How to Make Mass Incarceration a Political Issue

Bruce A. Dixon, BAR managing editor

21 Jul 2005

by BAR Managing Editor Bruce Dixon

This article was originally published in Black Commentator July 21, 2005

“A great force of suffering accumulated between the basement of heaven and the roof of hell...”

Zora Neale Hurston wrote those words almost seventy years ago at the beginning of her great allegorical work on black America, Moses, Man of the Mountain. She could have been speaking about African America today. As black activists ponder how best to build a mass movement to transform America, a mass movement that must start in but not be confined to our communities, one single low-hanging fruit of organizing opportunity is hard to miss. That opportunity lies in the manifest unfairness and hypocrisy of America’s system of racially selective policing, prosecution and mass imprisonment. These awful public policies are inviting targets for electoral and other mobilizations in black communities and beyond.

The fact that America does implement a public policy of racially selective mass imprisonment is well documented and beyond dispute. With under 5 percent of the world’s people, the US accounts for 25 percent of the planet’s prisoners. More than half its 2.2 million prisoners come from the one eighth of its population which is black. Today, an astounding 3 percent of all African Americans languish in prisons and jails, and nearly as many more are on probation, parole, bail, house arrest or court supervision. Tens of thousands of jobless, skill-less, often anti-socialized inmates are released into black communities each month in which jobs, medical care, educational opportunities and family or official support are almost completely absent. Unsurprisingly, many are back behind the walls in a matter of months. Right now, the shadow of prison squats at the corners of, and often at the center of nearly every black family’s life in this nation.

Since 1970, the US prison population has multiplied more than six times. The explosive growth of America's incarceration and crime control industries have occurred despite essentially level crime rates over the last four decades. This has only been possible because the public policies which enable and support locking up more people longer and for less have until now been exempt from analyses of their human, economic and social costs or from any reckoning of the relationships of spiraling imprisonment to actual crime rates and public safety. Most tellingly, while public discussions of these policies are deracialized, their racially disparate impacts are a seldom discussed but widely known fact. Thus even though the damning numbers are widely reported and well known, mass incarceration is practically invisible as a political issue, even in those heavily black communities which suffer most from its implementation.

Making mass incarceration a political issue

In the absence of an independent, adversarial press, which might be willing to raise issues on its own and educate the public, US political discourse is limited to what officeholders and candidates say and what the media chooses to report about what they say. As long as no candidate or official can be heard calling for a moratorium on the prosecution of juveniles as adults, it is a non-issue. If no candidate or official is cited in the media advocating the extension of health care, job and educational opportunities or the rights of citizenship to the prisoner class such proposals are absolutely off the table. And unless some candidates or officials somehow get ink or air time publicly questioning the economic and social effects of mass incarceration on children, on families, on whole communities, these concerns remain politically invisible.

The fact that sizeable chunks of the population, including likely majorities in constituencies with large numbers of African Americans might support radical reforms of America’s racially skewed policing, prosecutorial and sentencing practices, if anybody would ask them, is irrelevant. The establishment political consensus and media lockdown assure that no section of the public will ever be asked such questions, and hence will never know how widely shared their own views on the clear injustice of these policies are.

If we are to build a mass movement in opposition to America’s crime control and prison industries, we must succeed in putting the facts of racially selective mass incarceration, impoverishment and criminalization, first, in front of our African American communities, and then before the whole of America, and do so effectively, persuasively, consistently and persistently. America must be forced to publicly unpack and examine the myths that have justified its incarceration binge. An indispensable tactic in this struggle must be the mounting of competent, effective campaigns for elected office which directly question the unfairness, along with the social and human costs of these policies, political campaigns which propose radical and understandable measures to shrink the “crime control” and prison industries rather than expand them, and to ameliorate some of the harm already done to families and communities.

A short list of such down-to-earth public policy proposals might include, but not be limited to the following:

A moratorium on the prosecution of juveniles as adults, and the confinement of juveniles in facilities with adult inmates.

A moratorium on all privatization of prisons and jails, including piecemeal privatizations of such services as inmate feeding, medical care and probation.

Repeal or sunset of all “two-strikes”, “three strikes” and indeterminate sentencing legislation.

The imposition of mandatory ethnic and racial impact statements for all future prison construction and sentencing legislation, with a period set for mandatory review comparing the statement at outset with the results no less than four years out.

Elimination of sentencing disparities between powdered cocaine and crack.

End felony disenfranchisement in those states where it exists, perhaps with a constitutional amendment guaranteeing voting as a right.

Repeal of legislation banning Pell Grants to convicted felons and inmates, and require states to offer college credit courses to inmates who have completed their GED or the equivalent.

Refocus parole systems upon the re-entry and productive reintegration of former prisoners into society rather than re-imprisonment.

Civilian review boards with teeth to oversee police and prosecutorial practices.

Explicit commitments to reduce and eliminate disparities in prosecution and imprisonment.

Over the next several months we should refine and expand the list of policy positions that campaigns must incorporate if they expect the support of a mass movement to end the nation’s policy of racially selective imprisonment.

Organic connections between electoral campaigns and mass movements

In another article, It's Time To Build a Mass Movement, we described some of the essential characteristics of mass movements, progressive and otherwise:

”Mass movements exist outside electoral politics, and outside the law, or they don’t exist at all. Mass movements are never respecters of law and order. How can they be? A mass movement is an assertion of popular leadership by the people themselves. A mass movement aims to persuade courts, politicians and other actors to tail behind it, not the other way around. ”

“Politicians are elected and selected, but mass movements transform societies. Judges uphold, strike down, or invent brand new law, but mass movements drag the courts, laws and officeholders all in their wake. Progressive and even partially successful mass movements can alter the political calculus for decades to come, thus improving the lives of millions….

There are already many serious people in our communities involved in churches and voluntary organizations that try their best to offer services to the families of inmates, that lobby and agitate against drug and incarceration policies, that attempt to offer counseling and re-entry services to those emerging from our state and federal gulag. An electoral campaign and a mass movement is an unparalleled opportunity for grandmothers in church-sponsored re-entry programs to work with unchurched young people who know that they, their siblings and classmates are destined to be fodder for the imprisonment industry if things don’t turn around. If that isn’t a formula that can feed a mass movement, no such thing exists. Electoral campaigns conducted against the crime control industry are an indispensable tool in extending a movement’s outreach.

Still, we must not allow ourselves to become confused about the differences between a mass movement to change America's policy of selective policing and racist incarceration, and an electoral campaign, even ones that succeed in putting the issue of mass imprisonment at its center. Unlike a mass movement, a political campaign is a decorous, time-limited legal exercise. We must know that political campaigns have often heralded the demobilization of a mass movement, even when that movement’s objectives have not been met. Being able to use electoral campaigns to advance the agenda of a mass movement demands prior preparation and steadfast resolve, lest the candidate before or after election stray from within the bright lines of opposing the incarceration of juveniles as adults, or demanding racial and ethnic impact statements and evaluation for sentencing legislation, to use two of several possible examples.

The culture of campaigns and officialdom as practiced in America today makes officeholders unaccountable to anyone except corporate cash and corporate media. Hence it is suicidal for the leaders of local movements to wait for candidates to emerge and then decide which if any to support. Candidates that surface without the help of a movement against mass incarceration will have intended all along to run whether such a movement existed or not, and should hence be shunned. Local “movement leaders,” forced to choose among such a crop, will inevitably choose the “least worst” candidate, who will offer only tepid support to a movement’s “bright line” issues and will not advance the cause of de-legitimizing our nation’s racially skewed crime control industry at all.

To guarantee that political campaigns endorsed by the movement do indeed advance the cause, over the individual fortunes and pressures to which candidates are prey, we must set up local, statewide and even regional screening committees to recruit and interview suitable candidates for office, and to facilitate the channeling of funds and campaign expertise to those who pledge to stay within the bright lines and place the issue of mass incarceration squarely at the center of their campaigns. A national PAC whose sole purpose is funding movement-vetted candidates running against mass imprisonment – and other “bright line issues – might be employed.

Candidates who run against the crime control industry and racist mass imprisonment will certainly need all the help they can get. Although they are likely to receive surprising support and attract tons of youthful talent and enthusiasm in our base communities, they will face formidable odds getting their message out through an indifferent or hostile media. Time-tested best practices like accountable voter registration drives, accurate phone and door to door canvasses in base areas, and competent Get-Out-The-Vote (GOTV) practices will have to be combined with newer innovations to circumvent the monopoly that corporate media have on access to the American public, including the black public. BC will explore the impact of some of these new media tactics and tools in an upcoming article.

Targeting local prosecutors and sheriffs

Federal prosecutors are presidential appointees. But the state level gatekeepers for the prison industry’s stream of human raw material are local prosecutors – elected officials who must run for office at the level of counties, cities and judicial circuits. A number of these jurisdictions have black majorities. The local politicians with responsibility for housing pre-trial inmates are usually elected county officials too: sheriffs.

The table below, which arranges the list of US counties to show those with the top 130 black populations, shows a target-rich environment, with fully 37 jurisdictions having African American population percentages of 30% or greater. Every major city in the state of Georgia, for instance, is on the list, including 3 of the 4 largest counties in metro Atlanta. And you don’t need a black majority to run against mass imprisonment and win. A black prosecutor ran against the Rockefeller drug laws in Albany NY, where African Americans are a distinct minority – and won.

Counties by Black Population

County Name	State	Total County Population	Total Black Population	Percent
Cook County	IL	5,376,741	1,405,361	26.1
Los Angeles County	CA	9,519,338	930,957	9.8
Kings County	NY	2,465,326	898,350	36.4
Wayne County	MI	2,061,162	868,992	42.2
Philadelphia County	PA	1,517,550	655,824	43.2
Harris County	TX	3,400,578	628,619	18.5
Prince George's County	MD	801,515	502,550	62.7
Bronx County	NY	1,332,650	475,007	35.6
Miami-Dade County	FL	2,253,362	457,214	20.3
Dallas County	TX	2,218,899	450,557	20.3
Queens County	NY	2,229,379	446,189	20
Shelby County	TN	897,472	435,824	48.6
Baltimore city	MD	651,154	418,951	64.3
Cuyahoga County	OH	1,393,978	382,634	27.4
Fulton County	GA	816,006	363,656	44.6
DeKalb County	GA	665,865	361,111	54.2
District of Columbia	DC	572,059	343,312	60
Broward County	FL	1,623,018	333,304	20.5
Essex County	NJ	793,633	327,324	41.2
Orleans Parish	LA	484,674	325,947	67.3
New York County	NY	1,537,195	267,302	17.4
Jefferson County	AL	662,047	260,608	39.4
Milwaukee County	WI	940,164	231,157	24.6
Duval County	FL	778,879	216,780	27.8
Alameda County	CA	1,443,741	215,598	14.9
Marion County	IN	860,454	207,964	24.2
Hamilton County	OH	845,303	198,061	23.4
Mecklenburg County	NC	695,454	193,838	27.9
St. Louis County	MO	1,016,315	193,306	19
Franklin County	OH	1,068,978	191,196	17.9
Tarrant County	TX	1,446,219	185,143	12.8
St. Louis city	MO	348,189	178,266	51.2
East Baton Rouge Parish	LA	412,852	165,526	40.1
Orange County	FL	896,344	162,899	18.2
San Diego County	CA	2,813,833	161,480	5.7
Allegheny County	PA	1,281,666	159,058	12.4
Palm Beach County	FL	1,131,184	156,055	13.8
San Bernardino County	CA	1,709,434	155,348	9.1
Suffolk County	MA	689,807	153,418	22.2
Hinds County	MS	250,800	153,297	61.1
Jackson County	MO	654,880	152,391	23.3
Baltimore County	MD	754,292	151,600	20.1
Hillsborough County	FL	998,948	149,423	15
Davidson County	TN	569,891	147,696	25.9
Richland County	SC	320,677	144,809	45.2
Nassau County	NY	1,334,544	134,673	10.1
Mobile County	AL	399,843	133,465	33.4
Montgomery County	MD	873,341	132,256	15.1
Westchester County	NY	923,459	131,132	14.2
Jefferson County	KY	693,604	130,928	18.9
Clark County	NV	1,375,765	124,885	9.1
Wake County	NC	627,846	123,820	19.7
Erie County	NY	950,265	123,529	13
Guilford County	NC	421,048	123,253	29.3
Lake County	IN	484,564	122,723	25.3
Clayton County	GA	236,517	121,927	51.6
Sacramento County	CA	1,223,499	121,804	10
Oakland County	MI	1,194,156	120,720	10.1
Pulaski County	AR	361,474	115,197	31.9
Maricopa County	AZ	3,072,149	114,551	3.7
Cobb County	GA	607,751	114,233	18.8
Richmond city	VA	197,790	113,108	57.2
Caddo Parish	LA	252,161	112,483	44.6
Montgomery County	OH	559,062	111,030	19.9
Union County	NJ	522,541	108,593	20.8
Montgomery County	AL	223,510	108,583	48.6
Charleston County	SC	309,969	106,918	34.5
Cumberland County	NC	302,963	105,731	34.9
Jefferson Parish	LA	455,466	104,121	22.9
Norfolk city	VA	234,403	103,387	44.1
New Castle County	DE	500,265	101,167	20.2
Monroe County	NY	735,343	101,078	13.7
Bexar County	TX	1,392,931	100,025	7.2
Hennepin County	MN	1,116,200	99,943	9
Hartford County	CT	857,183	99,936	11.7
Richmond County	GA	199,775	99,391	49.8
Oklahoma County	OK	660,448	99,241	15
Suffolk County	NY	1,419,369	98,553	6.9
Riverside County	CA	1,545,387	96,421	6.2
Chatham County	GA	232,048	93,971	40.5
King County	WA	1,737,034	93,875	5.4
New Haven County	CT	824,008	93,239	11.3
Camden County	NJ	508,932	92,059	18.1
Genesee County	MI	436,141	88,843	20.4
Contra Costa County	CA	948,816	88,813	9.4
Fairfield County	CT	882,567	88,362	10
Durham County	NC	223,314	88,109	39.5
Jefferson County	TX	252,051	85,046	33.7
Fairfax County	VA	969,749	83,098	8.6
Pinellas County	FL	921,482	82,556	9
Hudson County	NJ	608,975	82,098	13.5
Muscogee County	GA	186,291	81,488	43.7
Virginia Beach city	VA	425,257	80,593	19
Delaware County	PA	550,864	79,981	14.5
Forsyth County	NC	306,067	78,388	25.6
Gwinnett County	GA	588,448	78,224	13.3
Lucas County	OH	455,054	77,268	17
Travis County	TX	812,280	75,247	9.3
St. Clair County	IL	256,082	73,666	28.8
Bibb County	GA	153,887	72,818	47.3
Summit County	OH	542,899	71,608	13.2
Newport News city	VA	180,150	70,388	39.1
Fort Bend County	TX	354,452	70,356	19.8
Leon County	FL	239,452	69,704	29.1
Mercer County	NJ	350,761	69,502	19.8
Greenville County	SC	379,616	69,455	18.3
Middlesex County	NJ	750,162	68,467	9.1
Anne Arundel County	MD	489,656	66,428	13.6
Polk County	FL	483,924	65,545	13.5
Hampton city	VA	146,437	65,428	44.7
Henrico County	VA	262,300	64,805	24.7
Passaic County	NJ	489,049	64,647	13.2
Burlington County	NJ	423,394	64,071	15.1
Madison County	AL	276,700	63,025	22.8
Escambia County	FL	294,410	63,010	21.4
Hamilton County	TN	307,896	62,005	20.1
Tulsa County	OK	563,299	61,656	10.9
Denver County	CO	554,636	61,649	11.1
San Francisco County	CA	776,733	60,515	7.8
Solano County	CA	394,542	58,827	14.9
Dougherty County	GA	96,065	57,762	60.1
Chesapeake city	VA	199,184	56,823	28.5
Montgomery County	PA	750,097	55,969	7.5
Orangeburg County	SC	91,582	55,736	60.9
Douglas County	NE	463,585	53,330	11.5
Spartanburg County	SC	253,791	52,775	20.8
Prince William County	VA	280,813	52,691	18.8
Will County	IL	502,266	52,509	10.5
Kent County	MI	574,335	51,287	8.9
Portsmouth city	VA	100,565	50,899	50.6

Unpacking the myths around the crime control industry

Crime control policies on every level in the U.S. are based upon racist myths. Myths are powerful because they are never questioned, never examined, never unpacked. Nobody disputes that Justice Department data going back decades shows rates of drug use among blacks and whites to be about the same. A combination of white racism and a willingness to ignore unpleasant facts largely account for white indifference at the disparity between white and black rates of arrest and prosecution for offenses created with equal frequency by both groups. But black support for an industry and for public policies that criminalize a third of all young black men, which disrupt and retard the formation of strong families, and cripple workforce and educational opportunities for such a broad cross section of us, is at best ambivalent and at worst paper-thin, even among African Americans working in the industry, based as it is upon a tenuous mass acceptance that this is all somehow part of the normal balance of society.

“It’s hot in the summer,” we tell ourselves, “it’s cold in the winter, and a third of all young black men are in and out of jail.” Or we say “It’s a trap! It was out there waitin’ for them and they fell in it!” Both these positions are understandable as mental adjustments much like those that some of our forbears thought they had to make to get along in the world of triumphant Jim Crow and white terror eighty or a hundred years ago. Such views are uncomfortable for the black people that hold them, and unstable. We must engage them by depicting mass incarceration not as the way normal societies behave, but as a failed experiment that punishes our entire community, a malevolent social policy that can be challenged and must be changed.

Our language must be carefully constructed to aid in the process of demythologizing crime and crime control policies. We need new terminology, new language that better enables people to grasp the issues around mass imprisonment and the criminal justice industry as malevolent social policies which can be changed, rather than unalterable facts like cold in the winter and heat in the summer. For example, the terms “criminal justice system” and “corrections” ought to be replaced in all our dialogue with terms like “crime control industry”, or “imprisonment industry.” A “system” is a very generalized term that does not tell us much, while an “industry” is a very specific kind of system. To call it an “industry” instead raises powerful questions of profit and accountability which are obscured when we call it anything else.

White establishment pundits and politicians of a generation ago warned us. They predicted the coming of what they called a “white backlash.” This was their name for a predicted white racist response to the just demands of African America for equality of opportunity and economic justice advanced by the movement of the 1960s, a response some feared would entrench racial inequality and privilege deeper than ever before. They were right. Beginning in the 1970s the selective mass imprisonment of African Americans helped to swell the six or sevenfold expansion of the prison population. And while the rhetoric and official policies that enabled this were ostensibly race-neutral, the results were an open secret. Around the same time, Dr. King was saying that the movement which would save the nation’s soul would have to emerge from black America. He was right too.

The struggle to de-legitimize the racist crime control and prison industries are at the heart of this generation's struggle to de-legitimize racism itself. America’s policies of racially selective policing, prosecution and imprisonment are the first target for a mass movement which must emerge from our communities, but which must not be confined to them.

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