The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness PDF

## The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness **Michelle Alexander** ### Summary: This book explores the history of mass incarceration in the United States, arguing it is a new form of racial control that has replaced the Jim Crow era. It analyzes the rise of the War on Drug...

## The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness **Michelle Alexander** ### Summary: This book explores the history of mass incarceration in the United States, arguing it is a new form of racial control that has replaced the Jim Crow era. It analyzes the rise of the War on Drugs and its devastating impact on the African American community, highlighting how criminal justice policies have been used to systematically target, marginalize, and imprison people of color. ### The Birth of Jim Crow: - The backlash against the gains of African Americans in the Reconstruction Era was swift and severe, as whites reacted with panic and outrage. - The South was "redeemed" by a resurgent Ku Klux Klan and other terrorist groups that targeted Reconstruction governments and their leaders. - Federal troops were withdrawn from the South, and federal efforts to enforce civil rights legislation were abandoned. - Vagrancy laws and other criminal offenses were vigorously enforced against blacks, leading to widespread convict leasing. ### The Rebirth of Caste: - The terrorist campaign of the Reconstruction era effectively replaced the Jim Crow era with a new system of racial control, creating a "new Jim Crow." - The War on Drugs was used as a tool to target, marginalize, and imprison African Americans disproportionately. - Three philosophies of race relations emerged in this period: liberalism, conservatism, and radicalism. - Conservatives gained the most support and implemented a system of segregation and racial discrimination. - The Populist movement sought to create a multiracial alliance of poor whites and blacks against wealthy elites, but this movement quickly dissolved. ### Conclusion: - The new Jim Crow, built on the foundations of convict leasing and the War on Drugs, has created a permanent caste system in the United States. - This system is both racist and class-based, targeting marginalized communities for imprisonment and disenfranchisement. - It is a complex and deeply rooted problem that requires significant change in order to be dismantled.