Great listening on Fresh Air today -- Jan. 16 MLK Day
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Johanna Looye
Jan 16, 2012, 3:02:08 PM1/16/12
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Johanna Looye thought you would be interested in this story: Legal
Scholar: Jim Crow Still Exists In America
http://www.npr.org/2012/01/16/145175694/legal-scholar-jim-crow-still-exists-in-america?sc=emaf
Under Jim Crow laws, black Americans were relegated to a subordinate
status for decades. Things like literacy tests for voters and laws
designed to prevent blacks from serving on juries were commonplace in
nearly a dozen Southern states.
In her book The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of
Colorblindness, legal scholar Michelle Alexander writes that many of
the gains of the civil rights movement have been undermined by the
mass incarceration of black Americans in the war on drugs. She says
that although Jim Crow laws are now off the books, millions of blacks
arrested for minor crimes remain marginalized and disfranchised,
trapped by a criminal justice system that has forever branded them as
felons and denied them basic rights and opportunities that would allow
them to become productive, law-abiding citizens.
"People are swept into the criminal justice system — particularly in
poor communities of color — at very early ages ... typically for
fairly minor, nonviolent crimes," she tells Fresh Air's Dave Davies.
"[The young black males are] shuttled into prisons, branded as
criminals and felons, and then when they're released, they're
relegated to a permanent second-class status, stripped of the very
rights supposedly won in the civil rights movement — like the right to
vote, the right to serve on juries, the right to be free of legal
discrimination and employment, and access to education and public
benefits. Many of the old forms of discrimination that we supposedly
left behind during the Jim Crow era are suddenly legal again, once
you've been branded a felon."
On Monday's Fresh Air, Alexander details how President Reagan's war on
drugs led to a mass incarceration of black males and the difficulties
these felons face after serving their prison sentences. She also
details her own experiences working as the director of the Racial
Justice Program at the American Civil Liberties Union.
=====
I'm not teaching anything for which I could use this right now, but it
seems like it would be worth using. jwl
Scholar: Jim Crow Still Exists In America
http://www.npr.org/2012/01/16/145175694/legal-scholar-jim-crow-still-exists-in-america?sc=emaf
Under Jim Crow laws, black Americans were relegated to a subordinate
status for decades. Things like literacy tests for voters and laws
designed to prevent blacks from serving on juries were commonplace in
nearly a dozen Southern states.
In her book The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of
Colorblindness, legal scholar Michelle Alexander writes that many of
the gains of the civil rights movement have been undermined by the
mass incarceration of black Americans in the war on drugs. She says
that although Jim Crow laws are now off the books, millions of blacks
arrested for minor crimes remain marginalized and disfranchised,
trapped by a criminal justice system that has forever branded them as
felons and denied them basic rights and opportunities that would allow
them to become productive, law-abiding citizens.
"People are swept into the criminal justice system — particularly in
poor communities of color — at very early ages ... typically for
fairly minor, nonviolent crimes," she tells Fresh Air's Dave Davies.
"[The young black males are] shuttled into prisons, branded as
criminals and felons, and then when they're released, they're
relegated to a permanent second-class status, stripped of the very
rights supposedly won in the civil rights movement — like the right to
vote, the right to serve on juries, the right to be free of legal
discrimination and employment, and access to education and public
benefits. Many of the old forms of discrimination that we supposedly
left behind during the Jim Crow era are suddenly legal again, once
you've been branded a felon."
On Monday's Fresh Air, Alexander details how President Reagan's war on
drugs led to a mass incarceration of black males and the difficulties
these felons face after serving their prison sentences. She also
details her own experiences working as the director of the Racial
Justice Program at the American Civil Liberties Union.
=====
I'm not teaching anything for which I could use this right now, but it
seems like it would be worth using. jwl
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