mass incarceration phenomenon in recent years. Comparing Jim Crow with mass incarceration she points out that mass incarceration is a network of laws, policies, customs and institutions that works together –almost invisible– to ensure the subordinate status of a group defined by race, African American (p. 178 -190).
Alexander attempts to show by means of cultural and historical review, political decisions, enactment of legislation and statistical evidence from the time of the old Jim Crow laws, the retarded advancement of civil rights of young black men, and their mass incarceration. This occurrence produces a false reality and perpetuates the history of racial discrimination that exists today in America through a "caste system" by legal framework that disguising itself as the "War on Drugs." The practice of mass incarceration labels and demonizes those persons to the point that they lose their rights to vote, limits employment, are denied housing and educatio...
The 4th amendment provides citizens protections from unreasonable searches and seizures from law enforcement. Search and seizure cases are governed by the 4th amendment and case law. The United States Supreme Court has crafted exceptions to the 4th amendment where law enforcement would ordinarily need to get a warrant to conduct a search. One of the exceptions to the warrant requirement falls under vehicle stops. Law enforcement can search a vehicle incident to an individual’s arrest if the individual unsecured by the police and is in reaching distance of the passenger compartment. Disjunctive to the first exception a warrantless search can be conducted if there is reasonable belief
The majority of our prison population is made up of African Americans of low social and economic classes, who come from low income houses and have low levels of education. The chapter also discusses the amount of money the United States loses yearly due to white collar crime as compared to the cost of violent crime. Another main point was the factors that make it more likely for a poor person to be incarcerated, such as the difficulty they would have in accessing adequate legal counsel and their inability to pay bail. This chapter addresses the inequality of sentencing in regards to race, it supplies us with NCVS data that shows less than one-fourth of assailants are perceived as black even though they are arrested at a much higher rate. In addition to African Americans being more likely to be charged with a crime, they are also more likely to receive harsher punishments for the same crimes- which can be seen in the crack/cocaine disparities. These harsher punishments are also shown in the higher rates of African Americans sentenced to
Today, more African American adults are under correctional control than were enslaved in 1850, a decade before the Civil War began (Alexander 180). Throughout history, there have been multiple racial caste systems in the United States. In her book The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, Michelle Alexander defines a “racial caste” as “a racial group locked into an inferior position by law and custom” (12). Alexander argues that both Jim Crow and slavery functioned as racial caste systems, and that our current system of mass incarceration functions as a similar caste system, which she labels “The New Jim Crow”. There is now a silent Jim Crow in our nation. Mass incarceration today serves the same function as did slavery before the Civil War and Jim Crow laws after the Civil War - to uphold a racial caste system.
The 4th amendment protects US citizens from unreasonable searches and seizures by the government. If it is violated by the government, all evidence found by the unlawful search and seizure must be excluded as per the exclusionary rule which serves as a remedy for 4th amendment violations. Before a remedy can be given for violation of the 4th amendment, a court must determine whether the 4th amendment is applicable to a certain case.
From the study, Michelle Alexander’s argument is true and correct that the mass incarcerations are just a representation of Jim Crow. The Jim Crow has just been redesigned as the blacks have continued to be mistreated and denied some of the rights and privileges that their counterparts enjoy. There is discernment against the African Americans towards different privileges which are essential to their lives. This discrimination is political as leaders steer operations that are aimed at racially discriminating people from particular groups of race.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.” –U.S. Constitutional Amendments
Print. The. Alexander, Michelle. A. The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness.
These statistics demonstrate that racialized mass incarceration exists in the U.S. There are a few reasons why African Americans are discriminated against by the legal system. The primary cause is inequitable protection by the law and unequal enforcement of it. Unequal protection is when the legal system offers less protection to African Americans that are victimized by whites. It is unequal enforcement because discriminatory treatment of African Americans that are labeled as criminal suspects is more accepted.