Proposed 'Abolition Amendment' would close a major 13th Amendment loophole

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

While the 13th Amendment abolished chattel slavery, an often ignored clause still allows for slavery and involuntary servitude as “punishment for a crime.” This “slavery clause” is now the target of #EndTheException, a new campaign launched this year on Juneteenth weekend. #EndTheException is pushing for the passage of the Abolition Amendment, a joint resolution cosponsored by Sen. Jeff Merkley and Rep. Nikema Williams, which would strike the slavery clause from the 13th Amendment making it so that “neither slavery nor involuntary servitude may be imposed as a punishment for a crime.”

On Saturday, June 19, as communities across the country celebrated Juneteenth—a holiday long celebrated by Black Americans, particularly Black Texans—Merkley and Williams joined advocates from groups including WorthRises, LatinoJustice PRLDF, JustLeadershipUSA, and the Anti-Recidivism Coalition for an online discussion about the #EndTheException campaign, and to explain how the promise of freedom has yet to be fulfilled.

The average incarcerated worker earns 86 cents per hour, and in five states—Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Mississippi, and Texas—laborers inside earn nothing. Jorge Renaud, the national criminal justice director for LatinoJustice PRLDF, was incarcerated in Texas for 27 years. For 13 years, he experienced not just the painful labor of fieldwork—chopping trees and picking cotton, sorghum, and corn—but also retaliation when refusing to work.

“[It was] two years into my last sentence—I had a 60-year sentence,” Renaud said, “I thought I was going to die in prison and I drew a line. I said, ‘There are some things I’m not going to do for you all. I don’t care what you do to me.’ So I’m working out in the fields and I threw my aggy [grubbing hoe] up in the air and I was lucky they didn’t shoot me. They said, ‘You’re not going to work?’ and I said, ‘I’m not going out in the fields for y’all,’ and they put me in solitary for a couple of years.”

https://www.dailykos.com//stories/2021/6/26/2037073/-Proposed-Abolition-Amendment-would-close-a-major-13th-Amendment-loophole

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. We are way overdue to remove that pernicious loophole in the 13th Amendment.

It is unconscionable that such a loophole still exists in our Constitution.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

2. Prison labor is slave labor. K&R

[wryter2000]

3. Ava Duvernay did a documentary about this

It's called 13th. After emancipation, the south passed anti-black laws, which made all kinds of things illegal for black people to do. So, they'd get arrested and thrown back into slavery. The film goes up to the present about mass incarceration.

[cstanleytech]

4. I don't see anything wrong with

requiring people in prison to do everyday chores inside the prison like their own laundry or cooking meals and cleaning the prison.
Nor do I object to them doing jobs like working the fields or answering phones for something like 80 some cents an hour but if the job does not involve taking care of daily chores inside and around the prison it should be voluntary.

[mathematic]

5. Prison is not kidnapping and prison labor is not slavery nt

[WhiskeyGrinder]

9. Incarcerated people get substandard wages (if any), worker protection laws do not apply to them,

and they are in an inherently coercive environment. It's not chattel slavery, but it's definitely slave labor.

[erronis]

13. But if certain jurisdictions write and enforce laws that cause people to be enslaved?

This seems to be the primary way that southern states get cheap/slave labor.

Black: Tail light out? Dead, or working in the fields.

Is this fair in any sense of the word?

[obamanut2012]

17. Oh stop, yes it is.

Substandard wages if any, zero labor protection, punishments for a badly done job. It is total coercion, with all the money going to large corporations and the state.

Pay them at least minimum wage, with OT, and all Federal labor protection. And, bo punishments if the job is done poorly.

[The Jungle 1]

6. Do not eat chocoholic.

Two thirds of the worlds cocoa comes from the Ivory Coast and is produced with slave and child labor.
The major candy producers have all broken their promises to end the slave labor. The promises are a lie.
Hershey, Mars and Nestle are scum. If you eat their produces you are eating a product produced by slave child labor.
THEY KNOW.
Until we stop they will not stop.

[Smackdown2019]

7. Prison is not a luxury hotel!

Prisoners are to work their time in positive meaning, instead laying up in a dark cell watching tv! Good honest work brings ethics and skills. If prisons force inmates to produce their own meals and provide educational means to better the inmate; I am for that!

What i dont agree with is farming out inmates to nearby farmers for profit, which was done back in the day and probably in a few occasions behind the scenes in today's time.

Basically, if you got a life sentence for a horrific crime, tough luck, your new pain will be a deterrent for another potential criminal.

If you got a short term, work is a deterrent to remind you if you do it again....

[WhiskeyGrinder]

10. .

Prisoners are to work their time in positive meaning, instead laying up in a dark cell watching tv!

Are they? Positive meaning?

Good honest work brings ethics and skills.

Good honest work should be paid, and the workers should be protected.

If prisons force inmates to produce their own meals and provide educational means to better the inmate; I am for that!

If they're forced, is it good honest work?

What i dont agree with is farming out inmates to nearby farmers for profit, which was done back in the day and probably in a few occasions behind the scenes in today's time.

It happens right out in the open now. Prison labor is sold to all sorts of private companies, public-private partnerships and state institutions at low, low rates. Manufacturers, ag companies, janitorial services, etc. Do you agree with that?

Basically, if you got a life sentence for a horrific crime, tough luck, your new pain will be a deterrent for another potential criminal.

Okay is it meant to be pain, or positive meaning?

[Smackdown2019]

16. Ok, I will bite and respond

Are they? Positive meaning?
Rehibiltation is the worst and Positive meaning was meant to be bring something other rough edges and turn that individual into someone that has brought something good out of prison. Laying in a cell will never be anything good. Reform through work will bring character into a person.. self respect... Shawshank rod top project is a prime example, they want out to be free of the cell, it was a respectable job to mock tar on the roof.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

19. The Shawshank Redemption was fiction.

Work that exploits cannot rehabilitate. People do not have to be productive to be worthy.

[Liberal In Texas]

20. Loss of freedom should be punishment enough. After the punishment we should

be trying to rehabilitate and train prisoners so they can integrate back into society when they are released. This might include medical treatment for drug use and mental problems.

Forcing them into menial slavery seems like the worst thing we could do.

[Smackdown2019]

22. .

Good honest work should be paid, and the workers should be protected.

I disagree. It's called working off a debt on society. Let's face it, if an individual breaks the law, why does society have to pay for their reformation.

As for protection, I agree on that, safety always should be followed, but protecting from work, no.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

23. "why does society have to pay for their reformation."

How is selling your labor at a cheap-ass rate "reformative"?

It's called working off a debt on society.

I guess I wouldn't call prison labor making money for prisons and the companies that use prison labor for products and services as "working off a debt on society."

but protecting from work, no.

This sounds like forced labor. How is forced labor "reformative"?

[Smackdown2019]

24. If they're forced, is it good honest work?

Ok, so WHY must a theif, rapist, murderer, or criminal get FREE room and boarding, while HONEST taxpaying citizens must pay? Answer is, they should WORK for their food. It does build character and bestows values. Much of which a few were NOT TAUGHT in their upbringing.

So forced.... yes forced... they are forced behind bars for crimes they have committed!

[Smackdown2019]

25. Response

"It happens right out in the open now. Prison labor is sold to all sorts of private companies, public-private partnerships and state institutions at low, low rates. Manufacturers, ag companies, janitorial services, etc. Do you agree with that?"

Answer: read what wrote again,

What i dont agree with is farming out inmates to nearby farmers for profit, 

[Smackdown2019]

26. Life sentence

Okay is it meant to be pain, or positive meaning?

Mental or physical pain ...

Yes positive deterrent... laws have punishments... if no deterrence, Anarchy will rule!

[WhiskeyGrinder]

27. Studies have found that the likelihood of getting caught is a bigger deterrent than

increased punishments, interestingly.

if no deterrence, Anarchy will rule!

Are laws and deterrence what keep you from committing crimes?

[Smackdown2019]

28. No, good upbringing and realizing that actions have consequences.

Let's face it, crime and punishment has been a talking point for centuries. Roman's had the games for the condemned and other punishments. Other regions had harsh punishments that are still practiced today. Then we had pilgrims that used the stocks for the offenders. 19th century we had prisons that basically we just cells with bars. 20th century, prisons went towards reforming and now we have in prisons that are nothing but a cesspool of criminals without consequences. The south prisons have somewhat a control over the inmates....

[obamanut2012]

18. Lolz

At least you didn't write works makes them free. You at least controlled that.

[The Jungle 1]

8. Ethical chocoholic producers are listed here

https://www.slavefreechocolate.org/ethical-chocolate-companies

[ShazzieB]

12. Thanks for this!

[Richard D]

11. This is well worth reading

It covers the prison/industrial complex in detail.

Prison labor is a central part of the United States prison system as it exists today. An exploration of the issue brings to light the perverse economic incentives that propel the carceral complex. Private corporations are incentivized to lobby for policies that maximize prison populations in order to sustain a business model that is only profitable because they can exploit artificially deflated labor costs. Over 4,100 corporations profit from mass incarceration in the United States. These corporations include private prisons, which hold valuable government contracts featuring minimum bed guarantees and a fixed price per-prisoner, private companies that stock overpriced commissaries and provide telephone services, and private companies using prison labor in their supply chains.

Cheap prison labor is a powerful labor market incentive against criminal justice reform. The built-in, low-cost workforce benefits the prison industry, which relies on undercompensated labor to keep operating costs low and sell cheap goods to government agencies and private companies. Companies that source prison-produced goods, or themselves subcontract labor from prisons, also benefit from low labor costs.

https://corpaccountabilitylab.org/calblog/2020/8/5/private-companies-producing-with-us-prison-labor-in-2020-prison-labor-in-the-us-part-ii


And another one with 12 major corporations such as McDonald's, Wendy's, Starbucks, and more who profit greatly from prison labor.
There's big money here. Instead of paying workers a living wage and benefits, they contract out to prisons at pennies an hour:

http://maltajusticeinitiative.org/12-major-corporations-benefiting-from-the-prison-industrial-complex-2/

[ShazzieB]

14. WOW.

"Instead of paying workers a living wage and benefits, they contract out to prisons at pennies an hour."

The implications of that are huge. I never thought of prison labor being a means to keep wages artificially depressed, but that's what it sounds like. Yikes.

[marble falls]

15. This is hugely important. We need to close down the prison/plantation system.

[berniesandersmittens]

21. Kick and Rec