The United States And The Civil Rights Crisis - 898 Words

The United States of America has the largest prison system in the world with over 2.2 million prisoners. 1,320,000 of those prisoners are blacks and hispanics. The justice system in the United States has unequal outcomes across racial groups. Although together they make up only 30% of the country’s population, black and hispanic men are 3 times more likely to end up behind bars for the same crime committed by white males, allowing them to make up 60% of the prison population. Private prisons, the War on Drugs and a civil rights crisis and are the main factors to why people of color are overrepresented in our prison systems. Private prisons continuously buy prisons in states all across the US. Once they buy these prisons and a contract is†¦show more content†¦This leads to a plethora of men and women being stopped constantly for no reason. Often a civilian is stopped solely on the basis of their skin color/stereotypes. To work properly, private prisons require full prisons as aforementioned, and the least expensive prisoner as possible. The 2012 ACLU report , relates that â€Å"it costs $68,270 to support a prisoner age 50 or older compared with $34,135 per year to house a non-geriatric prisoner† (ACLU,2012). In their contracts private prisons exempt themselves from having to accept older prisoners. This is why young men of color are filling up these private prisons in record numbers. Modern day prison systems guarantee monetary security for the corporations, rather than protect the public and rehabilitate the inmates. President Richard Nixon first used the term â€Å"The War on Drugs† in 1971. Since then little to nothing has been accomplished to stop drug use, trade and distribution. The Drug business is a multi-billion dollar enterprise that continues to thrive. A federal study conducted by â€Å"Monitoring the Future† reports that 85% of high school students found marijuana easy to obtain. (Williams,2011). Many believe it is nonsensical to spend billions of dollars on arrest of small time offenders who commit non-violent crimes, when in over 45 years nothing has improved. Initially, Federal law mandates five years in prison without possibility of parole for possession of 5 grams of crack or 3.5 ounces of heroin.