#13th Amendment allows slavery for prisoners

[kirch]

in other news: Trump's Own SCOTUS just blew up Net Neutrality in a "loss for democrats" (and anyone else who doesn't prefer the taste of bootleather) -- GOP/DOGE's Trump/Musk "Free Speech Censorship Regime" is set to roll out, and steamroll anyone who actually enjoys freedom. https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2025/01/02/net-neutrality-fcc-sixth-circuit-strike-down/ https://archive.is/voMIE this is from their new "Congress has no right to regulate anything" decision from last year ... getting rid of "Chevron Deference" -- which allowed Congress to delegate tasks to regulatory agencies it sets up ... SCOTUS said "no, congress has to write all the rules, no regulators writing rules!" ... and, well ... they're really hoping they can keep the Mitch McConnell train running where congress only gets to do whatever the oldest and most racist person in the room allows - so that business regulations can go bye-bye and they can start feeding us bread made with sawdust again ... and the new Gov't Deregulation Agency (the newest implementation of Gestapo) DOGE will do it's best to make Elon Musk the King of the Internet... (and nevermind all this from 2017: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LFhT6H6pRWg )

URGENT: 🚨🚨EARN IT ACT IS BACK IN THE SENATE 🚨🚨 TUMBLR’S NSFW BAN HITTING THE ENTIRE INTERNET THIS SUMMER 2023

April 28, 2023

I’m so sorry for the long post but please please please pay attention and spread this

What is the EARN IT Act?

The EARN IT Act (s. 1207) has been roundly condemned by nearly every major LGBTQ+ advocacy and human rights organization in the country.

This is the third time the Senate has been trying to force this through, and I talked about it last year. It is a bill that claims "protects children and victims against CSAM" by creating an unelected and politically appointed national commission of law enforcement specialists to dictate "best practices" that websites all across the nation will be forced to follow. (Keep in mind, most websites in the world are created in the US, so this has global ramifications). These "best practices" would include killing encryption so that any law enforcement can scan and see every single message, dm, photo, cloud storage, data, and any website you have every so much as glanced at. Contrary to popular belief, no they actually can't already do that. These "best practices" also create new laws for "removing CSAM" online, leading to mass censorship of non-CSAM content like what happened to tumblr. Keep in mind that groups like NCOSE, an anti-LGBT hate group, will be allowed on this commission. If websites don't follow these best practices, they lose their Section 230 protections, leading to mass censorship either way.

Section 230 is foundational to modern online communications. It's the entire reason social media exists. It grants legal protection to users and websites, and says that websites aren't responsible for what users upload online unless it's criminal. Without Section 230, websites are at the mercy of whatever bullshit regulatory laws any and every US state passes. Imagine if Texas and Florida were allowed to say what you can and can't publish and access online. That is what will happen if EARN IT passes. (For context, Trump wanted to get rid of Section 230 because he knew it would lead to mass govt surveillance and censorship of minorities online.)

This is really not a drill. Anyone who makes or consume anything “adult” and LGBT online has to be prepared to fight Sen. Blumenthal’s EARN IT Act, brought back from the grave by a bipartisan consensus to destroy Section 230. If this bill passes, we’re going to see most, if not all, adult content and accounts removed from mainstream platforms. This will include anything related to LGBT content, including SFW fanfiction, for example. Youtube, Twitter, Reddit, Tiktok, Tumblr, all of them will be completely gutted of anything related to LGBT content, abortion healthcare, resources for victims of any type of abuse, etc. It is a right-wing fascists wet dream, which is why NCOSE is behind this bill and why another name for this bill is named in reference to NCOSE.

NCOSE used to be named Morality in Media, and has rebranded into an "anti-trafficking" organization. They are a hate group that has made millions off of being "against trafficking" while helping almost no victims and pushing for homophobic laws globally. They have successfully pushing the idea that any form of sexual expression, including talking about HEALTH, leads to sex trafficking. That's how SESTA passed. Their goal is to eliminate all sex, anything gay, and everything that goes against their idea of ‘God’ from the internet and hyper disney-fy and sanitize it. This is a highly coordinated attack on multiple fronts.

The EARN IT Act will lead to mass online censorship and surveillance. Platforms will be forced to scan their users’ communications and censor all sex-related content, including sex education, literally anything lgbt, transgender or non-binary education and support systems, aything related to abortion, and sex worker communication according to the ACLU. All this in the name of “protecting kids” and “fighting CSAM”, both of which the bill does nothing of the sort. In fact it makes fighting CSEM even harder.

EARN IT will open the way for politicians to define the category of “pornography" as they — or the lobbies that fund them — please. The same way that right-wing groups have successfully banned books about race and LGBT, are banning trans people from existing, all under the guise of protecting children from "grooming and exploitation", is how they will successfully censor the internet.

As long as state legislatures can tie in "fighting CSAM" to their bullshit laws, they can use EARN IT to censor and surveill whatever they want.

This is already a nightmare enough. But the bill also DESTROYS ENCRYPTION, you know, the thing protecting literally anyone or any govt entity from going into your private messages and emails and anything on your devices and spying on you.

This bill is going to finish what FOSTA/SESTA started. And that should terrify you.

Senator Blumenthal (Same guy who said ‘Facebook should ban finsta’) pushed this bill all of 2020, literally every activist (There were more than half a million signatures on this site opposing this act!) pushed hard to stop this bill. Now he brings it back, doesn’t show the text of the bill until hours later, and it’s WORSE. Instead of fixing literally anything in the bill that might actually protect kids online, Bluemnthal is hoping to fast track this and shove it through, hoping to get little media attention other than propaganda of “protecting kids” to support this shitty legislation that will harm kids. Blumental doesn't care about protecting anyone, and only wants his name in headlines.

It will make CSAM much much worse.

One of the many reasons this bill is so dangerous: It totally misunderstands how Section 230 works, and in doing so (as with FOSTA) it is likely to make the very real problem of CSAM worse, not better. Section 230 gives companies the flexibility to try different approaches to dealing with various content moderation challenges. It allows for greater and greater experimentation and adjustments as they learn what works – without fear of liability for any “failure.” Removing Section 230 protections does the opposite. It says if you do anything, you may face crippling legal liability. This actually makes companies less willing to do anything that involves trying to seek out, take down, and report CSAM because of the greatly increased liability that comes with admitting that there is CSAM on your platform to search for and deal with. This liability would allow anyone for any reason to sue any platform they want, suing smaller ones out of existence. Look at what is happening right now with book bans across the nation with far right groups. This is going to happen to the internet if this bill passes.

(Remember, the state department released a report in December 2021 recommending that the government crack down on “obscenity” as hard the Reagan Administration did. If this bill passes, it could easily go way beyond shit red states are currently trying. It is a goldmine for the fascist right that is currently in the middle of banning every book that talks about race and sexuality across the US.)

The reason these bills keep showing up is because there is this false lie spread by organizations like NCOSE that platforms do nothing about CSEM online. However, platforms are already liable for child sexual exploitation under federal law. Tech companies sent more than 45 million+ instances of CSAM to the DOJ in 2019 alone, most of which they declined to investigate. This shows that platforms are actually doing everything in their power already to stop CSEM by following already existing laws. The Earn It Act includes zero resources for proven investigation or prevention programs. If Senator Bluementhal actually cared about protecting youth, why wouldn’t he include anything to actually protect them in his shitty horrible bill? EARN IT is actually likely to make prosecuting child molesters more difficult since evidence collected this way likely violates the Fourth Amendment and would be inadmissible in court.

I don’t know why so many Senators are eager to cosponsor the “make child pornography worse” bill, but here we are.

HOW TO FIGHT BACK

EARN IT Act was introduced just two weeks ago and is already being fast-tracked. It will be marked up the week of May 1st and head to the Senate floor immediately after. If there is no loud and consistent opposition, it will be law by JUNE! Most bills never go to markup, so this means they are putting pressure to move this through. There are already 20 co-sponsors, a fifth of the entire Senate. This is an uphill battle and it is very much all hands on deck.

CALL YOUR REPRESENTATIVES.

This website takes you to your Senator / House members contact info. EMAIL, MESSAGE, SEND LETTERS, CALL CALL CALL CALL CALL. Calling is the BEST way to get a message through. Get your family and friends to send calls too. This is literally the end of free speech online.

(202) 224-3121 connects you to the congressional hotline. Here is a call script if you don't know what to say. Call them every day. Even on the weekends, leaving voicemails are fine.

2. Sign these petitions!

Link to Petition 1

Link to Petition 2

3. SPREAD THE WORD ONLINE

If you have any social media, spread this online. One of the best ways we fought back against this last year was MASSIVE spread online. Tiktok, reddit, twitter, discord, whatever means you have at least mention it. We could see most social media die out by this fall if we don't fight back.

Here is a linktree with more information on this bill including a masterpost of articles, the links to petitions, and the call script.

DISCORD LINK IF YOU WANT TO HELP FIGHT IT

TLDR: The EARN IT Act will lead to online censorship of any and all adult & lgbt content across the entire internet, open the floodgates to mass surveillance the likes which we haven’t seen before, lead to much more CSEM being distributed online, and destroy encryption. Call 202-224-3121 to connect to your house and senate representative and tell them to VOTE NO on this bill that does not protect anyone and harms everyone.

[pisshandkerchief]

Haven't seen anyone post this yet, but since I've heard people talking about it in light of the LA fires I'd like to urge everybody in the U.S. to call your congressmen and tell them to support the Abolition Amendment to get rid of the exception in the 13th Amendment which allows for prisoners to be forced into slave labor. You can also email your representatives but I would recommend a phone call, your message is more likely to get through if you actually all to someone in their office.

[whencyclopedia]

Native American Enslavement in Colonial America

Slavery was practiced by the Native Americans before any Europeans arrived in the region. People of one tribe could be taken by another for a variety of reasons but, whatever the reason, it was understood that the enslaved had done something – staked himself in a gamble and lost or allowed himself to be captured – to warrant such treatment.

This model changed with the arrival of the Spanish in the West Indies in 1492 and their colonization of that region, South, and Central America throughout the 16th century. Native Americans were then enslaved simply for being Native Americans. In North America, after the English arrived, Native Americans were at first enslaved as prisoners of war but, eventually, were taken and sold to plantations in the West Indies to clear the land for expansion of English colonies.

This practice continued throughout the colonial era aided and encouraged by Native American tribes themselves up through 1750 and, after the American War of Independence (1775-1783), natives were pushed into the interior as African slavery became more lucrative. Even so, the enslavement of Native Americans continued even after slavery was abolished by the 13th Amendment to the Constitution in 1865. Americans got around illegal enslavement of natives by calling it by other names and justified it in the interests of "civilizing the savages". The practice continued up through 1900, dramatically impacting Native American cultures, languages, and development.

Native American Slavery & Columbus

Native American tribes were incredibly diverse, each with their own culture, and far from the cohesive, unified civilization they are often represented as under the umbrella term "Native American" or "American Indian". Each tribe understood itself as inherently superior to others and although they would form alliances for short periods in a common cause, or for longer periods as confederacies, they frequently warred with each other for goods, in the name of tribal honor, and for captives, among other reasons.

Men, women, and children taken captive were then enslaved by the victorious tribe, sometimes for life and other times for a given number of years and, in still other cases, until they were adopted and became members of the tribe. People could also be enslaved as hostages, held to ensure compliance with a treaty, and in some tribes, people were not only enslaved for life but any children born to them were also considered slaves, thereby creating a slave class long before the arrival of Europeans.

This model changed after the arrival of Christopher Columbus (l. 1451-1506) in the West Indies in 1492 and the Portuguese in 1500. Columbus kidnapped natives he brought back to Spain as slaves on his first voyage and sent over 500 back on his second. Between 1493-1496, he implemented the encomienda system, which institutionalized Native American enslavement throughout the Spanish colonies of the New World, and, by the time the French, Dutch, and English began colonizing North America, the Transatlantic Slave Trade was already established.

Continue reading...

[readyforevolution]

IF YOU DIDN'T KNOW THIS YESTERDAY THEN TODAY WOULD BE A GOOD DAY TO LEARN THIS.... "All stories don't have a happy ending"

In 1866, one year after the 13 Amendment was ratified (the amendment that ended slavery), Alabama, Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Georgia, Mississippi, Florida, Tennessee, and South Carolina began to lease out convicts for labor (peonage). This made the business of arresting Blacks very lucrative, which is why hundreds of White men were hired by these states as police officers. Their primary responsibility was to search out and arrest Blacks who were in violation of Black Codes. Once arrested, these men, women and children would be leased to plantations where they would harvest cotton, tobacco, sugar cane. Or they would be leased to work at coal mines, or railroad companies. The owners of these businesses would pay the state for every prisoner who worked for them; prison labor.

It is believed that after the passing of the 13th Amendment, more than 800,000 Blacks were part of the system of peonage, or re-enslavement through the prison system. Peonage didn’t end until after World War II began, around 1940.

This is how it happened.

The 13th Amendment declared that "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." (Ratified in 1865)

Did you catch that? It says, “neither slavery nor involuntary servitude could occur except as a punishment for a crime". Lawmakers used this phrase to make petty offenses crimes. When Blacks were found guilty of committing these crimes, they were imprisoned and then leased out to the same businesses that lost slaves after the passing of the 13th Amendment. This system of convict labor is called peonage.

The majority of White Southern farmers and business owners hated the 13th Amendment because it took away slave labor. As a way to appease them, the federal government turned a blind eye when southern states used this clause in the 13th Amendment to establish laws called Black Codes. Here are some examples of Black Codes:

In Louisiana, it was illegal for a Black man to preach to Black congregations without special permission in writing from the president of the police. If caught, he could be arrested and fined. If he could not pay the fines, which were unbelievably high, he would be forced to work for an individual, or go to jail or prison where he would work until his debt was paid off.

If a Black person did not have a job, he or she could be arrested and imprisoned on the charge of vagrancy or loitering.

This next Black Code will make you cringe. In South Carolina, if the parent of a Black child was considered vagrant, the judicial system allowed the police and/or other government agencies to “apprentice” the child to an "employer". Males could be held until the age of 21, and females could be held until they were 18. Their owner had the legal right to inflict punishment on the child for disobedience, and to recapture them if they ran away.

This (peonage) is an example of systemic racism - Racism established and perpetuated by government systems. Slavery was made legal by the U.S. Government. Segregation, Black Codes, Jim Crow and peonage were all made legal by the government, and upheld by the judicial system. These acts of racism were built into the system, which is where the term “Systemic Racism” is derived.

This is the part of "Black History" that most of us were never told about.

[kny111]

Do World Powers Engage in Subtle Systemic Slavery or Overt Systemic Slavery? It doesn’t Matter. Slavery is Slavery & It Will Never Be Needed Especially Not As A System.

The United States along with other world powers and those that serve them have created this ‘using us, yet against us’ system. We need to change this. The fire James Baldwin spoke of, the very merited rage those enslaved have against this system, is well overdue.

Those who serve a government that knowingly allow for enslavement still and lie to people about it being abolished when their own amendment backs daily institutional and systemic enslavement when it allows “slavery is abolished except in punishment or crime“. This does nothing to remove slavery as a systemic feature from this governing system and you are implicit.

                                                                                                by - K, Blog Admin

What happens when we as a community repurpose the instruments of science and evidence gathering and focus on the 13th amendment? This piece of document literally allows for enslavement. What has been created in its wake? Here’s the thing, when colonial imperial powers in Europe said okay when issues occur we’re gonna call them ‘crime’  they meant it as a word to account for social norms being breached and a sort of “holler if you hear me“ approach to solving those issues was laid out institutionally which included neighborhood watch people that could process this. They later became police. Between that time and the present 2023, legislature and policy reshaped crime and policing, as well as the defending of issues through military, crime became systemically synonymous with prisons/cages/slavery to solve those issues. From the Trans-Atlantic slave trade and its bolstering of these pro enslavement laws to this past historical investment in this strange notion of punishing others so physically, violently to the benefit of a system, a legalized market of slavery was formed and continues to persist with similar legislative and political play on words as they did with the 13th amendment’s clause: The 13th Amendment to the United States Constitution provides that "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."

When you specifically write into law and action that amendments create and actualize the means to the system we use, what are you enacting when you pronounce through this same mechanism that “no slavery shall exist within the united states or any place subject to its jurisdiction - EXCEPT as punishment for crime“? We need to, as a people really inspect this slowly and carefully because science has yet to produce any evidence that says punishment at that level and method is required to solve these issues so where is this evidence that says that type of punishment is even needed for the people to “fall in line”?

Secondly, isn’t it evident that processing issues as merely ‘crime’ is factually bringing us more structural issues than not because not every issue can be generalized to crime and often times the word crime itself just doesn’t do nearly enough to account for the disabled community and many other far reaching issues.

These aren’t assumptions, these are educated deductions based on statistical data provided by the errors of the running system. Again, it has yet to produce reputable convincing evidence that establishes prisons, crime, and cops/ slave patrol systems they synergized with as effective means to solve the issues we as a society constantly face. And with this same lack of adhering to scientific facts are we supposed to feel comforted by these slave industry agents, legislators and policy makers that allow for that amendment to exist as is because they know it buys them that much time to not worry of their implicitness in enslavement of others? I implore everyone watch the documentary by Ava DuVernay 13th available for free on youtube from NetFlix due to its educational merit. This documentary is like a course 101 on understanding just how much of an issue enslavement systems are and how synonymous prisons and cops are to slave markets and patrols. It gets right to the problem of slavery, what scriptures did they use to embed it into our social mainframe? did it exist back then? Yes, Is it gone? No, it let’s us know it’s still active and strategies by white supremacists and slavers then benefit their lineages and communities now.

They have a lot of control over the systems that try to govern us. Reconfiguring, inspecting and enacting amendments at this level will be required for us to do something meaningful against this oppressive system and its unsustainable, inefficient amalgamation with slavery markets as a resource system.

Reparations for those harmed by these systems as well as systemic decolonization strategies will be commonly needed. We need documentaries like this and similar subject media to help the public understand the necessary steps to abolish prisons and repurposing the military that serve them away from the rich’s interest and focus on the people. Since all defending this slavery system are implicit. 13th by Ava DuVernay is available now on YouTube for free via NetFlix along with other educational documentaries

[yetisidelblog]

Prison slavery is never the answer

The “Exception Clause”, also known as the Punishment Clause, made it possible for slavery to be used as a method of punishment, allowing the government to legally subject people incarcerated across the United States to forced labor. But what is legal is not what is just. 

Incarcerated persons exposed to prison slavery or forced prison labor are coerced into working through the loss of privileges, visitations, good time earnings, commissary access or the threat of solitary confinement and even being tasered according to one lawsuit.2

Congress has the chance to end legal slavery

That is why we are asking states and US Congress to abolish the Punishment Clause in state constitutions and amend the 13th Amendment. 

The Punishment Clause is not just a glaring fault in the US Constitution — several state constitutions contain identical language. Beginning with Colorado, Utah, and Nebraska, many states are taking aim at striking the Punishment Clause from their state constitutions.  

In 2022, Vermont, Alabama, Tennessee and Oregon, through successful Midterm election referenda, have introduced amendments to either remove the punishment clause from their state constitutions or add language to explicitly outlaw slavery or involuntary servitude as punishment for a crime.3

In 2024, voters in Nevada struck down forced labor in the state constitution in the general elections.4

If more states remove the Punishment Clause from their state constitutions, this will create a domino effect for other states to follow their lead, as well as increase the chances of the Abolition Amendment — set to be reintroduced this year — passing through the US Congress.  

The forced labor indicators

Forced labor in prisons is often built into “rehabilitation” or “educational” programs. Many who are incarcerated report being threatened with solitary confinement or longer sentences if they refuse to work. On top of this, incarcerated people are often paid nothing at all for their work or mere pennies, leaving them with almost no savings to help them re-enter society upon release. 

In 2017, Prison Policy Initiative reported incarcerated people appear to be paid less than they were in 2001. The report stated “What changed? At least seven states appear to have lowered their maximum wages, and South Carolina no longer pays wages for most regular prison jobs – assignments that paid up to $4.80 per day in 2001. With a few rare exceptions, regular prison jobs are still unpaid in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, and Texas.”5

According to the International Labour Organization, under the 1930 Forced Labour Convention No. 29, forced labor is work undertaken involuntarily under threat of menace or penalty. This also applies to prison labor, meaning wages must be comparable to those of free workers with similar skills who are not incarcerated. 6

The Punishment Clause has been a blight on the US for over 100 years, creating an economic incentive for increasing incarceration and exploiting incarcerated people as a source of cheap labor.7 As Senator Merkley, sponsor of the Abolition Amendment, explains, the Punishment Clause created a financial incentive for mass incarceration throughout history, targeting communities of color in particular:

Following the ratification of the 13th Amendment, including the Punishment Clause, in 1865, Southern jurisdictions arrested Black Americans in large numbers for minor crimes, like loitering or vagrancy, codified in new ‘Black Codes,’ which were only applied to Black Americans. The Punishment Clause was then used by sheriffs to lease out imprisoned individuals to work landowners’ fields, which in some cases included the very same plantations where they had been enslaved.  The practice grew in prevalence and scope to the point that, by 1898, 73% of Alabama’s state revenue came from renting out the forced labor of Black Americans. The Punishment Clause’s facilitating and incentivizing of minor crime convictions continued to drive the over–incarceration of  Black  Americans throughout the  Jim Crow era.8

Today prison labor has contributed to the growth of an $80 billion detention industry. America is home to 5% of the world’s total population but is home to 25% of the world’s incarcerated population.

97% of incarcerated people never had a trial. Instead, low-income Americans and people of color in particular, are coerced into plea deals for non-violent offenses.

Join the movement

The United States must reckon with the injustices faced by incarcerated people borne out the Punishment Clause. At the same time, we recognize that this is a first step in tackling the myriad of other state and federal laws excluding incarcerated people from minimum wage and labor rights protection, as well as the need for the public and private sector to divest from facilities that subject incarcerated people to severe labor exploitation.9

Join us in demanding all states and the federal government to explicitly outlaw slavery and involuntary servitude as punishment for a crime in the US and state constitutions — put an end to the Punishment Clause in the United States! You can write directly to your legislature urging them to support the Abolishment Amendment here!

Watch a discussion on this topic here.

Notes:

https://www.archives.gov/historical-docs/13th-amendment ↩

https://www.cpr.org/2022/02/15/prisoners-allege-forced-labor-violates-states-anti-slavery-law/ ↩

https://news.yahoo.com/slavery-forced-prison-labor-ballot-midterm-elections-vote-210923161.html ↩

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/11/05/us/elections/results-nevada-question-4-remove-slavery-exception.html ↩

https://www.prisonpolicy.org/blog/2017/04/10/wages/ ↩

https://www.ilo.org/empent/areas/business-helpdesk/faqs/WCMS_DOC_ENT_HLP_FL_FAQ_EN/lang–en/index.htm#Q3 ↩

https://eji.org/news/history-racial-injustice-prison-labor/ ↩

https://www.merkley.senate.gov/news/press-releases/merkley-clay-propose-constitutional-amendment-to-close-slavery-loophole-in-13th-amendment-2020 ↩

https://www.freedomunited.org/advocate/end-prison-slavery/ ↩

@upontheshelfreviews

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@akron-squirrel

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@justice-for-jacob-marley

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@what-is-my-aesthetic

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@mentally-quiet-spycrab

[tieflingkisser]

Forced Labor Continues in Colorado, Years After Vote to End Prison Slavery 

Coloradans voted in 2018 to amend their state constitution to ban forced labor in prison. Years later, incarcerated people are still being punished for refusing work assignments.

Throughout Abron Arrington’s decades-long incarceration in Colorado, he often found himself in solitary confinement—not because he was causing trouble, but simply because he refused to work. He didn’t see the point given he was paid 13 cents an hour and figured his time could be better spent learning physics. Before Arrington was incarcerated in 1989, he was studying to get his aircraft mechanic license. But within weeks of returning home from the U.S. Air Force, at 22 years old, he was arrested and ultimately sentenced to life in prison for a murder he didn’t commit. In 2019, he received clemency from Governor Jared Polis and was released after three decades behind bars. “I was actually 30 years a slave,” Arrington, who is Black, told a crowd of people gathered in one of Colorado’s oldest Black churches on Juneteenth, the federal holiday that commemorates the emancipation of enslaved African Americans. “So, this is deeply personal to me.”

[...]

In 2018, after years of community organizing, Colorado sparked a national movement when voters overwhelmingly passed Amendment A, a ballot measure that deleted half a sentence from the state constitution that allowed slavery and involuntary servitude “as a punishment for crime, whereof the party shall have been duly convicted.” Colorado was the first state to do so since the signing of the 13th Amendment. Since Colorado removed its language, Utah, Nebraska, Vermont, Oregon, Alabama, and Tennessee have followed suit with similar constitutional amendments. Organizers in around a dozen more states are now pushing to get similar ballot measures in front of voters during the 2024 elections. 

[...]

But in some ways, Colorado’s Amendment A only abolished prison slavery on paper. That’s because the Colorado Department of Corrections (CDOC) has continued to punish those who refuse to work. Since 2018, there have been at least 727 documented instances where an incarcerated person was disciplined for failing to work, according to a 9News investigation this past summer, with punishment ranging from changes in housing to loss of privileges and delayed parole.

[...]

Today, incarcerated workers produce more than $2 billion each year in goods and commodities, and over $9 billion in services for the maintenance of the very prisons that confine them—all while being paid pennies an hour or nothing at all, according to research conducted by the American Civil Liberties Union and the University of Chicago Law School’s Global Human Rights Clinic. Their labor enables mass incarceration by offsetting the cost of the country’s ballooning prison system, which has grown by 500 percent over the last 50 years.

[...]

In addition to off-setting costs for federal, state and local governments, approximately 4,100 companies in the U.S. have directly profited off of prison labor, a number that is likely an undercount—including large companies like Walmart, McDonald’s, Starbucks, IBM, Tyson Foods and Microsoft, according to a database created by the advocacy organization Worth Rises. “A lot of people are making a lot of money off the system,” said Arrington, who has worked for the reentry nonprofit, Second Chance Center, since his release. “It is no different than it was 200 years ago.” 

[dogsuffrage]

Non-penal slavery was permitted by the laws of the United States until 1942. Debt slavery persisted through to 1942 and was defended in court by arguing that, while the 13th amendment says slavery shall not exist, it does not actually make slaveholding a crime, so they could continue to operate slave plantations without legal issue. In fact, debt peonage was a crime, so they had to argue that the debts were fictitious and it was just an excuse to enslave people. They explicitly stated that. The United States only actively began dismantling this form of slavery because they had entered WW2 and were concerned that the Japanese government would push propaganda shining a light on the fact that slavery was still widely practiced in the US and would nullify any propaganda the US could make about Japanese slavery, and they believed the Japanese propaganda would be too compelling to allow.

On a similar topic, after the Civil War, the South began a widespread policy of arresting freed black men on bullshit charges (when you see those lists of "wackiest laws in each state!" many of them are holdovers from when states passed a series of obscure laws to allow them to arrest black people at will) and sentencing them to long terms of hard labor in which a third of those sent to these labor camps would die. This is also the origin of criminalizing homelessness and unemployment. Black people were freed and then told to either immediately enter into debt slavery or go to a labor camp for the crime of being unemployed. In the years following the Civil War, 1/5 of freed black people were arrested and sentenced to this form of labor, including children. These remained legal until 1928, and after 1928 were just replaced with other forms of prison slavery. In the 1920s, the plurality of all of those arrested and sent to these camps were arrested for drinking. And in fact Southern states enacted Prohibition before it was in the Constitution largely as a means to supplement their continued penal slavery. It was a precursor to the War on Drugs today.

[maeinthekinning]

Random reminder, the u.s. still has an exception in the 13th amendment (slavery) that allows slavery and involuntary servitude if you have been convicted of any crime, including petty crimes, including innocent but convicted.

That exception was exploited by many to keep their slaves.

And when you get out, you can't vote to rectify that.

Recently some states (a small minority) have gotten rid of slavery in those states, some like Colorado taking multiple tries to succeed in outlawing slavery.

Even where slavery is not being used, the wages are much lower then minimal wage for where work and the cost of even a phone call or reading a free book can be immense.

Prisons optimally imo should be focused on rehabilitation, instead of punishment. This would help lower recidivism and lower homelessness.

And there shouldn't be lower then minimum wage work or fees for reading free books or pricy phone calls.

[arpov-blog-blog]

..."The goods these prisoners produce wind up in the supply chains of a dizzying array of products found in most American kitchens, from Frosted Flakes cereal and Ball Park hot dogs to Gold Medal flour, Coca-Cola and Riceland rice. They are on the shelves of virtually every supermarket in the country, including Kroger, Target, Aldi and Whole Foods. And some goods are exported, including to countries that have had products blocked from entering the U.S. for using forced or prison labor.

Many of the companies buying directly from prisons are violating their own policies against the use of such labor. But it’s completely legal, dating back largely to the need for labor to help rebuild the South’s shattered economy after the Civil War. Enshrined in the Constitution by the 13th Amendment, slavery and involuntary servitude are banned – except as punishment for a crime.

That clause is currently being challenged on the federal level, and efforts to remove similar language from state constitutions are expected to reach the ballot in about a dozen states this year.

Some prisoners work on the same plantation soil where slaves harvested cotton, tobacco and sugarcane more than 150 years ago, with some present-day images looking eerily similar to the past. In Louisiana, which has one of the country’s highest incarceration rates, men working on the “farm line” still stoop over crops stretching far into the distance.

Willie Ingram picked everything from cotton to okra during his 51 years in the state penitentiary, better known as Angola.

During his time in the fields, he was overseen by armed guards on horseback and recalled seeing men, working with little or no water, passing out in triple-digit heat. Some days, he said, workers would throw their tools in the air to protest, despite knowing the potential consequences.

“They’d come, maybe four in the truck, shields over their face, billy clubs, and they’d beat you right there in the field. They beat you, handcuff you and beat you again,” said Ingram, who received a life sentence after pleading guilty to a crime he said he didn’t commit. He was told he would serve 10 ½ years and avoid a possible death penalty, but it wasn’t until 2021 that a sympathetic judge finally released him. He was 73.

The number of people behind bars in the United States started to soar in the 1970s just as Ingram entered the system, disproportionately hitting people of color. Now, with about 2 million people locked up, U.S. prison labor from all sectors has morphed into a multibillion-dollar empire, extending far beyond the classic images of prisoners stamping license plates, working on road crews or battling wildfires.

Though almost every state has some kind of farming program, agriculture represents only a small fraction of the overall prison workforce. Still, an analysis of data amassed by the AP from correctional facilities nationwide traced nearly $200 million worth of sales of farmed goods and livestock to businesses over the past six years – a conservative figure that does not include tens of millions more in sales to state and government entities. Much of the data provided was incomplete, though it was clear that the biggest revenues came from sprawling operations in the South and leasing out prisoners to companies.

Corrections officials and other proponents note that not all work is forced and that prison jobs save taxpayers money. For example, in some cases, the food produced is served in prison kitchens or donated to those in need outside. They also say workers are learning skills that can be used when they’re released and given a sense of purpose, which could help ward off repeat offenses. In some places, it allows prisoners to also shave time off their sentences. And the jobs provide a way to repay a debt to society, they say.

While most critics don’t believe all jobs should be eliminated, they say incarcerated people should be paid fairly, treated humanely and that all work should be voluntary. Some note that even when people get specialized training, like firefighting, their criminal records can make it almost impossible to get hired on the outside.

“They are largely uncompensated, they are being forced to work, and it’s unsafe. They also aren’t learning skills that will help them when they are released,” said law professor Andrea Armstrong, an expert on prison labor at Loyola University New Orleans. “It raises the question of why we are still forcing people to work in the fields.”

[reasoningdaily]

Incarcerated women risk their lives fighting California fires. It's part of a long history of prison labor

For most of the 23 years Romarilyn Ralston spent in a California prison, she made 37 cents an hour, unable to afford crafty birthday cards for her two sons, let alone the financial support she desperately wanted to give them.

Ralston did clerical and recreational work at the California Institution for Women in Chino, while voluntarily training women who have recently made national headlines for being on the front lines of the state’s biggest wildfires. The state has deployed more than 15,000 people to combat fires ripping through more than 220,000 acres in recent weeks, including as many as 1,600 trained inmates who earn, at the high end, a base pay of close to $2 a day.

Ralston said her friends on the outside were shocked to hear about the low wages and the tough work, and she, as well as a woman who said she trained for the program, said it deserves much more scrutiny.

Describing dangerous, backbreaking labor — they use hoes and chainsaws to manipulate the landscape and redirect fires in their tracks — Ralston compared it to a slave-era practice.

“Prisoners are leased out and thrown down to public and private corporations for labor,” she said. “That’s part of the convict-leasing system from Reconstruction, unfortunately, and it’s shameful.”

The second clause of the 13th Amendment to abolish slavery and involuntary servitude made an exception for people convicted of crimes, allowing landowners to incriminate newly-freed slaves with arbitrary laws and rent them out for cheap labor.

Since then, prisons have relied on this labor — including cleaning, serving food, laundry, plumbing and construction — to run their facilities as well as to provide the state with other workers, including those who make license plates or pave roads.

Though firefighting, Ralston said, is particularly high-risk.

“I’ve seen women come back with broken ankles and broken arms, burns or just suffering from exhaustion, you know, the psychological stress that people go through trying to just pass the requirements because if they don’t pass the requirements, they don’t get to camp,” she said. “It’s very stressful, not only on the body but also on the mind.”

California corrections spokesperson Bill Sessa said he did not anticipate the women would get so much attention. The female California Conservation Camp program has been intact since 1983 and 40 of the 43 camps are male.

“The men were getting all the coverage, so I just happened to mention to a reporter, ‘You know, we do have women who do this,’” Sessa said. “The fact that it’s women, the fact that it’s Malibu, it’s just got all the elements for lack of a better term, a sexy story.”

He also described the positions as coveted among inmates — the environment is nicer, the pay can be higher, the food is better and he said it can accelerate their release dates. For every day most of them are at camp and are on good behavior, they can get two days off their sentence, according to corrections.

A fireman who has managed prison crews for the past seven years, watches over a team of female prisoners in a remote mountainous area of the Witch Fire past Santa Ysabel, California to build a protection line against spreading fire, October 25, 2007. Of about 9,000 firefighters battling the southern California flames, nearly 3,000 are inmates. About 300 are from all-women prisoner brigades. Picture taken October 25, 2007. Photo by Adam Tanner/Reuters

Ralston agreed that it is more humane than other prison jobs for those reasons and that plenty of people get satisfaction out of the work, but that given the history of prison labor, and the low pay for risky work, it can still be demeaning. Corrections estimates the program saves the state $124 million a year, amounting to 3 million hours of firefighting work.

“When it costs $70,000 a year to incarcerate someone, then training them to be a high-functioning state worker and fight fires and put their lives on the line,” she said. “To treat people that way is absolutely shameful.”

While Ralston was incarcerated, she was serving a life sentence, unable to stay at a camp – those spots are for people who are deemed as minimum flight risks.

“It was tough. I tried to send little birthday cards and gifts home but it’s hard to support your kids,” she said. “Even when you make things, sometimes materials are free but sometimes you want to buy materials, or order something from a catalogue because they did well in school, but you can’t afford it.”

She was sentenced to life in 1988 when her sons were 2 and 5 years old. In the 23 years she served, she had bought savings bonds that had amounted to about $500, which she retrieved upon her release in 2011. Since then, she has earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees and become a program coordinator at Project Rebound at Cal State Fullerton, a resource for incarcerated people who want access to higher education.

The director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Prison Project David Fathi said that not all prison jobs are inherently bad. Voluntary jobs can lower recidivism rates, provide routine and a valuable sense of worth and responsibility. But whether they are actually “voluntary” is an important nuance, he said.

“Little in prison is truly voluntary,” Fathi said. “It’s hard for most people to understand the pervasively and inherently coercive nature of the prison environment.”

While California corrections states on its fact sheet that no one is involuntarily assigned to the fire program, Ralston and Ingrid Archie disagree.

Most people in California prisons go through a classification system every year so the facility can assess where they should work based on skills, attitude, work habits and education level.

They are often placed on a pay scale that is anywhere from 8 cents an hour for labor, maxing out at $12 a month, to 37 cents an hour for a lead position, maxing out at $56 a month.

Archie, who was released about two years ago, said she was assigned to the camp without her input.

“If you refuse the program, that’s a disciplinary infraction,” she said.

She said the infraction is called “refusal to program” and that it can layer an additional 30 to 60 days onto a person’s sentence.

Ralston, who did administrative work for the fire program, said that people risk an infraction and added time if they do not cooperate.

California corrections spokesperson Terry Thornton said that there is an infraction called “refusal to program,” but that she still considers the fire program voluntary because corrections “cannot force an inmate” to comply.

Regardless, Fathi said there are clearer lines to better wages.

“State minimum wage laws don’t apply to prisoners. This is something the legislature could fix very easily. The minimum wage could apply to everyone who works,” he said. “Same with worker’s compensation laws.”

California corrections states in its fact sheet that people in the program make $2 a day, but most of them are actually making $1.45. There is a ranking system: $1.45 a day is grade 1, while “skilled and experienced” people get $1.67 a day and “a limited number of skilled inmates who have been given special assignments” get $1.95 per day.

Ralston maxed out at $56 a month as a clerk for the fire crews and Archie said she was compensated $1 a day to clean the camp.

With their earnings, they could buy items like soap or lotion, pre-made birthday cards, vitamins, allergy tablets, cough drops, or Saltine crackers. They could spend it on co-pays for health concerns, but it was never enough money to save or send it home.

Sessa says part of the appeal of the fire program is the extra pay for being in the field. In those circumstances, firefighters get an extra $1 an hour.

Given the severity of the fires in recent weeks, he said some of the crews were working up to 80 hours in a row before they could get a break.

“They can put it in special accounts which gives them a financial cushion when they go back to their home community,” he said.

READ NEXT: Oklahoma lawmakers, voters disagree on punishments for drug crimes

But Ralston says that money is not what lures women to these jobs. Most of them, she said, risk their well-being to get out of prison faster so they can get home to their children and prove that they are “redeemable.”

The majority of women in prison have children, are victims of violence or trauma and are most often there for nonviolent offenses, as opposed to their male counterparts. While California has one of the lowest female incarceration rates, it has come under scrutiny in recent years for its failure to adequately address some of their unique mental health issues.

And even if they are making top prison dollars, the wages are still “shameful,” especially given the many obstacles women face, she said.

“A lot of women in the program are in there because they want to get to their children, but they don’t need a broke down mom when she gets home,” she said.

[matcha-and-strawberries-pls]

More people need to be aware of the practice of “legal slavery” in correctional facilities in the US like prisons. This is a reminder that the 13th Amendment ALLOWS INVOLUNTARY SERVITUDE for people convicted of crimes. And of course, big businesses take advantage of this practice as they always do.

[whencyclopedia]

Native American Enslavement in Colonial America

Slavery was practiced by the Native Americans before any Europeans arrived in the region. People of one tribe could be taken by another for a variety of reasons but, whatever the reason, it was understood that the enslaved had done something – staked himself in a gamble and lost or allowed himself to be captured – to warrant such treatment.

This model changed with the arrival of the Spanish in the West Indies in 1492 and their colonization of that region, South, and Central America throughout the 16th century. Native Americans were then enslaved simply for being Native Americans. In North America, after the English arrived, Native Americans were at first enslaved as prisoners of war but, eventually, were taken and sold to plantations in the West Indies to clear the land for expansion of English colonies.

This practice continued throughout the colonial era aided and encouraged by Native American tribes themselves up through 1750 and, after the American War of Independence (1775-1783), natives were pushed into the interior as African slavery became more lucrative. Even so, the enslavement of Native Americans continued even after slavery was abolished by the 13th Amendment to the Constitution in 1865. Americans got around illegal enslavement of natives by calling it by other names and justified it in the interests of "civilizing the savages". The practice continued up through 1900, dramatically impacting Native American cultures, languages, and development.

Native American Slavery & Columbus

Native American tribes were incredibly diverse, each with their own culture, and far from the cohesive, unified civilization they are often represented as under the umbrella term "Native American" or "American Indian". Each tribe understood itself as inherently superior to others and although they would form alliances for short periods in a common cause, or for longer periods as confederacies, they frequently warred with each other for goods, in the name of tribal honor, and for captives, among other reasons.

Men, women, and children taken captive were then enslaved by the victorious tribe, sometimes for life and other times for a given number of years and, in still other cases, until they were adopted and became members of the tribe. People could also be enslaved as hostages, held to ensure compliance with a treaty, and in some tribes, people were not only enslaved for life but any children born to them were also considered slaves, thereby creating a slave class long before the arrival of Europeans.

This model changed after the arrival of Christopher Columbus (l. 1451-1506) in the West Indies in 1492 and the Portuguese in 1500. Columbus kidnapped natives he brought back to Spain as slaves on his first voyage and sent over 500 back on his second. Between 1493-1496, he implemented the encomienda system, which institutionalized Native American enslavement throughout the Spanish colonies of the New World, and, by the time the French, Dutch, and English began colonizing North America, the Transatlantic Slave Trade was already established.

Continue reading...

[neuromycelic-blog]

**How Capitalism Drives the Exploitation of Migrant Children and Generational Harm**

Capitalism, as an economic system prioritizing profit, privatization, and market-driven efficiency, directly fuels the exploitation of migrant children and perpetuates cycles of generational harm. Below is an analysis of its role, supported by historical and contemporary evidence:

---

### **1. Profit Motive and Labor Exploitation**

Capitalism’s reliance on **cheap, disposable labor** incentivizes the exploitation of marginalized groups, including migrant children:

- **Corporate Cost-Cutting**: Companies subcontract labor to avoid accountability. For example, major brands like Hyundai and Tyson Foods rely on third-party suppliers that illegally employ migrant children in dangerous jobs (Reuters, 2023; *New York Times*, 2023).

- **Wage Suppression**: Migrant children, often undocumented, are paid **$1–$4/hour** in sectors like agriculture and meatpacking—far below minimum wage. This practice boosts corporate profits while trapping families in poverty (Economic Policy Institute, 2023).

- **Historical Precedent**: The post-13th Amendment **convict leasing system** replaced enslaved labor with incarcerated Black workers, demonstrating capitalism’s ability to adapt racialized exploitation for profit (Blackmon, *Slavery by Another Name*, 2008).

---

### **2. Privatization of Detention and Carceral Profiteering**

Capitalism commodifies human suffering through **private prisons and detention centers**:

- **Corporate Profit Models**: Companies like GEO Group and CoreCivic operate 80% of ICE detention facilities. Their contracts often include **bed quotas**, guaranteeing payment for maintaining high detention numbers (Detention Watch Network, 2023).

- **Exploitative Labor in Detention**: Detained migrants are forced to clean facilities, cook meals, and manufacture goods for **$1/day**, generating $200+ million annually for private contractors (ACLU, *Captive Labor*, 2022).

- **Shareholder Incentives**: GEO Group’s 2022 revenue reached $2.3 billion, with executives earning bonuses tied to cost-cutting measures like reduced food and healthcare for detainees (*The Guardian*, 2023).

---

### **3. Deregulation and Weakened Labor Protections**

Capitalist lobbying has eroded laws designed to protect workers, enabling child labor:

- **Agricultural Exemptions**: The Fair Labor Standards Act (1938) allows children as young as **12** to work in agriculture, a carve-out demanded by farm lobbies to maintain cheap labor (EPI, 2023).

- **Gig Economy Exploitation**: Apps like Uber and DoorDash classify workers as “independent contractors,” avoiding benefits and enabling underage migrant labor in delivery jobs (*The Atlantic*, 2023).

- **Corporate Immunity**: Meatpacking giant Packers Sanitation Services Inc. (PSSI) paid just $1.5 million in fines after employing 102 children—a fraction of its $4.6 billion annual revenue (DOL, 2023).

---

### **4. Racial Capitalism and Marginalization**

Capitalism thrives on racial hierarchies to justify exploitation:

- **Targeting Vulnerable Populations**: Latinx and Indigenous migrants, fleeing poverty and violence caused by U.S. trade policies (e.g., NAFTA), are funneled into exploitative jobs as “disposable” labor (García Hernández, *Migrating to Prison*, 2019).

- **Criminalizing Survival**: Black and Brown migrants are disproportionately arrested for minor offenses (e.g., crossing borders), then forced into prison labor programs that supply Fortune 500 companies (Bureau of Prisons, 2023).

---

### **5. Commodification of Human Lives**

Capitalism reduces migrants to **economic inputs** rather than human beings:

- **Detention as an Industry**: The U.S. spends **$3.4 billion/year** on immigration detention, enriching contractors while subjecting children to trauma (ICE, 2023).

- **Foster Care Profiteering**: Firms like VisionQuest and Southwest Key secure federal contracts ($775+/child/day) to warehouse migrant children in prison-like facilities (Texas Tribune, 2023).

---

### **6. Generational Harm as a Byproduct**

Capitalism’s focus on short-term gains perpetuates cycles of poverty and crime:

- **Education Deprivation**: Migrant children working 12-hour shifts cannot attend school, increasing their likelihood of incarceration (63% higher for dropouts; Brookings, 2023).

- **Intergenerational Trauma**: Parents in exploitative jobs (e.g., construction, cleaning) lack time and resources to care for children, replicating neglect (Annie E. Casey Foundation, 2023).

- **Corporate Landlords**: Private equity firms buy mobile home parks and low-income housing, displacing migrant families into unstable living conditions that exacerbate harm (*The Nation*, 2023).

---

### **Conclusion: Capitalism’s Moral Contradiction**

The exploitation of migrant children and the generational harm it causes are not accidental but **structural features** of capitalism. By prioritizing profit over human dignity, the system perpetuates:

- **Dehumanization** of migrants as cheap labor.

- **Racialized inequality** to maximize extraction.

- **Intergenerational trauma** as a cost of doing business.

As theologian Kelly Brown Douglas argues:

> *“Capitalism’s sin is its commodification of human beings, reducing them to instruments of profit.”*

Addressing this crisis requires dismantling capitalist structures that normalize exploitation—from abolishing private detention to enforcing living wages—and recentering economic systems on equity, care, and collective thriving.

---

**References**

- Blackmon, D. A. (2008). *Slavery by Another Name*. Anchor Books.

- Economic Policy Institute (EPI). (2023). *Child Labor in the U.S. Agricultural Sector*.

- García Hernández, C. C. (2019). *Migrating to Prison*. The New Press.

- Detention Watch Network. (2023). *Profit Over People: The Role of Private Prisons in Immigration Detention*.

- *The Guardian*. (2023). *“How GEO Group Turns Migrant Suffering into Shareholder Profit.”*

- U.S. Department of Labor (DOL). (2023). *Findings on Child Labor Violations*.

[uwuchan-ramen]

They wanted their government run like a business. Now it is. Only those at the top get paid, everyone else is exploited. And who is going to work all those jobs left empty by the deportations? Prisoners. With the slavery exception in the 13th amendment, corporations are going to start hiring for-profit prisons for slave labor. Labor shortages in these fields will fuel an increase in over policing and mass incarceration of the American people, especially people of color.

This is what happens when you try to run a government like a business. This is what happens when you put profit over public service, money over citizens.

The presence of the billionaires at the inauguration is only a confirmation of the oligarchy we now live in. The United States government allowed companies to have rights as if they were people, allowing them to line their pockets with bribes. It was only a matter of time before each seat was bought by one company or another.

I'm just so disappointed in what's happening in my country.

[yetisidelblog]

Section I of the amendment reads:  

“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.”1

Prison slavery is never the answer

The “Exception Clause”, also known as the Punishment Clause, made it possible for slavery to be used as a method of punishment, allowing the government to legally subject people incarcerated across the United States to forced labor. But what is legal is not what is just. 

Incarcerated persons exposed to prison slavery or forced prison labor are coerced into working through the loss of privileges, visitations, good time earnings, commissary access or the threat of solitary confinement and even being tasered according to one lawsuit.2

Congress has the chance to end legal slavery

That is why we are asking states and US Congress to abolish the Punishment Clause in state constitutions and amend the 13th Amendment. 

The Punishment Clause is not just a glaring fault in the US Constitution — several state constitutions contain identical language. Beginning with Colorado, Utah, and Nebraska, many states are taking aim at striking the Punishment Clause from their state constitutions.  

In 2022, Vermont, Alabama, Tennessee and Oregon, through successful Midterm election referenda, have introduced amendments to either remove the punishment clause from their state constitutions or add language to explicitly outlaw slavery or involuntary servitude as punishment for a crime.3

In 2024, voters in Nevada struck down forced labor in the state constitution in the general elections.4

If more states remove the Punishment Clause from their state constitutions, this will create a domino effect for other states to follow their lead, as well as increase the chances of the Abolition Amendment — set to be reintroduced this year — passing through the US Congress.  

The forced labor indicators

Forced labor in prisons is often built into “rehabilitation” or “educational” programs. Many who are incarcerated report being threatened with solitary confinement or longer sentences if they refuse to work. On top of this, incarcerated people are often paid nothing at all for their work or mere pennies, leaving them with almost no savings to help them re-enter society upon release. 

In 2017, Prison Policy Initiative reported incarcerated people appear to be paid less than they were in 2001. The report stated “What changed? At least seven states appear to have lowered their maximum wages, and South Carolina no longer pays wages for most regular prison jobs – assignments that paid up to $4.80 per day in 2001. With a few rare exceptions, regular prison jobs are still unpaid in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, and Texas.”5

According to the International Labour Organization, under the 1930 Forced Labour Convention No. 29, forced labor is work undertaken involuntarily under threat of menace or penalty. This also applies to prison labor, meaning wages must be comparable to those of free workers with similar skills who are not incarcerated. 6

The Punishment Clause has been a blight on the US for over 100 years, creating an economic incentive for increasing incarceration and exploiting incarcerated people as a source of cheap labor.7 As Senator Merkley, sponsor of the Abolition Amendment, explains, the Punishment Clause created a financial incentive for mass incarceration throughout history, targeting communities of color in particular:

Following the ratification of the 13th Amendment, including the Punishment Clause, in 1865, Southern jurisdictions arrested Black Americans in large numbers for minor crimes, like loitering or vagrancy, codified in new ‘Black Codes,’ which were only applied to Black Americans. The Punishment Clause was then used by sheriffs to lease out imprisoned individuals to work landowners’ fields, which in some cases included the very same plantations where they had been enslaved.  The practice grew in prevalence and scope to the point that, by 1898, 73% of Alabama’s state revenue came from renting out the forced labor of Black Americans. The Punishment Clause’s facilitating and incentivizing of minor crime convictions continued to drive the over–incarceration of  Black  Americans throughout the  Jim Crow era.8

Today prison labor has contributed to the growth of an $80 billion detention industry. America is home to 5% of the world’s total population but is home to 25% of the world’s incarcerated population.

97% of incarcerated people never had a trial. Instead, low-income Americans and people of color in particular, are coerced into plea deals for non-violent offenses.

Join the movement

The United States must reckon with the injustices faced by incarcerated people borne out the Punishment Clause. At the same time, we recognize that this is a first step in tackling the myriad of other state and federal laws excluding incarcerated people from minimum wage and labor rights protection, as well as the need for the public and private sector to divest from facilities that subject incarcerated people to severe labor exploitation.9

Join us in demanding all states and the federal government to explicitly outlaw slavery and involuntary servitude as punishment for a crime in the US and state constitutions — put an end to the Punishment Clause in the United States! You can write directly to your legislature urging them to support the Abolishment Amendment here!

Watch a discussion on this topic here.

Notes:

https://www.archives.gov/historical-docs/13th-amendment ↩

https://www.cpr.org/2022/02/15/prisoners-allege-forced-labor-violates-states-anti-slavery-law/ ↩

https://news.yahoo.com/slavery-forced-prison-labor-ballot-midterm-elections-vote-210923161.html ↩

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/11/05/us/elections/results-nevada-question-4-remove-slavery-exception.html ↩

https://www.prisonpolicy.org/blog/2017/04/10/wages/ ↩

https://www.ilo.org/empent/areas/business-helpdesk/faqs/WCMS_DOC_ENT_HLP_FL_FAQ_EN/lang–en/index.htm#Q3 ↩

https://eji.org/news/history-racial-injustice-prison-labor/ ↩

https://www.merkley.senate.gov/news/press-releases/merkley-clay-propose-constitutional-amendment-to-close-slavery-loophole-in-13th-amendment-2020 ↩

https://www.freedomunited.org/advocate/end-prison-slavery/ ↩

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