Yes,
you read that right.
In
the “land of the free,” the states of
Alabama, Louisiana,Oregon, Tennessee and
Vermont have an opportunity to vote to abolish
slavery,
as part of an effort by the criminal
justice reform movement effortto end
prison labor.
Read
the not-so-fine print in the 13th
Amendment
to the U.S. Constitution to understand the
problem. That amendment,which was ratified
in 1865 and thankfully ended slavery for
millions
of Black people in America, has a loophole
that amounts to a gapinghole if you care
about criminal justice reform and ending
prison
labor: “Neither slavery nor involuntary
servitude, except
as a punishment for crime whereof the
party shall have been dulyconvicted,
shall exist within the United States, or
any place subject to theirjurisdiction.
That
means forced labor—with
little
to no pay—is
allowed by law and has been for over a
century and a half after theend of
slavery. And around 20 states have similar
loopholes in their
own constitutions.
13th,
the 2016
Netflix documentary
directed by Ava DuVernay, explored the
“intersection of race,justice, and mass
incarceration in the United States”—with
a focus on the troubling language of the
amendment. The film, whichwas a boost for
the Black Lives Matter movement, shines a
light on
the ongoing criminalization of Black
people by exposing the linkagesbetween the
13th Amendment, Jim Crow subjugation and
the prison
industrial complex.
Under
slavery, the
slave codes
criminalized enslaved Black people,
controlled their movement anddeputized
white men to police the plantation, hunt
them down and even
kill them. Under the Jim Crow regime of
racial terrorism and forcedlabor, vagrancy
laws targeted Black people for prison for
minor or
imaginary offenses and funneled Black
people into a convict-leasingsystem of
free labor to build white wealth. It is no
accident that
prison farms in the South are former slave
plantations. And today’smass incarceration
and drug war craze built on criminalizing
and
warehousing Black bodies has devastated
Black communities.
In
other words, slavery persists to this day
under a different name.Today, in America,
Black people are picking crops
like their enslaved ancestors, in a nation
with 5 percent of theworld’s population
and 25 percent of the world’s
prisoners, disproportionately Black. And
someone profits from thatmostly free labor
today, just as they profited back then.
This
election year, some states want to turn
this around.
Voters
in
Alabama
will have the chance to overhaul their
state constitution and removeall
references to racist language, including
the following section:
“That no form of slavery shall exist in
this state; and thereshall not be any
involuntary servitude, otherwise than for
the
punishment of crime, of which the party
shall have been dulyconvicted.”
Louisiana
voters will decide on a proposed state
constitutional amendment that“removes the
exception allowing for the use of
involuntary
servitude as punishment for a crime.”
Oregon,
with its troubling history of Black
exclusion
laws
to keep Portland white, could reject
language in its constitutionallowing for
slavery and involuntary servitude as criminal
punishments.
The Oregon ballot measure would also
authorize an Oregon court or aprobation or
parole agency to order alternatives to
incarceration at
sentencing for those who are convicted of
a crime.
In
Tennessee,
a ballot initiative would replace the
current language in the stateconstitution—
“That slavery and involuntary servitude,
except as a punishment for crime, whereof
the party shall have beenduly convicted,
are forever prohibited in this state”—with
new language saying “slavery and
involuntary servitude areforever
prohibited in this State.”
A
ballot measure in Vermont
would repeal language in the state
constitution stating that “personscould be
held as servants, slaves, or apprentices
with the person’s
consent” or “for the payments of debts,
damages, fines,costs, or the like” and add
language that “slavery and
indentured servitude in any form are
prohibited.”
Since
2018, Colorado,
Nebraska
and Utah
voted in favor of similar ballot measures.
And efforts are underwayin California,
Florida, New Jersey, Ohio and Texas to
allow their
voters to decide on similar items.
On
the federal level, the Abolition
Amendment
before the Senate Judiciary Committee
would amend
the
U.S. Constitution
to say, “[n]either slavery nor indentured
servitude may beimposed as a punishment
for a crime.” The legislation has not
made any progress.
Ultimately,
the
nation
with
the highest incarcerated rate in the
world
cannot continue to claim itself as a
democracy unless it addressesits past and
present-day enslavement.
“The
United States cannot in good faith
confront the legacy of chattelslavery
while still permitting vestiges of that
economy to persist,”
said Simeon
Spencer
of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund.
“Dehumanization allowed forthe evils of
chattel slavery. Dehumanization allows
slavery and
involuntary servitude to continue under
the guise of a carceralstate.”
Abolition
is on the ballot, and this is real, not
symbolism. The outcome ofthese ballot items
will be proof yet again that elections do
matter.
And Black people must be liberated in the
era of mass incarcerationand the New Jim
Crow.
This
commentary is also posted on The
Grio
