WEBVTT - The Brutal History of Prison Labor

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<v Speaker 1>Hey, everybody, we are partnering up with a Cooperative for

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<v Speaker 1>Welcome to stuff you should know a production of iHeartRadio.

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<v Speaker 2>Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh and there's

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<v Speaker 2>Chuck and it's just us. Jerry's on leave right now.

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<v Speaker 2>She's having a little R and R living it up

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<v Speaker 2>in the South Seas, falling in love, spending a lot

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<v Speaker 2>of time on beach writing people's names in the sand

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<v Speaker 2>for money. Wow, I assume that's what she's doing. Oh okay,

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<v Speaker 2>she might also just be in New York.

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<v Speaker 1>It's one of the two, right, unless she could ride

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<v Speaker 1>on a beach there, Jones beach. I guess, so sure,

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<v Speaker 1>Coney Island.

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<v Speaker 2>I guess we should stop all the joking around the

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<v Speaker 2>horse and around Chuck. This is a very serious episode,

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<v Speaker 2>so let's just end that now.

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<v Speaker 1>Yeah. I mean, what better to chat about over what's

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<v Speaker 1>probably gonna end up being the holiday season when this

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<v Speaker 1>is released than hard labor at prisons in that history?

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<v Speaker 2>Yeah, because I mean, if you think about prison labor,

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<v Speaker 2>it's bad enough as it is, but when you really

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<v Speaker 2>start to get into the nuts and bolts of it,

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<v Speaker 2>and all the loopholes that are abused, and all of

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<v Speaker 2>the ways that prisoners are actually treated in exchange for

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<v Speaker 2>the labor. It's even worse than you would think, it

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<v Speaker 2>turns out.

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<v Speaker 1>Yeah, that's the good news, right.

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<v Speaker 2>Yeah, And we'll get into the bad news for sure.

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<v Speaker 2>But the thing that I was a little surprised about

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<v Speaker 2>from the outside is that I would have thought that

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<v Speaker 2>this was ancient, like the Sumerians doing stuff like this,

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<v Speaker 2>And it turns out no Sumerians forward all the way

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<v Speaker 2>into the Enlightenment period in Europe, just killed people. They

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<v Speaker 2>hung you, or they cut your hand off, or put

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<v Speaker 2>you in the stocks. Maybe the stocks were a non

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<v Speaker 2>lethal form of punishment, and you would be ridiculed by

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<v Speaker 2>your neighbors. And then a guy named Thomas Moore wrote

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<v Speaker 2>a book called Utopia, and he said, there's a better

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<v Speaker 2>way people, There's an alternative to just killing people or

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<v Speaker 2>cutting off their hands. What if we just put them

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<v Speaker 2>to work. There's all sorts of benefits and upsides to this.

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<v Speaker 2>And they said, well, what are they? Thomas Moore, he said,

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<v Speaker 2>let me tell you.

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<v Speaker 1>I'm glad you asked, Yeah, he basically, I mean and

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<v Speaker 1>we'll see this over and over again. The you know,

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<v Speaker 1>the point has sort of always been one. It can

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<v Speaker 1>or really threefold. One, it can deter people from committing

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<v Speaker 1>crime if they see somebody manual laboring, yeah, for probably

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<v Speaker 1>no money or very little money these days. Right. The

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<v Speaker 1>second is it can you know, help rehabilitate that person

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<v Speaker 1>and make them, you know, make them think about what

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<v Speaker 1>they've done basically, Yeah. And then the most obvious one

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<v Speaker 1>is we can get them to do stuff for us

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<v Speaker 1>for nothing.

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<v Speaker 2>Yeah, Like we can really use that labor. Especially if

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<v Speaker 2>you put a bunch of people together and make them

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<v Speaker 2>work for free, you can get a lot of stuff done.

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<v Speaker 2>And that is a fairly new form of punishment. It

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<v Speaker 2>wasn't like immediately adopted after Thomas Moore wrote Utopia. He

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<v Speaker 2>wrote it in the sixteenth century. Even into the American

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<v Speaker 2>Revolution and beyond, there was not like a lot of

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<v Speaker 2>government enforced punishment using prison labor. They were still crazy

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<v Speaker 2>for the stocks. But there were things regarding the colonies

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<v Speaker 2>that did have to do with punishment that did result

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<v Speaker 2>in your labor. And that would be if you got

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<v Speaker 2>into trouble, saying in England you would be sentenced to

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<v Speaker 2>transportation either Australia or the United States, maybe even Canada

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<v Speaker 2>if you were lucky, and I think sixty thousand people

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<v Speaker 2>before the American Revolution while America was British colonies or

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<v Speaker 2>British colonies were sentenced to transportation and showed up there

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<v Speaker 2>and said, Okay, what do you want me to do?

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<v Speaker 2>I'm here to work.

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<v Speaker 1>Yeah. Well, I doubt if they said that. They were

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<v Speaker 1>probably more told that, but they were known as the

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<v Speaker 1>King's passengers, and they you know, the colonies, you know,

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<v Speaker 1>the people in the colonies, they weren't that wild about this.

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<v Speaker 1>They were worried about, you know, sending convicted criminals there, obviously,

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<v Speaker 1>but most of these criminals were you know, maybe not

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<v Speaker 1>petty crimes, but pretty minor crimes, maybe theft, maybe vagrancy,

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<v Speaker 1>you know, depending on what the laws were, and whatever

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<v Speaker 1>weird English village you lived, you might have committed a

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<v Speaker 1>crime against one of those. But they weren't sending over

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<v Speaker 1>generally to the colonies. That is like the worst of

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<v Speaker 1>the worst. Right, if you were a plantation owner or

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<v Speaker 1>if you were an employer that maybe was near a prison,

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<v Speaker 1>you were pretty psyched because that was very cheap, meaning

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<v Speaker 1>usually free labor. Compared to what it cost to you know,

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<v Speaker 1>trade in the slaved African market.

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<v Speaker 2>Yeah, and we should say this early indentured servitude is

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<v Speaker 2>what they called it if it was aimed at white

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<v Speaker 2>people exclusively in the colonies and then later on the

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<v Speaker 2>early United States, because if the government intervened in a

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<v Speaker 2>plantation owner enslaved person's dynamic, then and they removed the

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<v Speaker 2>enslaved person and put them in jail, the poor white

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<v Speaker 2>plantation owner was the one suffering there, he lost the laborer.

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<v Speaker 2>So it was left entirely to the plantation owners to

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<v Speaker 2>basically keep their slaves punish their slaves essentially, And if

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<v Speaker 2>you've ever have you ever seen twelve years of slave yet.

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<v Speaker 1>That still shamefully cannot bring myself to see it.

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<v Speaker 2>Yeah, I mean I get it. I totally understand your reticence.

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<v Speaker 2>But it's the way that plantation owners punished slaves is

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<v Speaker 2>depicted throughout in really brutal, honest fashion, and it's it

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<v Speaker 2>really drives home like what it was like. But you

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<v Speaker 2>were left up to the guy that owned you legally

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<v Speaker 2>doling out punishment based on his whim. Essentially, the state

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<v Speaker 2>would not intervene. It was just strictly up to white

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<v Speaker 2>people or it was just strictly directed at white people

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<v Speaker 2>at first.

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<v Speaker 1>Yeah, and you know what, that's the kind of movie

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<v Speaker 1>that you got to watch that when it comes out

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<v Speaker 1>and when it's in the zeitgeist, because that's never the

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<v Speaker 1>movie when you're like, what do I want to watch tonight?

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<v Speaker 1>Like Gloomy set several years later, it's just not going

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<v Speaker 1>to happen, So I need to just you know, it's

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<v Speaker 1>like a history lesson, So I need to watch it.

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<v Speaker 1>And I've heard it's it's good, like in an upsetting way,

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<v Speaker 1>but like a well made film.

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<v Speaker 2>Oh yeah, definitely. Everybody does an amazing job. And look

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<v Speaker 2>at it like a classic novel that you just have

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<v Speaker 2>to read before you die, because I think that'll be

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<v Speaker 2>a dad approach to it.

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<v Speaker 1>You know what, when I start Moby Dick finally, I'll

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<v Speaker 1>watch Twelve Years of Slave and I'll just I'll just

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<v Speaker 1>do both at the same time.

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<v Speaker 2>I remember we talked about reading Mobi Dick and a

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<v Speaker 2>couple of people wrote in and they're like, Josh, do

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<v Speaker 2>not waste your time. It is not worth reading. And

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<v Speaker 2>I'm just gonna go with their interpretation. Oh wow, I

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<v Speaker 2>like Bartleby the Scrivener, but I'm not sure I could

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<v Speaker 2>take hundreds and hundreds of pages of that writing.

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<v Speaker 1>Yeah. Well, you know, our mutual friend in front of

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<v Speaker 1>the show, Joey cr is gonna be very upset to

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<v Speaker 1>hear that.

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<v Speaker 2>I'm sorry, Joey.

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<v Speaker 1>So as far as these laborers, ninety percent of the

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<v Speaker 1>ones that were of those sixty thousand that were sent

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<v Speaker 1>to the States, which is I'm surprised it was, you know,

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<v Speaker 1>ninety percent, they ended up kind of in two places,

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<v Speaker 1>Maryland Virginia, probably working in you know, industry like you know,

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<v Speaker 1>the Industrial Revolution type stuff, or on the farm, so

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<v Speaker 1>like tobacco farming obviously in Virginia. And it was terrible work.

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<v Speaker 1>It was really brutal. You know, you're talking maybe seven

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<v Speaker 1>to fourteen years as your sentence. After your sentence, maybe

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<v Speaker 1>you go back to England. Maybe you have a shot

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<v Speaker 1>at a free life in the New Colonies. But you know,

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<v Speaker 1>just like getting out of prison these days, it's a

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<v Speaker 1>it's not an easy transition to make.

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<v Speaker 2>Right. The ones that went back to England were like,

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<v Speaker 2>I really missed the tasteless cuisine of home.

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<v Speaker 1>Right, so back then, maybe sure, it's come a long way.

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<v Speaker 2>So one of the it has for sure. One of

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<v Speaker 2>the other things that had to evolve for prison labor

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<v Speaker 2>to become an actual thing in the United States was

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<v Speaker 2>prisons themselves. Like at the same time when they were

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<v Speaker 2>still crazy about the stocks and a dentured servitude, like

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<v Speaker 2>you had jails, you didn't have prisons, and a jail

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<v Speaker 2>was just basically where they kept you while you were

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<v Speaker 2>awaiting trial or sentencing or something like that. And then

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<v Speaker 2>sure you left the jail. The idea of going to

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<v Speaker 2>a place to be held as a punishment in and

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<v Speaker 2>of itself, that is prisons that came later on after

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<v Speaker 2>the American Revolution. I think it was the Quakers that

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<v Speaker 2>came up with the idea of the penitentiary, which is

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<v Speaker 2>meant to give you quiet time to reflect on what

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<v Speaker 2>terrible things you've done and hopefully find God and come

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<v Speaker 2>out bit a better person. Of course, it's not how

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<v Speaker 2>it worked out, but very quickly after penitentiaries became a thing,

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<v Speaker 2>prison labor became a thing. In early short order, actually

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<v Speaker 2>like decades maybe.

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<v Speaker 1>Yeah, And I never thought about the root word penitent

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<v Speaker 1>for penitentiaries. It was sort of one of those things

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<v Speaker 1>where I was today years old, you know.

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<v Speaker 2>Yeah, But I mean, like you, yeah, it's just so

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<v Speaker 2>easy to look right past it. It's its own thing,

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<v Speaker 2>yeah for sure.

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<v Speaker 1>But yeah, redemptive suffering is what they called it. And

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<v Speaker 1>that was a big part of being in prison and

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<v Speaker 1>committing well, not committing to hardly like being committed too

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<v Speaker 1>hard labor. Auburn Prison in New York was one of

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<v Speaker 1>the sort of leading examples that set the way forward

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<v Speaker 1>for what was to become the norm where private businesses

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<v Speaker 1>would lease prison buildings along with the prisoners and say, hey,

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<v Speaker 1>we're just gonna You've got this big building over here,

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<v Speaker 1>You've got lots of free labor. I'm going to bring

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<v Speaker 1>my machinery into here, and all of a sudden, the

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<v Speaker 1>prison is part prison in part you know, industrial plant

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<v Speaker 1>for whatever company worked out whatever deal. And that proved,

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<v Speaker 1>you know, provided a real model moving forward. I think Auburn,

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<v Speaker 1>they the prisoners of Auburn ended up building Sing Sing.

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<v Speaker 2>Yeah, yeah, they use them for that as well. And

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<v Speaker 2>that I think Sing Sing opened in eighteen twenty eight.

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<v Speaker 2>So this is going on, like if prisons became a

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<v Speaker 2>thing around the time of the American Revolution, like this, this,

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<v Speaker 2>like I said, my point, has proven this transition happened quickly. Yeah,

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<v Speaker 2>so by the time the Civil War came around, like this,

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<v Speaker 2>it's called the Northern model or the Auburn prison model,

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<v Speaker 2>where you can rent a building, rent the inmates, and

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<v Speaker 2>then set up shop there. That's what prison labor looked like,

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<v Speaker 2>or else you were working for the prison, like say,

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<v Speaker 2>building other prisons. That's what the North was doing. In

0:11:49.280 --> 0:11:53.320
<v Speaker 2>the South, they were still quite hung up on the

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<v Speaker 2>idea of chattel slavery and h owning a person and

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<v Speaker 2>making them work until they died. Essentially that that was

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<v Speaker 2>something that was really ingrained in the culture and was

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<v Speaker 2>not an easy thing to give up despite having lost

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<v Speaker 2>the Civil War and the thirteenth Amendment being passed. And

0:12:11.480 --> 0:12:14.920
<v Speaker 2>I know you've seen thirteenth the Avia de Verne documentary.

0:12:15.480 --> 0:12:16.280
<v Speaker 1>I have seen that.

0:12:16.280 --> 0:12:18.720
<v Speaker 2>That's a great one too. That's one of those like

0:12:18.840 --> 0:12:22.839
<v Speaker 2>life changing, perspective changing, eye opening type documentaries.

0:12:23.280 --> 0:12:25.000
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, and even if I hadn't seen it, I would

0:12:25.120 --> 0:12:28.000
<v Speaker 1>I would lie to your face right now, okay, and

0:12:28.080 --> 0:12:30.280
<v Speaker 1>all of our listeners, because there's no way you're gonna

0:12:30.360 --> 0:12:31.000
<v Speaker 1>double shame me.

0:12:31.200 --> 0:12:32.960
<v Speaker 2>Well, how about this if you but I did see it,

0:12:32.960 --> 0:12:35.080
<v Speaker 2>If you, well, if you are lying right now and

0:12:35.120 --> 0:12:37.360
<v Speaker 2>you go look for it. Do not be infused by

0:12:37.400 --> 0:12:41.360
<v Speaker 2>the documentary Thirteenth that came out in twenty twenty five, Yeah,

0:12:41.360 --> 0:12:43.400
<v Speaker 2>which was about the Yeah, it's about the high pressure

0:12:43.440 --> 0:12:45.520
<v Speaker 2>student exams in India.

0:12:45.800 --> 0:12:48.360
<v Speaker 1>Yeah. Well, I mean, I'm sure that's upsetting too.

0:12:48.559 --> 0:12:51.680
<v Speaker 2>I'm sure, But the thirteenth Amendment is kind of what

0:12:51.800 --> 0:12:54.880
<v Speaker 2>we're talking about here, and that's not only abolished slavery.

0:12:55.240 --> 0:13:01.080
<v Speaker 2>It abolished involuntary servitude of all kinds except one tiny provision,

0:13:01.240 --> 0:13:04.880
<v Speaker 2>one little loophole that said that if you're a convicted prisoner,

0:13:05.440 --> 0:13:09.560
<v Speaker 2>you can be punished with slave labor. That's okay. And

0:13:09.559 --> 0:13:12.960
<v Speaker 2>not only was it okay, it's enshrined in the Constitution

0:13:13.440 --> 0:13:16.719
<v Speaker 2>that slave labor is legal in prisons.

0:13:17.360 --> 0:13:20.199
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, and you know, it's one of those things where

0:13:20.240 --> 0:13:22.120
<v Speaker 1>it's hard to go back and imagine what the original

0:13:22.160 --> 0:13:25.679
<v Speaker 1>framers intended, But I think most people agree that they

0:13:25.679 --> 0:13:29.240
<v Speaker 1>didn't intend to just have you know, enslavement and another

0:13:29.360 --> 0:13:33.079
<v Speaker 1>name basically, whereas that's basically what happened for a long

0:13:33.120 --> 0:13:37.120
<v Speaker 1>long time, you know, through that, through the loophole, and

0:13:37.160 --> 0:13:38.840
<v Speaker 1>you know, you mentioned loopholes in the beginning. There's been

0:13:38.840 --> 0:13:40.920
<v Speaker 1>a lot of loopholes over the year, and anytime there's

0:13:40.960 --> 0:13:44.400
<v Speaker 1>a loophole, somebody's gonna exploit it, like for greedy purposes.

0:13:44.480 --> 0:13:47.640
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, free labor. I saw that. The reason that they

0:13:47.800 --> 0:13:50.800
<v Speaker 2>included it in that amendment was because it was just

0:13:50.960 --> 0:13:54.000
<v Speaker 2>such a no brainer that you would want the ability

0:13:54.360 --> 0:13:58.680
<v Speaker 2>to to to perform hard labor rather than just being

0:13:58.679 --> 0:14:01.079
<v Speaker 2>punished in other ways. That it was just an accepted

0:14:01.120 --> 0:14:04.120
<v Speaker 2>thing that, Yeah, the loophole wasn't meant to be there.

0:14:04.760 --> 0:14:08.840
<v Speaker 2>But in the South, almost immediately they put that to use.

0:14:09.280 --> 0:14:11.320
<v Speaker 2>We did an episode on the Black Codes back in

0:14:11.440 --> 0:14:15.280
<v Speaker 2>January of twenty twenty two. Yeah, another very eye opening topic,

0:14:15.880 --> 0:14:17.880
<v Speaker 2>and those only lasted like a year or two. And

0:14:17.960 --> 0:14:20.760
<v Speaker 2>it was basically they criminalized being a free black person

0:14:20.800 --> 0:14:23.160
<v Speaker 2>in the South. Yeah, And so they could pick you

0:14:23.240 --> 0:14:25.520
<v Speaker 2>up and they could arrest you with something. If you

0:14:25.560 --> 0:14:27.800
<v Speaker 2>couldn't prove on the spot that, say, you had a job,

0:14:28.040 --> 0:14:30.920
<v Speaker 2>you'd be arrested for vagrancy. You'd be taken to jail,

0:14:31.560 --> 0:14:34.280
<v Speaker 2>and then you could be leased out as a slave

0:14:34.440 --> 0:14:37.040
<v Speaker 2>to a local plantation owner doing the work you were

0:14:37.080 --> 0:14:40.800
<v Speaker 2>doing before you were freed by the Thirteenth Amendment. Legally,

0:14:40.960 --> 0:14:43.360
<v Speaker 2>because of that loophole in the Thirteenth Amendment.

0:14:43.720 --> 0:14:48.200
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, maybe to the same plantation where you were previously held, right, Yeah,

0:14:48.240 --> 0:14:51.080
<v Speaker 1>a lot of times. That's a great episode. People should

0:14:51.080 --> 0:14:54.120
<v Speaker 1>go back and listen to that creed that you know,

0:14:54.200 --> 0:14:56.560
<v Speaker 1>the black codes went away with the Civil Rights Act

0:14:56.600 --> 0:14:59.960
<v Speaker 1>of eighteen sixty six and the Fourteenth Amendment, which is

0:15:00.040 --> 0:15:04.080
<v Speaker 1>ratified in eighteen sixty eight, made equal rights and protections.

0:15:04.120 --> 0:15:07.920
<v Speaker 1>You know, you know the law everywhere basically, but you know,

0:15:07.960 --> 0:15:11.760
<v Speaker 1>there were still ways to make things happen, especially in

0:15:11.800 --> 0:15:15.560
<v Speaker 1>the South, and especially as it turns out shamefully, in Georgia.

0:15:15.960 --> 0:15:18.000
<v Speaker 1>Georgia kind of led the way in eighteen sixty eight.

0:15:18.080 --> 0:15:22.280
<v Speaker 1>That was a provisional governor named Thomas Ruger, and he

0:15:22.480 --> 0:15:25.880
<v Speaker 1>leased like this is when the kind of the big

0:15:26.800 --> 0:15:30.400
<v Speaker 1>sort of prisoner trade started, where they were leasing prisoners

0:15:30.560 --> 0:15:32.880
<v Speaker 1>to different states, kind of back and forth like hey,

0:15:32.920 --> 0:15:35.720
<v Speaker 1>you got to you've got a farm in your state

0:15:35.800 --> 0:15:38.600
<v Speaker 1>that needs like a crop tended to, Well, let me

0:15:38.720 --> 0:15:41.920
<v Speaker 1>lease you some prisoners from our state. And Georgia led

0:15:41.960 --> 0:15:45.360
<v Speaker 1>the way early on with one hundred black prisoners being

0:15:45.440 --> 0:15:49.760
<v Speaker 1>leased to William Fort of the Georgia and Alabama Railroad

0:15:49.800 --> 0:15:53.800
<v Speaker 1>for twenty five hundred bucks, so twenty five twenty five

0:15:53.840 --> 0:15:58.080
<v Speaker 1>dollars a prisoner. Right, But here's the thing, it's like, hey,

0:15:58.840 --> 0:16:01.800
<v Speaker 1>you're paying us to lead these prisoners to you, So

0:16:01.880 --> 0:16:04.160
<v Speaker 1>now not only are we getting money for that, but

0:16:04.240 --> 0:16:09.120
<v Speaker 1>now they're your responsibility. But your responsibility didn't really mean anything.

0:16:09.200 --> 0:16:11.480
<v Speaker 1>Like sixteen of those prisoners died in the first year.

0:16:11.880 --> 0:16:13.640
<v Speaker 1>And as you'll see, a story that you know is

0:16:13.640 --> 0:16:16.600
<v Speaker 1>going to be repeated over and over, that was you know,

0:16:16.680 --> 0:16:18.640
<v Speaker 1>one of the biggest problems with all of this is

0:16:18.680 --> 0:16:23.480
<v Speaker 1>like basic medical care was not provided, and decent food

0:16:23.720 --> 0:16:28.000
<v Speaker 1>and certainly, like you know, somebody was sick, they would

0:16:28.040 --> 0:16:30.000
<v Speaker 1>just let them die basically, right.

0:16:30.080 --> 0:16:33.320
<v Speaker 2>And that still happens today, I mean not quite to

0:16:33.400 --> 0:16:36.160
<v Speaker 2>that dramatic a degree, but when people die in custody

0:16:36.200 --> 0:16:40.080
<v Speaker 2>in prison, there's not a lot the prison's held accountable for.

0:16:41.000 --> 0:16:43.720
<v Speaker 2>So that's that's essentially a long standing thing in the

0:16:43.840 --> 0:16:47.160
<v Speaker 2>United States. People like prisoners dying even though they haven't

0:16:47.200 --> 0:16:50.440
<v Speaker 2>been sentenced to death. So I think you said that

0:16:50.640 --> 0:16:53.080
<v Speaker 2>Georgia was making some pretty good money off of this.

0:16:53.400 --> 0:16:57.240
<v Speaker 2>Starting in the eighteen sixties, I read this started to

0:16:57.600 --> 0:16:59.360
<v Speaker 2>like other states were like, oh h that's a really

0:16:59.400 --> 0:17:04.080
<v Speaker 2>good idea. By eighteen ninety eight, convict leasing made up

0:17:04.160 --> 0:17:10.320
<v Speaker 2>seventy three percent of Alabama state revenue. Wow, yeah, which

0:17:10.320 --> 0:17:11.399
<v Speaker 2>is really saying something.

0:17:11.880 --> 0:17:14.120
<v Speaker 1>So yeah, that's a staggering stat right.

0:17:14.480 --> 0:17:17.000
<v Speaker 2>And then when reconstruction and did the federal government just

0:17:17.000 --> 0:17:19.520
<v Speaker 2>basically said, hey, we really just want to be on

0:17:19.600 --> 0:17:22.359
<v Speaker 2>good terms with the Southern elite against so we're just

0:17:22.400 --> 0:17:25.160
<v Speaker 2>going to leave you on your own and withdrew from

0:17:25.200 --> 0:17:30.440
<v Speaker 2>the South. Black people were in really terrible positions, really

0:17:30.520 --> 0:17:35.240
<v Speaker 2>vulnerable positions, and at that time, prison labor stepped up.

0:17:35.480 --> 0:17:39.240
<v Speaker 2>Incarcerations stepped up, but prison labor also did it as well,

0:17:39.280 --> 0:17:42.560
<v Speaker 2>and it was nothing compared to what you would the

0:17:42.600 --> 0:17:44.680
<v Speaker 2>work you would be put to in the North. It

0:17:44.720 --> 0:17:50.320
<v Speaker 2>was essentially slavery all over again. But again this time

0:17:50.560 --> 0:17:53.200
<v Speaker 2>the Fed the Union wasn't going to come down and

0:17:53.240 --> 0:17:55.880
<v Speaker 2>push anybody around at the end of a bayonet, because

0:17:55.880 --> 0:17:58.679
<v Speaker 2>this was all agreed upon in the thirteenth Amendment.

0:17:59.480 --> 0:18:02.760
<v Speaker 1>Yeah. Up North, if you were working prison labor, you

0:18:02.840 --> 0:18:05.280
<v Speaker 1>might work an eight or nine hour day. In the

0:18:05.359 --> 0:18:08.520
<v Speaker 1>South that was routinely twelve to sixteen hours or just

0:18:08.600 --> 0:18:10.560
<v Speaker 1>however long they felt like you needed to work to

0:18:10.720 --> 0:18:15.320
<v Speaker 1>get whatever job done. There's anecdotal evidence at least like

0:18:15.400 --> 0:18:18.960
<v Speaker 1>during the cotton harvest, like before the cotton harvest, that

0:18:19.400 --> 0:18:22.160
<v Speaker 1>the plantation owners would call up the sheriff and say, hey,

0:18:22.440 --> 0:18:25.719
<v Speaker 1>why don't you make some more arrests. We need some guys.

0:18:25.920 --> 0:18:28.280
<v Speaker 1>And you know, a lot of these pretextual arrests were

0:18:28.320 --> 0:18:30.880
<v Speaker 1>happening where it was just like you know, they would

0:18:30.880 --> 0:18:32.840
<v Speaker 1>just cook something up and arrest you and you have

0:18:33.240 --> 0:18:37.280
<v Speaker 1>basically no rights and no representation. So it's just a

0:18:37.280 --> 0:18:40.959
<v Speaker 1>way to stock the industry or the farm or the

0:18:40.960 --> 0:18:42.920
<v Speaker 1>field with workers. Right.

0:18:43.359 --> 0:18:46.440
<v Speaker 2>So that was like plantation owners local plantations. Like you said,

0:18:46.480 --> 0:18:49.080
<v Speaker 2>you could have been a former slave who was arrested

0:18:49.080 --> 0:18:52.040
<v Speaker 2>for something as stupid as mischief and put back to

0:18:52.080 --> 0:18:55.080
<v Speaker 2>work on that same plantation essentially as a slave. They

0:18:55.119 --> 0:18:57.760
<v Speaker 2>would also, like corporations got in on this as well,

0:18:57.800 --> 0:19:00.720
<v Speaker 2>like you said the railroad. There was a company in

0:19:00.760 --> 0:19:05.639
<v Speaker 2>Alabama called the Sloss Sheffield Steel and Iron Company in

0:19:05.760 --> 0:19:09.600
<v Speaker 2>Jefferson County, Alabama. That's where their minds were. They had

0:19:09.600 --> 0:19:12.800
<v Speaker 2>a ten percent death rate from the least convict labor

0:19:13.600 --> 0:19:16.280
<v Speaker 2>that they got from the state. And there was a

0:19:16.440 --> 0:19:20.800
<v Speaker 2>sugar company, the Imperial Sugar Company in Sugarland, Tennessee, which

0:19:20.800 --> 0:19:22.280
<v Speaker 2>I guess is an appropriate place for.

0:19:22.280 --> 0:19:23.600
<v Speaker 1>It to be where else.

0:19:24.400 --> 0:19:27.520
<v Speaker 2>A lot of people died when Texas leased them every

0:19:27.600 --> 0:19:31.480
<v Speaker 2>single state prisoner it had in eighteen seventy eight to

0:19:31.560 --> 0:19:34.960
<v Speaker 2>help in the sugar fields. People were dying of things

0:19:35.000 --> 0:19:38.240
<v Speaker 2>like malaria. Like you said, they weren't They weren't given

0:19:38.280 --> 0:19:40.359
<v Speaker 2>any kind of medical care at all. They were fed

0:19:40.600 --> 0:19:44.760
<v Speaker 2>just the minimum amount to keep them alive and have

0:19:44.960 --> 0:19:47.639
<v Speaker 2>energy enough to work. And this is just par for

0:19:47.760 --> 0:19:49.119
<v Speaker 2>the course in the South.

0:19:50.160 --> 0:19:52.920
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, I mean, I was bagging on Georgia because that's

0:19:52.920 --> 0:19:57.240
<v Speaker 1>our home state or my home home state. But Louisiana

0:19:57.440 --> 0:20:00.000
<v Speaker 1>has kind of from the beginning been one of certainly

0:20:00.080 --> 0:20:03.320
<v Speaker 1>one of the worst defenders. In the eighteen seventies and eighties,

0:20:03.840 --> 0:20:08.119
<v Speaker 1>they built the New Orleans specific railway with prison labor.

0:20:08.560 --> 0:20:10.840
<v Speaker 1>About one hundred and forty people died, and when you

0:20:10.880 --> 0:20:15.080
<v Speaker 1>look at some of the incarceration rates and especially incarceration

0:20:15.200 --> 0:20:18.800
<v Speaker 1>rates for black males in the United States today, Louisiana

0:20:18.880 --> 0:20:21.639
<v Speaker 1>leads the way and also with some of the worst

0:20:21.760 --> 0:20:23.520
<v Speaker 1>you know, working conditions for forced labor.

0:20:24.359 --> 0:20:26.399
<v Speaker 2>That's another thing too that you mentioned, like they built

0:20:26.640 --> 0:20:30.880
<v Speaker 2>the railroad or say they mined something that was turned

0:20:30.880 --> 0:20:33.119
<v Speaker 2>into a product that people use. They don't think about.

0:20:33.640 --> 0:20:35.560
<v Speaker 2>I'm sure they didn't think like, oh, this railroad is

0:20:35.600 --> 0:20:38.280
<v Speaker 2>really nice. The prisoners who built it really did a

0:20:38.280 --> 0:20:41.560
<v Speaker 2>good job. That actually still carries on today. Like a

0:20:41.560 --> 0:20:44.800
<v Speaker 2>lot of people don't realize that the stuff they're buying

0:20:45.160 --> 0:20:48.520
<v Speaker 2>from a big box retailer was made somewhere down the

0:20:48.560 --> 0:20:52.119
<v Speaker 2>line by a convict who was essentially leased out to

0:20:52.359 --> 0:20:55.879
<v Speaker 2>that company to make those products. It still goes on today.

0:20:56.720 --> 0:20:59.680
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, I mean, the chicken on your plate in your

0:20:59.680 --> 0:21:03.400
<v Speaker 1>house might have come from a chicken farm that had

0:21:04.320 --> 0:21:06.720
<v Speaker 1>and you know, these are people that are sort of

0:21:06.760 --> 0:21:08.760
<v Speaker 1>the work release programs we're going to talk about later,

0:21:09.080 --> 0:21:11.080
<v Speaker 1>where they leave the prison to go work for like

0:21:11.160 --> 0:21:13.080
<v Speaker 1>a private industry, and a lot of times it might

0:21:13.119 --> 0:21:15.840
<v Speaker 1>be like a chicken farm, or they may work at

0:21:15.880 --> 0:21:18.640
<v Speaker 1>a D and B call center or something like that. So, yeah,

0:21:18.680 --> 0:21:21.080
<v Speaker 1>the person you talked to on the phone might be

0:21:21.160 --> 0:21:22.120
<v Speaker 1>you know, incarcerated.

0:21:22.240 --> 0:21:25.800
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, which is quite surprising, But Chuck, don't call it

0:21:25.840 --> 0:21:29.560
<v Speaker 2>convict releasing, even though essentially it's so much the same

0:21:29.560 --> 0:21:33.840
<v Speaker 2>thing that basically just the people's clothes changed. That's what's

0:21:33.880 --> 0:21:38.320
<v Speaker 2>going on today. Still Supposedly, in the nineteen thirties, thanks

0:21:38.359 --> 0:21:41.520
<v Speaker 2>to the New Deal, America became enlightened enough that we

0:21:41.640 --> 0:21:44.000
<v Speaker 2>moved on past convict fleecing. We didn't do that kind

0:21:44.080 --> 0:21:49.080
<v Speaker 2>of stuff anymore, not at least a private industry. Prison

0:21:49.200 --> 0:21:52.359
<v Speaker 2>labor working for the prison were working for the state.

0:21:52.640 --> 0:21:56.600
<v Speaker 1>That was still aokay, yeah, I mean that was you know,

0:21:56.680 --> 0:22:00.960
<v Speaker 1>sort of fifty years before that is when wage workers

0:22:01.000 --> 0:22:05.120
<v Speaker 1>started complaining, Like prisoners obviously were complaining. Families might be complaining,

0:22:05.119 --> 0:22:06.600
<v Speaker 1>but they're not going to get very far. But once

0:22:06.680 --> 0:22:11.199
<v Speaker 1>wage workers got unions involved, they're like, hey, these you know,

0:22:11.240 --> 0:22:14.400
<v Speaker 1>we want these jobs. We want to you know, make

0:22:14.440 --> 0:22:18.320
<v Speaker 1>a little bit of money ourselves. And that's when it

0:22:18.359 --> 0:22:20.360
<v Speaker 1>finally started to change a little bit. And I think

0:22:20.400 --> 0:22:23.400
<v Speaker 1>eventually that led to that New Deal era law prohibiting

0:22:23.480 --> 0:22:28.400
<v Speaker 1>interstate trade and prison made products. But in nineteen thirty four,

0:22:29.119 --> 0:22:32.400
<v Speaker 1>the Federal Prison Industries was created. It's now known as Unicor,

0:22:33.119 --> 0:22:35.199
<v Speaker 1>and that is, you know, still a big program at

0:22:35.200 --> 0:22:38.959
<v Speaker 1>employees people that are incarcerated in our federal system, not

0:22:39.000 --> 0:22:43.800
<v Speaker 1>state prisons again, and obviously not private prisons are federal.

0:22:43.840 --> 0:22:45.920
<v Speaker 1>Are any federal prisons private? Or is that just state.

0:22:46.520 --> 0:22:48.600
<v Speaker 2>I don't know. I don't know the answer that question.

0:22:49.200 --> 0:22:51.800
<v Speaker 1>I know we never did one on the private prison industry,

0:22:51.840 --> 0:22:52.240
<v Speaker 1>did we.

0:22:52.320 --> 0:22:53.560
<v Speaker 2>No, and we really should.

0:22:53.600 --> 0:22:54.240
<v Speaker 1>It's on the list.

0:22:54.280 --> 0:22:57.359
<v Speaker 2>They do this too, and they like the idea of

0:22:57.400 --> 0:23:00.879
<v Speaker 2>them leasing out convicts for before profit prison is just

0:23:01.000 --> 0:23:02.200
<v Speaker 2>mind boggling.

0:23:02.359 --> 0:23:06.080
<v Speaker 1>Yeah for sure. But yeah, and with Unicorn, they're making

0:23:06.080 --> 0:23:08.240
<v Speaker 1>things for the federal government like a lot of times,

0:23:08.880 --> 0:23:12.760
<v Speaker 1>you know, military fatigues or furniture stuff like that.

0:23:12.800 --> 0:23:15.640
<v Speaker 2>Right, yeah, yeah, And if you are a government agency,

0:23:15.640 --> 0:23:17.479
<v Speaker 2>you have to go to Unicorp first to see if

0:23:17.480 --> 0:23:19.840
<v Speaker 2>they have what you want, then you order for them then.

0:23:20.080 --> 0:23:24.480
<v Speaker 2>And so even still today, like companies complain like these

0:23:24.520 --> 0:23:28.560
<v Speaker 2>guys it's unfair competition. You know, they have like unpaid

0:23:28.640 --> 0:23:31.240
<v Speaker 2>labor making these products so they can sell it for whatever.

0:23:32.040 --> 0:23:34.320
<v Speaker 2>And the Feds are basically like, we can't hear you.

0:23:35.560 --> 0:23:36.440
<v Speaker 1>Should we take a break?

0:23:36.440 --> 0:23:36.840
<v Speaker 2>I think so?

0:23:37.160 --> 0:23:39.440
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, I mean, since the Feds can't hear us, right,

0:23:39.920 --> 0:23:40.600
<v Speaker 1>we might as well.

0:23:40.800 --> 0:23:41.440
<v Speaker 2>We might as well.

0:23:41.480 --> 0:23:43.840
<v Speaker 1>All right, we'll be right back with more on prison labor.

0:24:12.960 --> 0:24:17.080
<v Speaker 2>Okay, So when we left off, like convict leasing was

0:24:17.119 --> 0:24:22.000
<v Speaker 2>dead in the North thanks to labor unions. The South

0:24:22.040 --> 0:24:25.160
<v Speaker 2>has long been considered kind of anti worker, so labor

0:24:25.240 --> 0:24:27.720
<v Speaker 2>unions never really got a foothold here, so it took

0:24:27.720 --> 0:24:30.840
<v Speaker 2>a little longer for convict leasing to go away. But

0:24:31.080 --> 0:24:34.040
<v Speaker 2>again that doesn't mean that there was no such thing

0:24:34.080 --> 0:24:36.480
<v Speaker 2>as prison labor. They just kind of directed them to

0:24:36.600 --> 0:24:39.879
<v Speaker 2>state owned stuff. A really good example of this is

0:24:39.920 --> 0:24:44.440
<v Speaker 2>a Parchment farm in Mississippi, part of Parchment State Penitentiary.

0:24:45.080 --> 0:24:49.240
<v Speaker 2>It's a twenty thousand acre farm where in the early

0:24:49.680 --> 0:24:55.119
<v Speaker 2>nineteen teens, with a ninety percent black prison population, prisoners

0:24:55.119 --> 0:24:58.280
<v Speaker 2>were put to work on this farm. And one of

0:24:58.320 --> 0:25:03.440
<v Speaker 2>the reasons that got so famous very quickly, in addition

0:25:03.480 --> 0:25:06.040
<v Speaker 2>to just the scope of what was going on, was

0:25:06.080 --> 0:25:09.320
<v Speaker 2>they used a trustee system they spelled it trustee is

0:25:09.359 --> 0:25:12.520
<v Speaker 2>in tr us t Y where some of the worst,

0:25:12.600 --> 0:25:17.040
<v Speaker 2>most violent convicted felons that were prisoners there were given

0:25:17.160 --> 0:25:20.200
<v Speaker 2>rifles and said, you guys, make sure this other eighty

0:25:20.240 --> 0:25:22.920
<v Speaker 2>percent of your fellow prisoners do the work the way

0:25:22.960 --> 0:25:23.639
<v Speaker 2>we want them to.

0:25:24.600 --> 0:25:28.239
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, that's a really interesting system, it really is.

0:25:28.480 --> 0:25:30.040
<v Speaker 2>It seems risky, you know.

0:25:30.160 --> 0:25:32.000
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, I wanted to look more. I'm going to look

0:25:32.040 --> 0:25:34.600
<v Speaker 1>more into that just for my own edification, but because

0:25:34.880 --> 0:25:38.200
<v Speaker 1>I'm curious that that dynamic is I don't know, it

0:25:38.200 --> 0:25:40.520
<v Speaker 1>seems like a would create a really dodgy dynamic.

0:25:40.640 --> 0:25:44.399
<v Speaker 2>It would, But it also reminded me of what is

0:25:44.440 --> 0:25:50.600
<v Speaker 2>the Quentin Tarantino Antebellum Slavery movie. So, yeah, Jenko, remember

0:25:50.640 --> 0:25:52.040
<v Speaker 2>he posed as a black slaver.

0:25:52.880 --> 0:25:53.280
<v Speaker 1>Uh huh.

0:25:53.880 --> 0:25:56.320
<v Speaker 2>That's kind of how I took it to kind of be.

0:25:56.440 --> 0:26:01.640
<v Speaker 1>Like, yeah, I think you're probably right. Chain gangs is

0:26:01.680 --> 0:26:05.679
<v Speaker 1>something that you know, you've seen in like movies and stuff.

0:26:05.720 --> 0:26:08.720
<v Speaker 1>Like I was watching over other where Thal Again the

0:26:08.760 --> 0:26:12.080
<v Speaker 1>other night, and there was you know, chain gang scenes

0:26:12.080 --> 0:26:15.720
<v Speaker 1>in that. And that was another type of sort of

0:26:15.800 --> 0:26:18.880
<v Speaker 1>very public penal labor because they were put in place

0:26:18.920 --> 0:26:21.320
<v Speaker 1>to build roads in the South in the nineteen twenties.

0:26:22.359 --> 0:26:24.680
<v Speaker 1>You know, hard laboring all day again in the South,

0:26:24.800 --> 0:26:27.480
<v Speaker 1>out in the hot sun on that black top, tend

0:26:27.520 --> 0:26:30.840
<v Speaker 1>to fifteen hours a day. But they were chained together.

0:26:30.840 --> 0:26:32.640
<v Speaker 1>That's why they were called chain gangs. They were chained

0:26:32.640 --> 0:26:35.480
<v Speaker 1>to their ankle, They stayed chained when they walked to

0:26:35.520 --> 0:26:37.600
<v Speaker 1>the job, they stayed chained as they slept in their

0:26:37.600 --> 0:26:41.160
<v Speaker 1>bunks that were close to one another. And again the

0:26:41.200 --> 0:26:46.480
<v Speaker 1>conditions were abysmal, terrible food. They were beaten, they were tortured.

0:26:47.200 --> 0:26:49.280
<v Speaker 1>I think there was this one investigation this was in

0:26:49.400 --> 0:26:51.520
<v Speaker 1>a chain gang, but this was Tucker Farm in Arkansas,

0:26:52.040 --> 0:26:56.080
<v Speaker 1>where they found that the staff stripped prisoners naked at

0:26:56.080 --> 0:26:59.800
<v Speaker 1>the prison hospital and put electric you know, shocks to

0:26:59.880 --> 0:27:05.919
<v Speaker 1>the testicles in penis. Women prisoners were also subjected to

0:27:05.920 --> 0:27:08.600
<v Speaker 1>work in the fields. Not as much as men. They were,

0:27:08.640 --> 0:27:10.600
<v Speaker 1>you know, the main labor force, but you know women

0:27:10.640 --> 0:27:13.320
<v Speaker 1>were put to work as well.

0:27:13.320 --> 0:27:18.200
<v Speaker 2>Have you ever read beloved Tony Morrison novel, I feel

0:27:18.200 --> 0:27:20.360
<v Speaker 2>like I have to see Yes, you should read that too.

0:27:20.400 --> 0:27:22.160
<v Speaker 2>If you have, no, I haven't read that. It's very good,

0:27:22.160 --> 0:27:24.840
<v Speaker 2>but there's a it's it's mind bogglingly good actually, but

0:27:25.359 --> 0:27:30.600
<v Speaker 2>it's there's a few scenes about a chain gang and

0:27:30.720 --> 0:27:33.320
<v Speaker 2>just what it would have been like. One of the

0:27:33.359 --> 0:27:37.320
<v Speaker 2>main characters spent time on a chain gang, and I mean,

0:27:37.400 --> 0:27:39.359
<v Speaker 2>this is the way you said. It was brutal work.

0:27:39.760 --> 0:27:42.439
<v Speaker 2>And they were building roads. Like a good example of

0:27:42.480 --> 0:27:44.600
<v Speaker 2>what chain gangs did. If you were building a road,

0:27:45.000 --> 0:27:47.320
<v Speaker 2>you were using like human labor to build roads. This

0:27:47.400 --> 0:27:51.400
<v Speaker 2>was before they had machinery, right, like road building machinery,

0:27:51.440 --> 0:27:53.720
<v Speaker 2>it just didn't exist, so you used human beings. To

0:27:53.800 --> 0:27:56.840
<v Speaker 2>do this stuff. If you ran into say in Georgia,

0:27:56.840 --> 0:27:58.840
<v Speaker 2>and you were building a state road, if you ran

0:27:58.880 --> 0:28:02.760
<v Speaker 2>into a chunk of stone mountain that was popping up

0:28:02.800 --> 0:28:05.439
<v Speaker 2>out of the ground where you wanted your road to go, well,

0:28:05.680 --> 0:28:07.480
<v Speaker 2>you would just set a bunch of convicts to work

0:28:07.480 --> 0:28:10.000
<v Speaker 2>on it with sledgehammers, and eventually they're gonna wear it

0:28:10.040 --> 0:28:11.919
<v Speaker 2>down to nothing if you give them long enough and

0:28:11.960 --> 0:28:15.080
<v Speaker 2>work them hard enough. That's what people did on chain gangs.

0:28:15.080 --> 0:28:18.080
<v Speaker 2>That's just what life was like. And again, you were

0:28:18.080 --> 0:28:20.760
<v Speaker 2>working outside, so you weren't protected in any way, shape

0:28:20.840 --> 0:28:23.919
<v Speaker 2>or form. You were fed meagerly, like you were working

0:28:23.960 --> 0:28:26.919
<v Speaker 2>as hard as anyone's ever worked in their life, with

0:28:28.000 --> 0:28:32.280
<v Speaker 2>like the minimum amount of nutrition, the minimum amount of rest.

0:28:32.440 --> 0:28:35.280
<v Speaker 2>And if you put all that together, especially if you

0:28:35.280 --> 0:28:39.080
<v Speaker 2>think about it accumulating, it's a brutal, brutal form of

0:28:40.200 --> 0:28:40.960
<v Speaker 2>prison labor.

0:28:41.880 --> 0:28:44.400
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, and I mean, and it was a racist framework.

0:28:44.400 --> 0:28:47.360
<v Speaker 1>I know, we're talking a lot about the racism involved.

0:28:47.360 --> 0:28:50.520
<v Speaker 1>There were white labor camps and stuff like that of

0:28:50.560 --> 0:28:56.800
<v Speaker 1>course too. You know, sometimes they look like Paul Newman even. Yeah,

0:28:56.840 --> 0:29:00.120
<v Speaker 1>but it was very much a racist framework wherein the

0:29:00.640 --> 0:29:04.040
<v Speaker 1>threat of violence, the threat of torture they felt was

0:29:04.120 --> 0:29:07.280
<v Speaker 1>like a necessary component to you know, quote unquote keeping

0:29:07.280 --> 0:29:07.920
<v Speaker 1>guys in line.

0:29:08.200 --> 0:29:09.960
<v Speaker 2>Yeah. One of the other things, too, is there was

0:29:10.240 --> 0:29:15.880
<v Speaker 2>a certain amount of usefulness to letting these chain gangs

0:29:15.960 --> 0:29:19.600
<v Speaker 2>get these horrible reputations, because the reach of these things

0:29:19.960 --> 0:29:24.080
<v Speaker 2>reached out beyond the inside of prisons into the outside world.

0:29:24.520 --> 0:29:27.600
<v Speaker 2>Because if you were black and you were looking for

0:29:27.640 --> 0:29:30.400
<v Speaker 2>a job, and you could be arrested for not having

0:29:30.480 --> 0:29:33.360
<v Speaker 2>a job and put onto a chain gang, and you

0:29:33.400 --> 0:29:36.160
<v Speaker 2>knew it, you would accept all sorts of terrible working

0:29:36.200 --> 0:29:39.440
<v Speaker 2>conditions in low pay because at least that was better

0:29:39.480 --> 0:29:41.720
<v Speaker 2>than being put on a chain gang, which if you

0:29:41.760 --> 0:29:44.520
<v Speaker 2>didn't accept this job and got caught without a job,

0:29:44.840 --> 0:29:47.440
<v Speaker 2>you would end up on a chain gang anyway. That's

0:29:47.560 --> 0:29:50.960
<v Speaker 2>that was another really kind of insidious effect that they had.

0:29:51.920 --> 0:29:53.560
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, but you know, it's not like this kind of

0:29:53.600 --> 0:29:56.560
<v Speaker 1>thing was being you know, there were no expos's being

0:29:56.560 --> 0:30:00.080
<v Speaker 1>written in newspapers about chain gangs. You might drive by one,

0:30:00.120 --> 0:30:02.800
<v Speaker 1>and that's how you knew they existed. But little by

0:30:02.840 --> 0:30:05.800
<v Speaker 1>little what went on with these chain gangs started to

0:30:05.880 --> 0:30:10.040
<v Speaker 1>kind of leak out, especially all over the South. There

0:30:10.080 --> 0:30:12.640
<v Speaker 1>are a couple of famous examples In nineteen thirty two,

0:30:13.240 --> 0:30:16.880
<v Speaker 1>there was a white Northern veteran who is a convict,

0:30:16.880 --> 0:30:19.320
<v Speaker 1>obviously named Robert Burns. He published a book called I

0:30:19.360 --> 0:30:23.360
<v Speaker 1>Am a Fugitive from a Georgia chain Gang exclamation point

0:30:23.840 --> 0:30:26.160
<v Speaker 1>That's why I read it that way. That kind of

0:30:26.160 --> 0:30:27.640
<v Speaker 1>got the word out a little bit. There was a

0:30:27.640 --> 0:30:28.560
<v Speaker 1>movie adaptation.

0:30:28.840 --> 0:30:29.400
<v Speaker 2>Have you seen that?

0:30:30.200 --> 0:30:31.200
<v Speaker 1>I haven't seen it, have you?

0:30:31.440 --> 0:30:32.320
<v Speaker 2>Yeah?

0:30:32.360 --> 0:30:32.640
<v Speaker 1>Really?

0:30:32.840 --> 0:30:35.080
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, it's really yeah. For some reason, I don't know

0:30:35.080 --> 0:30:37.360
<v Speaker 2>where you me found out about it, but she's one

0:30:37.440 --> 0:30:40.600
<v Speaker 2>of her well liked movies. I want to say it's

0:30:40.600 --> 0:30:42.000
<v Speaker 2>one of her favorite. But she showed it to me

0:30:42.320 --> 0:30:42.640
<v Speaker 2>and it is.

0:30:42.680 --> 0:30:44.920
<v Speaker 1>What year was that the movie?

0:30:45.320 --> 0:30:49.520
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, you're asking when I saw it? Nineteen thirty two,

0:30:49.640 --> 0:30:53.800
<v Speaker 2>I believe, or nineteen thirty five, something like that.

0:30:53.920 --> 0:30:56.080
<v Speaker 1>I don't watch a lot of movies from that era.

0:30:56.040 --> 0:30:58.120
<v Speaker 2>But Chuck, you should this one. It has eight point

0:30:58.160 --> 0:31:01.680
<v Speaker 2>two on IMDb and that's a pretty high rating. It's

0:31:01.720 --> 0:31:04.120
<v Speaker 2>really good. It's a good movie. Well.

0:31:04.160 --> 0:31:06.960
<v Speaker 1>In nineteen forty seven, some more news leaked out when

0:31:07.000 --> 0:31:10.400
<v Speaker 1>a black civil rights activist name Bayard Rustin. And I

0:31:10.440 --> 0:31:14.440
<v Speaker 1>know we've talked about Baird Rusting before. He was on

0:31:14.480 --> 0:31:17.680
<v Speaker 1>a chain gang in North Carolina after being arrested for

0:31:17.760 --> 0:31:22.080
<v Speaker 1>civil disobedience, and a series of articles that he wrote

0:31:22.080 --> 0:31:23.320
<v Speaker 1>came out in The New York Post.

0:31:23.440 --> 0:31:25.000
<v Speaker 2>Did you read those? Huh?

0:31:25.040 --> 0:31:27.320
<v Speaker 1>I read some of I read, like, you know, snippets

0:31:27.360 --> 0:31:28.760
<v Speaker 1>from it, just to sort of get an idea.

0:31:29.040 --> 0:31:30.000
<v Speaker 2>Oh, I was just kidding.

0:31:30.640 --> 0:31:32.560
<v Speaker 1>I don't know. I looked into some of it, but

0:31:32.600 --> 0:31:33.880
<v Speaker 1>I didn't like sit around and read him.

0:31:33.920 --> 0:31:36.120
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, I gotcha. Yeah, No, I was trying to get you. Yeah,

0:31:36.480 --> 0:31:37.040
<v Speaker 2>I gotcha.

0:31:37.840 --> 0:31:41.360
<v Speaker 1>But the fifties and sixties, like because of the New

0:31:41.440 --> 0:31:44.120
<v Speaker 1>York Post and because of that movie that Umi Loves

0:31:44.160 --> 0:31:48.120
<v Speaker 1>came out, fifties and sixties is kind of when chain

0:31:48.200 --> 0:31:52.240
<v Speaker 1>gangs basically went away. Although you know, if you lived

0:31:52.240 --> 0:31:54.719
<v Speaker 1>in Maricopa County, Arizona in the nineties, you know they

0:31:54.760 --> 0:31:58.000
<v Speaker 1>tried pretty hard. What was that guy's name, the sheriff there,

0:31:58.800 --> 0:32:02.400
<v Speaker 1>Joe Arpaio. Yeah, I'm not sure he pronounced it, but

0:32:02.520 --> 0:32:06.320
<v Speaker 1>he made big news a lot, and he was one

0:32:06.360 --> 0:32:08.720
<v Speaker 1>of the guys trying to push for the reinstatement of

0:32:08.760 --> 0:32:09.560
<v Speaker 1>the chain gangs.

0:32:10.560 --> 0:32:13.600
<v Speaker 2>Did not happen though, because again America lost its taste

0:32:13.640 --> 0:32:17.200
<v Speaker 2>for chain gangs in the first half of the twentieth century,

0:32:17.240 --> 0:32:19.200
<v Speaker 2>and the idea of bringing them back was not something

0:32:19.200 --> 0:32:22.760
<v Speaker 2>that you would want to do. Even beyond that, not

0:32:22.880 --> 0:32:26.560
<v Speaker 2>bringing back the chain gangs. Prison labor got to be

0:32:26.640 --> 0:32:30.920
<v Speaker 2>more and more or I should say less and less brutal.

0:32:31.000 --> 0:32:33.680
<v Speaker 2>How about that, because the other way I could have

0:32:33.720 --> 0:32:35.720
<v Speaker 2>put it is more and more or less brutal, and

0:32:35.800 --> 0:32:37.040
<v Speaker 2>that just doesn't make sense.

0:32:38.000 --> 0:32:41.440
<v Speaker 1>Well, we took a late break, so it wasn't too

0:32:41.480 --> 0:32:43.320
<v Speaker 1>long ago, but I feel like we should go ahead

0:32:43.360 --> 0:32:45.640
<v Speaker 1>and get our second one under our belt. Okay, all right,

0:32:45.680 --> 0:32:47.880
<v Speaker 1>we'll be right back and talk about the modern era

0:32:48.240 --> 0:33:21.800
<v Speaker 1>of mass incarceration. All Right, we've covered mass incarceration quite

0:33:21.840 --> 0:33:25.920
<v Speaker 1>a bit, certainly in our Prisons episode. But here's a

0:33:25.960 --> 0:33:32.080
<v Speaker 1>stat for you. Over a thirty six year period from

0:33:32.160 --> 0:33:34.920
<v Speaker 1>nineteen seventy to two thousand and eight, the population of

0:33:34.960 --> 0:33:39.320
<v Speaker 1>the United States rose by about fifty percent and the

0:33:39.360 --> 0:33:45.440
<v Speaker 1>population of incarcerated prisoners rose by seven hundred percent. So

0:33:45.960 --> 0:33:51.280
<v Speaker 1>we entered the mass incarceration era big time over about

0:33:51.280 --> 0:33:54.720
<v Speaker 1>a thirty six year period, thanks to well, thanks to

0:33:54.760 --> 0:33:58.040
<v Speaker 1>a lot, but namely thanks to Nixon, Reagan, and Bill Clinton.

0:33:58.120 --> 0:34:01.320
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, Nixon's war on drugs, Reagan tough on crime thing

0:34:01.960 --> 0:34:06.280
<v Speaker 2>Clinton trying to wrestle the tough on crime. I guess

0:34:06.400 --> 0:34:10.000
<v Speaker 2>Moniker away from the GOP, and I guess it was

0:34:10.080 --> 0:34:14.520
<v Speaker 2>part of the Democrats platform every year until two thousand

0:34:14.520 --> 0:34:19.359
<v Speaker 2>and eight and when it was quietly removed and not coincidentally,

0:34:19.400 --> 0:34:21.880
<v Speaker 2>two thousand and eight is the year that the peak

0:34:21.920 --> 0:34:23.120
<v Speaker 2>incarceration happened.

0:34:23.160 --> 0:34:26.000
<v Speaker 1>Like you said, yeah, now we're about that went from

0:34:26.040 --> 0:34:27.640
<v Speaker 1>one point six to two thousand and eight to about

0:34:27.640 --> 0:34:30.640
<v Speaker 1>one point three million incarcerated individuals in the United States.

0:34:30.680 --> 0:34:33.000
<v Speaker 2>Now, yeah, because America has become softer and.

0:34:32.960 --> 0:34:37.279
<v Speaker 1>Gentler, About six hundred of every one hundred thousand people

0:34:37.320 --> 0:34:40.640
<v Speaker 1>in the US are incarcerated. That is a higher rate

0:34:40.680 --> 0:34:43.719
<v Speaker 1>than any other country in the world except Cuba, Rwanda,

0:34:43.760 --> 0:34:47.439
<v Speaker 1>and El Salvador and Louisiana once again leads the way

0:34:47.480 --> 0:34:51.160
<v Speaker 1>at a one thousand per one hundred thousand, and the

0:34:51.320 --> 0:34:55.160
<v Speaker 1>rate of for Black Americans is nine hundred per one

0:34:55.200 --> 0:34:55.840
<v Speaker 1>hundred thousand.

0:34:56.160 --> 0:34:58.360
<v Speaker 2>Can I talk about Al Salvador first second, because I

0:34:58.400 --> 0:35:02.240
<v Speaker 2>looked into their incredibly high incarceration rates.

0:35:02.760 --> 0:35:04.200
<v Speaker 1>Sure do they do prison labor?

0:35:05.600 --> 0:35:07.520
<v Speaker 2>I didn't check that out, but I got this other

0:35:07.560 --> 0:35:08.680
<v Speaker 2>stuff about it? How about that?

0:35:09.160 --> 0:35:09.520
<v Speaker 1>Sure?

0:35:09.840 --> 0:35:15.080
<v Speaker 2>So they have essentially established an authoritarian crackdown on gangs,

0:35:16.320 --> 0:35:21.120
<v Speaker 2>and in twenty fifteen, their murder rate was one hundred

0:35:21.120 --> 0:35:24.879
<v Speaker 2>and three people per hundred thousand population, which means every

0:35:24.920 --> 0:35:28.200
<v Speaker 2>year more than one percent of their population was murdered.

0:35:29.000 --> 0:35:32.760
<v Speaker 2>So they cracked down on gangs and just started throwing

0:35:32.800 --> 0:35:37.359
<v Speaker 2>everybody in jail, and between twenty fifteen and twenty twenty two,

0:35:37.440 --> 0:35:39.640
<v Speaker 2>their murder rate went from one hundred and three per

0:35:39.719 --> 0:35:42.960
<v Speaker 2>hundred thousand to seven point eight per one hundred thousand,

0:35:43.480 --> 0:35:47.600
<v Speaker 2>which you're like, okay, that's actually I mean, authoritarian crackdowns

0:35:47.640 --> 0:35:51.680
<v Speaker 2>on gangs and prisons is not very tasteful, but at

0:35:51.760 --> 0:35:54.400
<v Speaker 2>least they got results. Here in the United States, we

0:35:54.440 --> 0:35:57.960
<v Speaker 2>don't have the same excuse for that level of rise

0:35:58.000 --> 0:36:02.400
<v Speaker 2>in incarceration. Our hamas rate in nineteen fifty five was

0:36:02.440 --> 0:36:08.280
<v Speaker 2>four point five. In twenty twenty four it was like five.

0:36:08.800 --> 0:36:12.240
<v Speaker 2>It's remained relatively flat, give or take a few points

0:36:12.280 --> 0:36:14.400
<v Speaker 2>like here or there, over the years. So there's no

0:36:14.600 --> 0:36:19.240
<v Speaker 2>reason why our prison population should have increased seven hundred percent.

0:36:19.440 --> 0:36:24.839
<v Speaker 2>It just there's no reason for it. Yeah, unless you

0:36:24.920 --> 0:36:29.520
<v Speaker 2>expand crimes, especially non violent crimes like drug possession and

0:36:29.560 --> 0:36:31.560
<v Speaker 2>really throw the book at people, which is what happened

0:36:31.640 --> 0:36:32.640
<v Speaker 2>during that time.

0:36:32.760 --> 0:36:36.200
<v Speaker 1>Right exactly. As far as prison labor goes, most of

0:36:36.200 --> 0:36:39.200
<v Speaker 1>the people in state and federal prison these days do

0:36:39.640 --> 0:36:42.200
<v Speaker 1>some kind of prison labor. I think out of the

0:36:42.360 --> 0:36:45.600
<v Speaker 1>one point three million ish, it's about eight hundred thousand

0:36:45.640 --> 0:36:48.200
<v Speaker 1>as of a few years ago. The ones who don't

0:36:48.239 --> 0:36:51.640
<v Speaker 1>are probably either too old or have some sort of

0:36:51.680 --> 0:36:55.400
<v Speaker 1>disability or health problem that won't allow them to. About

0:36:55.440 --> 0:36:58.160
<v Speaker 1>eighty percent of those workers are working for the prison,

0:36:58.280 --> 0:37:01.080
<v Speaker 1>so you know, when you were in the cafeteria, you

0:37:01.080 --> 0:37:03.959
<v Speaker 1>work in the laundry or something like that. That's about

0:37:03.960 --> 0:37:06.799
<v Speaker 1>eighty percent of it, and most of the rest are

0:37:06.880 --> 0:37:10.359
<v Speaker 1>kind of what we were talking about earlier, government run operations.

0:37:11.560 --> 0:37:14.799
<v Speaker 1>Maybe you do laundry for a public hospital, maybe work

0:37:14.800 --> 0:37:18.400
<v Speaker 1>in that DMB call center. About two percent of total

0:37:18.400 --> 0:37:23.480
<v Speaker 1>prison workers in the federal prison system work for unicorse still,

0:37:24.239 --> 0:37:26.560
<v Speaker 1>And I was curious about the whole license plate thing,

0:37:26.640 --> 0:37:30.480
<v Speaker 1>you know that, oh yeah, sort of trope, But most

0:37:30.520 --> 0:37:32.920
<v Speaker 1>of that doesn't happen at prisons anymore because it's just

0:37:33.000 --> 0:37:35.920
<v Speaker 1>cheaper to have, you know, robot machinery do that kind

0:37:35.920 --> 0:37:39.120
<v Speaker 1>of thing. But it's still a thing in some states.

0:37:39.160 --> 0:37:41.919
<v Speaker 1>And I know, Utah is one of them. It's called

0:37:41.920 --> 0:37:46.360
<v Speaker 1>the UCI operation, and they call themselves plate busters and

0:37:46.400 --> 0:37:49.480
<v Speaker 1>they make them all, even the specialty like ski Utah

0:37:49.640 --> 0:37:52.359
<v Speaker 1>plates and the Olympic plates and stuff like that. They're

0:37:52.400 --> 0:37:52.960
<v Speaker 1>making them all.

0:37:53.040 --> 0:37:57.160
<v Speaker 2>Still, I saw that there's like a long standing kind

0:37:57.160 --> 0:38:01.640
<v Speaker 2>of jokey observation that prisoners in New Hampshire make their

0:38:01.719 --> 0:38:04.040
<v Speaker 2>license plate and on the license plate it says live

0:38:04.080 --> 0:38:07.200
<v Speaker 2>free or die, right, And that's actually true and they

0:38:07.239 --> 0:38:10.080
<v Speaker 2>still do today at the state prison and conquered the

0:38:10.080 --> 0:38:12.480
<v Speaker 2>prisoners in New Hampshire make those license plates.

0:38:13.480 --> 0:38:16.680
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, I imagine making those and making ski Utah plates

0:38:16.760 --> 0:38:18.600
<v Speaker 1>or I don't know, adds a little salt to them

0:38:19.160 --> 0:38:20.400
<v Speaker 1>to the situation.

0:38:20.040 --> 0:38:22.880
<v Speaker 2>You know, for sure. I like that.

0:38:22.880 --> 0:38:26.520
<v Speaker 1>That's saying a little salt to the situation. Well, I

0:38:26.520 --> 0:38:29.200
<v Speaker 1>didn't want to say wound. That's no. One likes that word.

0:38:30.120 --> 0:38:32.440
<v Speaker 2>No, it's not a very pleasant word. Uh.

0:38:32.560 --> 0:38:34.440
<v Speaker 1>Some of these prisoners do dangerous work too, though. You

0:38:34.440 --> 0:38:37.280
<v Speaker 1>know it's not all just like sort of hourly easy stuff.

0:38:38.160 --> 0:38:42.279
<v Speaker 2>No. No, I mean like again, you're you're engaged in

0:38:42.360 --> 0:38:45.120
<v Speaker 2>forced unpaid labor. So you go where they tell you

0:38:45.160 --> 0:38:48.040
<v Speaker 2>to go. I know in California, you might end up

0:38:48.080 --> 0:38:51.280
<v Speaker 2>fighting wildfires, and this is one of the highest paying jobs,

0:38:51.280 --> 0:38:53.720
<v Speaker 2>as we'll see. If you get two to five dollars

0:38:53.800 --> 0:38:56.680
<v Speaker 2>a day plus one dollar an hour when you're actively

0:38:56.719 --> 0:39:00.920
<v Speaker 2>fighting wildfires in California, that's something they can make you

0:39:00.960 --> 0:39:02.239
<v Speaker 2>do if you're a prisoner.

0:39:02.960 --> 0:39:08.080
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, saving the saving the houses at the wealthy. Yeah,

0:39:08.480 --> 0:39:09.919
<v Speaker 1>but not always wealthy to be fair.

0:39:10.080 --> 0:39:12.840
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, no, but there are a lot of wealthy people

0:39:12.840 --> 0:39:14.160
<v Speaker 2>in California to be sure.

0:39:14.680 --> 0:39:19.080
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, not only firefighting, disaster recovery sometimes lead paint removal.

0:39:20.440 --> 0:39:23.960
<v Speaker 1>I think there's around five percent of the incarcerated workforce,

0:39:24.000 --> 0:39:28.239
<v Speaker 1>which is about forty thousand people work for private industry still, right,

0:39:29.040 --> 0:39:30.600
<v Speaker 1>and that a lot of times is like the work

0:39:30.600 --> 0:39:32.719
<v Speaker 1>camp that I was talking about. So they they may

0:39:32.719 --> 0:39:35.719
<v Speaker 1>work at a food fast food restaurant, or may be

0:39:36.000 --> 0:39:39.239
<v Speaker 1>like a work on the custodial staff at a well

0:39:39.280 --> 0:39:40.160
<v Speaker 1>known hotel chain.

0:39:40.520 --> 0:39:43.840
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, and a lot of these bigger businesses have policies

0:39:43.880 --> 0:39:48.120
<v Speaker 2>where they don't use least convict labor like rice, but

0:39:48.880 --> 0:39:51.319
<v Speaker 2>they also sometimes can't do a thing about it, like

0:39:51.400 --> 0:39:54.120
<v Speaker 2>if their supplier part of the supply chain is that,

0:39:54.360 --> 0:39:58.400
<v Speaker 2>like companies don't know who's painting the patio furniture that

0:39:58.440 --> 0:40:00.799
<v Speaker 2>they're selling like they just I don't know, and that

0:40:00.920 --> 0:40:05.000
<v Speaker 2>the company painting the furniture might be using least convict labor,

0:40:05.320 --> 0:40:09.440
<v Speaker 2>or they their franchisees can use least convict labor, and

0:40:09.560 --> 0:40:12.319
<v Speaker 2>the corporate office can't do anything about it because they

0:40:12.320 --> 0:40:15.879
<v Speaker 2>don't own those stores. So it still does happen. Even

0:40:15.920 --> 0:40:19.400
<v Speaker 2>though large corporations in the US tend to have policies

0:40:19.440 --> 0:40:23.879
<v Speaker 2>against that, and in fact have policies that they put

0:40:23.880 --> 0:40:27.440
<v Speaker 2>in place two higher felons, like preferential hiring of felons.

0:40:28.440 --> 0:40:31.320
<v Speaker 2>Still it washes out to where there's plenty of least

0:40:31.360 --> 0:40:34.759
<v Speaker 2>convict labor today in private businesses. Yeah.

0:40:34.840 --> 0:40:36.759
<v Speaker 1>And you know, we've talked about money a little bit

0:40:36.800 --> 0:40:40.640
<v Speaker 1>here and there, like you know, no pay, and you know,

0:40:40.800 --> 0:40:43.400
<v Speaker 1>sometimes there is pay, sometimes there isn't. There's no federal

0:40:44.000 --> 0:40:46.600
<v Speaker 1>law that says that someone has to be paid for

0:40:46.680 --> 0:40:49.760
<v Speaker 1>work if they're a prisoner. Right on the state level.

0:40:50.280 --> 0:40:52.400
<v Speaker 1>It depends on the state, but you know, a lot

0:40:52.480 --> 0:40:56.080
<v Speaker 1>of them pay nothing at all. I think the average

0:40:56.080 --> 0:40:58.600
<v Speaker 1>pay for a prisoner in the US is fifty two

0:40:58.640 --> 0:41:00.839
<v Speaker 1>cents an hour, and that was like three years ago.

0:41:00.920 --> 0:41:02.879
<v Speaker 1>So I doubt if it's gone up that much, who knows,

0:41:02.880 --> 0:41:06.640
<v Speaker 1>maybe it's gone down. Almost always under a dollar an hour.

0:41:07.840 --> 0:41:11.040
<v Speaker 1>You may get like minimum wage if you work one

0:41:11.040 --> 0:41:13.840
<v Speaker 1>of the really hazardous jobs in a pretty forward thinking state.

0:41:15.320 --> 0:41:18.399
<v Speaker 1>But then the prison can turn around and say, yeah,

0:41:18.400 --> 0:41:21.120
<v Speaker 1>but we're gonna take most of that paycheck to cover

0:41:21.280 --> 0:41:24.840
<v Speaker 1>like room and board, or maybe to provide restitution to

0:41:24.880 --> 0:41:27.640
<v Speaker 1>your victims if it was a financial thing exactly.

0:41:27.719 --> 0:41:30.600
<v Speaker 2>So, like even if you're off making federal minimum wage

0:41:30.880 --> 0:41:34.319
<v Speaker 2>at KFC, as you know as a prisoner, as part

0:41:34.320 --> 0:41:39.279
<v Speaker 2>of your prison labor, you're ending up with pennies on

0:41:39.320 --> 0:41:44.040
<v Speaker 2>the dollar per hour after they deduct all that stuff

0:41:44.080 --> 0:41:47.080
<v Speaker 2>from you. So that's why that average for all prison

0:41:47.120 --> 0:41:49.520
<v Speaker 2>workers was fifty two cents an hour because they deduct

0:41:49.560 --> 0:41:53.080
<v Speaker 2>so many things. That's why it's essentially convict leasing. That

0:41:53.120 --> 0:41:56.400
<v Speaker 2>person goes out works, they get paid, and the prison says,

0:41:56.440 --> 0:42:00.799
<v Speaker 2>we're taking this x amount of your pay our own use.

0:42:01.680 --> 0:42:06.160
<v Speaker 1>That has to go into the private prison like financial

0:42:06.719 --> 0:42:07.600
<v Speaker 1>success rate.

0:42:07.480 --> 0:42:11.120
<v Speaker 2>Right precisely that private prisons are able to do that,

0:42:11.280 --> 0:42:14.239
<v Speaker 2>they probably deduct way more. But the other problem with

0:42:14.280 --> 0:42:17.400
<v Speaker 2>it too is that they're at the same time getting

0:42:17.520 --> 0:42:20.920
<v Speaker 2>tax breaks for leasing out their contracts to use in

0:42:20.960 --> 0:42:25.360
<v Speaker 2>the outside world. So they're getting like fees and tax breaks.

0:42:25.400 --> 0:42:27.600
<v Speaker 2>It's quite a racket from what I can tell.

0:42:28.080 --> 0:42:30.560
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, while the basic needs a lot of times that

0:42:30.600 --> 0:42:33.600
<v Speaker 1>these prisoners aren't even being met. Still some pretty bad

0:42:34.280 --> 0:42:38.319
<v Speaker 1>conditions as far as medical treatment goes and food. I

0:42:38.360 --> 0:42:40.640
<v Speaker 1>think Olivia helped us with this. She did a great job.

0:42:41.239 --> 0:42:43.440
<v Speaker 1>But she found one woman named Carla Simmons who is

0:42:43.480 --> 0:42:47.839
<v Speaker 1>an incarcerated in a woman's prison, and she wrote last year,

0:42:48.280 --> 0:42:51.960
<v Speaker 1>and this is right here in Georgia, that prisoners aren't paid.

0:42:52.480 --> 0:42:55.120
<v Speaker 1>And she said the food is so bad that they

0:42:55.360 --> 0:42:58.160
<v Speaker 1>people try to get work assignments where they can dig

0:42:58.200 --> 0:43:00.840
<v Speaker 1>through the trash to eat the guards meals like the

0:43:00.880 --> 0:43:04.520
<v Speaker 1>portions that they threw away, good God in twenty twenty four.

0:43:04.800 --> 0:43:09.080
<v Speaker 2>Yeah. One of the other things too is that I

0:43:09.080 --> 0:43:12.120
<v Speaker 2>mean people point to this and say, like, Okay, yes,

0:43:12.239 --> 0:43:14.880
<v Speaker 2>we agree that prison labor is in and of itself

0:43:14.920 --> 0:43:19.399
<v Speaker 2>a good thing. Like Thomas Moore was right, like there

0:43:19.440 --> 0:43:22.279
<v Speaker 2>is redemption in labor. So we're not saying do away

0:43:22.320 --> 0:43:25.799
<v Speaker 2>with it, but it needs a lot of reforms. These

0:43:25.840 --> 0:43:28.600
<v Speaker 2>are the people who are like, well, reform minded about

0:43:28.640 --> 0:43:30.640
<v Speaker 2>the whole thing. There's Basically, no one saying we should

0:43:30.640 --> 0:43:33.600
<v Speaker 2>do away with prison labor, but they say it should

0:43:33.640 --> 0:43:36.399
<v Speaker 2>be the kind of labor that's going to help them

0:43:36.440 --> 0:43:39.560
<v Speaker 2>get jobs on the outside, where they learn valuable skills.

0:43:40.160 --> 0:43:43.240
<v Speaker 2>They should be paid fairly federal minimum wage at least

0:43:43.239 --> 0:43:46.240
<v Speaker 2>for the labor that they're doing, and they should also

0:43:46.280 --> 0:43:49.880
<v Speaker 2>get protections that any worker gets in the United States.

0:43:50.239 --> 0:43:53.560
<v Speaker 2>This to me is mind blowing. We have workers protections

0:43:53.600 --> 0:43:56.880
<v Speaker 2>out the yin Yang. Here in the US, we have OSHA,

0:43:57.239 --> 0:43:59.400
<v Speaker 2>we have the Fair Labor Standards Act. All of these

0:43:59.440 --> 0:44:03.520
<v Speaker 2>are meant to protect workers physically from injury and also

0:44:03.600 --> 0:44:06.520
<v Speaker 2>protect them from being screwed over by their employers. And

0:44:06.640 --> 0:44:11.160
<v Speaker 2>court after court after court has ruled that prison laborers

0:44:11.320 --> 0:44:15.480
<v Speaker 2>do not count for these protections. They're not classified as

0:44:15.480 --> 0:44:19.080
<v Speaker 2>employees because, as I saw it put, the prison owns

0:44:19.320 --> 0:44:23.040
<v Speaker 2>the prisoner's labor. The laborer doesn't own their own labor,

0:44:23.360 --> 0:44:26.160
<v Speaker 2>So how can an employee be in that situation? They can't.

0:44:26.200 --> 0:44:28.640
<v Speaker 2>Therefore they don't get any of these protections.

0:44:29.360 --> 0:44:31.960
<v Speaker 1>Yeah. I mean, there was a lawsuit brought in Alabama

0:44:32.000 --> 0:44:34.520
<v Speaker 1>in twenty twenty four that was dismissed because they basically

0:44:34.520 --> 0:44:39.360
<v Speaker 1>were like, oh, this isn't forced labor. These are mandatory chores.

0:44:41.000 --> 0:44:43.080
<v Speaker 1>So it's just like depends on what you want to

0:44:43.120 --> 0:44:47.680
<v Speaker 1>call it. I guess. In twenty twenty one, there's an

0:44:47.680 --> 0:44:51.239
<v Speaker 1>international anti slavery nonprofit called walk Free in Australia who

0:44:51.280 --> 0:44:54.680
<v Speaker 1>produces what's called the Global Slavery Index. And the United

0:44:54.680 --> 0:44:59.920
<v Speaker 1>States is one of seventeen countries that use stadium posed

0:45:00.040 --> 0:45:03.320
<v Speaker 1>force labor, along with China and Russia and some other places.

0:45:04.040 --> 0:45:07.480
<v Speaker 1>And the United States is one of only six UN

0:45:07.480 --> 0:45:10.640
<v Speaker 1>member states that hasn't ratified the Forced Labor Convention of

0:45:10.760 --> 0:45:14.680
<v Speaker 1>nineteen thirty, which we considered. The Senate considered that nineteen

0:45:14.719 --> 0:45:16.400
<v Speaker 1>ninety one, like hey, maybe we should sign on to

0:45:16.440 --> 0:45:20.400
<v Speaker 1>this thing, and they said no, it really really conflicts

0:45:20.440 --> 0:45:25.160
<v Speaker 1>with subcontracting these prisoners out to private companies. So like,

0:45:25.520 --> 0:45:26.520
<v Speaker 1>let's not foul that.

0:45:26.680 --> 0:45:28.640
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, we'll just we'll walk past that one.

0:45:28.920 --> 0:45:29.960
<v Speaker 1>Yeah.

0:45:30.080 --> 0:45:32.960
<v Speaker 2>And like I think you mentioned Europe in the UN,

0:45:33.040 --> 0:45:37.440
<v Speaker 2>there's in Europe essentially the way that they treat prison labors.

0:45:38.160 --> 0:45:42.120
<v Speaker 2>What I was saying that in the US prison labor

0:45:42.120 --> 0:45:46.680
<v Speaker 2>reformed people are calling for and you mentioned Alabama in

0:45:46.719 --> 0:45:52.040
<v Speaker 2>that lawsuit about mandatory chores not prison labor. The reason

0:45:52.080 --> 0:45:55.840
<v Speaker 2>that lawsuit even came up is because Alabama, surprisingly is

0:45:55.880 --> 0:45:58.600
<v Speaker 2>one of seven states that in the last few years

0:45:58.719 --> 0:46:04.360
<v Speaker 2>has passed in their state constitution a ban on prison labor.

0:46:05.239 --> 0:46:08.600
<v Speaker 2>You're not allowed to You can't force prisoners to work.

0:46:08.920 --> 0:46:11.360
<v Speaker 2>They can. You can use prison labor, but you have

0:46:11.400 --> 0:46:13.919
<v Speaker 2>to pay them, and you can't coerce them with punishments.

0:46:14.719 --> 0:46:17.720
<v Speaker 2>Some of the punishments that prisoners face if they refuse

0:46:17.800 --> 0:46:21.400
<v Speaker 2>to work, they might be transferred to a higher security prison,

0:46:21.480 --> 0:46:23.200
<v Speaker 2>which is not what you want to happen to you.

0:46:23.360 --> 0:46:26.840
<v Speaker 2>Their family visits may get cut. There's all sorts of

0:46:26.840 --> 0:46:30.319
<v Speaker 2>punishments that can be meted out legally except in these

0:46:30.360 --> 0:46:33.400
<v Speaker 2>states under their constitution. But like you said, that lawsuit

0:46:33.440 --> 0:46:36.880
<v Speaker 2>where they were like, these aren't This isn't involuntary servitude.

0:46:36.880 --> 0:46:41.520
<v Speaker 2>It's mandatory chores. Yeah, they don't have any teeth right now.

0:46:42.440 --> 0:46:47.280
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, Tennessee was in there too, sort of surprising. In Nebraska,

0:46:47.400 --> 0:46:50.279
<v Speaker 1>here's finally some numbers for you. And I love it

0:46:50.320 --> 0:46:52.879
<v Speaker 1>when they kind of put numbers like this, which is like, hey,

0:46:52.920 --> 0:46:55.719
<v Speaker 1>if you actually spent this in the long run, it

0:46:55.760 --> 0:46:58.840
<v Speaker 1>would be better for everybody. I love those stats, and

0:46:58.880 --> 0:47:04.160
<v Speaker 1>this is one of those incarcerated workers saves prison. Saves

0:47:04.239 --> 0:47:07.759
<v Speaker 1>prison is about fifteen billion dollars a year and produces

0:47:07.800 --> 0:47:11.520
<v Speaker 1>another two billion dollars in goods and services. And so

0:47:11.600 --> 0:47:15.840
<v Speaker 1>the Edgeworth Economics Group did a study a cost benefit

0:47:15.920 --> 0:47:19.160
<v Speaker 1>analysis last year and found that, hey, if they actually

0:47:19.280 --> 0:47:23.600
<v Speaker 1>use that money to pay incarcerated workers like an okay wage,

0:47:23.600 --> 0:47:26.600
<v Speaker 1>like maybe even just minimum wage, it would reduce a

0:47:26.600 --> 0:47:28.719
<v Speaker 1>burden on families to send money, which they don't have

0:47:28.719 --> 0:47:31.399
<v Speaker 1>a lot of money to begin with. Maybe they could

0:47:31.440 --> 0:47:36.200
<v Speaker 1>pay child support from prison and improve their earnings like

0:47:36.320 --> 0:47:38.759
<v Speaker 1>once they get out. And so they did the math

0:47:38.800 --> 0:47:42.319
<v Speaker 1>and they found out in the end, every dollar spent

0:47:42.400 --> 0:47:45.680
<v Speaker 1>on prisoners' wages would add up to a society wide

0:47:45.840 --> 0:47:49.280
<v Speaker 1>return of two dollars and forty cents to three dollars

0:47:49.280 --> 0:47:50.160
<v Speaker 1>and sixteen cents.

0:47:50.320 --> 0:47:55.640
<v Speaker 2>Man, that's pretty pretty good, ROI just for paying prisoners.

0:47:55.960 --> 0:47:59.759
<v Speaker 2>I know. I can't think of any better way to

0:47:59.840 --> 0:48:00.920
<v Speaker 2>end this one, can you?

0:48:01.920 --> 0:48:02.759
<v Speaker 1>I got nothing else?

0:48:02.960 --> 0:48:04.720
<v Speaker 2>I thought I heard you drop from Mike.

0:48:04.640 --> 0:48:06.759
<v Speaker 1>Even No, No, it's still up.

0:48:06.840 --> 0:48:09.239
<v Speaker 2>Okay, Well, since Chuck said is Mike's still good to go,

0:48:09.280 --> 0:48:10.879
<v Speaker 2>I guess it's time for listener mail.

0:48:13.080 --> 0:48:14.839
<v Speaker 1>It's hard to drop the Mike in a studio because

0:48:14.840 --> 0:48:17.960
<v Speaker 1>you got to unscrew it. I've got like a windscreen.

0:48:18.560 --> 0:48:21.240
<v Speaker 1>Two things have to get unplugged, and by that time

0:48:21.400 --> 0:48:22.319
<v Speaker 1>everyone's left the room.

0:48:22.360 --> 0:48:24.160
<v Speaker 2>You know they gave you a Wins screen. I didn't

0:48:24.200 --> 0:48:24.920
<v Speaker 2>get a Wins screen.

0:48:25.480 --> 0:48:26.080
<v Speaker 1>I bought my own.

0:48:26.760 --> 0:48:27.800
<v Speaker 2>I brought this from home.

0:48:28.360 --> 0:48:32.600
<v Speaker 1>So who is this from? This is from Kimberly. Hey, guys,

0:48:32.640 --> 0:48:35.040
<v Speaker 1>thanks for keeping me company on long work trips, during chores,

0:48:35.040 --> 0:48:37.640
<v Speaker 1>and throughout my day to day life. I feel like

0:48:37.680 --> 0:48:39.360
<v Speaker 1>I'm listening to old friends. Like a lot of people

0:48:39.360 --> 0:48:41.720
<v Speaker 1>have said before, I appreciate how my worldview is challenged

0:48:42.080 --> 0:48:44.640
<v Speaker 1>and enlightened when I listened to the show. My weekly

0:48:44.680 --> 0:48:46.640
<v Speaker 1>trivia team also appreciates how I can answer some of

0:48:46.680 --> 0:48:50.680
<v Speaker 1>the most random questions thanks to the random facts, and

0:48:51.280 --> 0:48:56.399
<v Speaker 1>Kimberly sent in a great recommendation how crowds work. I'd

0:48:56.400 --> 0:48:58.440
<v Speaker 1>love to know more about how humans move through crowds.

0:48:58.480 --> 0:49:00.120
<v Speaker 1>How do we manage to avoid bumping into each each

0:49:00.120 --> 0:49:03.600
<v Speaker 1>other at airport, stadiums and other crowded places. How do

0:49:03.640 --> 0:49:05.759
<v Speaker 1>we avoid crowd crushes? I feel like we touched on

0:49:05.760 --> 0:49:06.840
<v Speaker 1>that now we have.

0:49:06.800 --> 0:49:09.279
<v Speaker 2>On our Black Friday episode. In a couple I guess

0:49:09.320 --> 0:49:10.600
<v Speaker 2>we talked about crowd crushes.

0:49:11.200 --> 0:49:14.040
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, I think maybe just crowds would be a pretty

0:49:14.040 --> 0:49:14.399
<v Speaker 1>good idea.

0:49:14.480 --> 0:49:17.520
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, really we could work in standing in line. Where

0:49:17.560 --> 0:49:21.040
<v Speaker 2>that came from.

0:49:19.640 --> 0:49:21.680
<v Speaker 1>Is that is that? Do people do that? I don't

0:49:21.719 --> 0:49:22.440
<v Speaker 1>stand in lines.

0:49:23.280 --> 0:49:27.560
<v Speaker 2>A lot of people do surprisingly and wait for their turn,

0:49:27.680 --> 0:49:29.280
<v Speaker 2>I think is what they call it their turn.

0:49:30.640 --> 0:49:32.799
<v Speaker 1>I'm a line jumper, you know. People love those guys.

0:49:32.960 --> 0:49:36.399
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, right, All the key is to just not pay

0:49:36.400 --> 0:49:38.799
<v Speaker 2>attention to anyone behind you, pretend like they're not there.

0:49:39.360 --> 0:49:42.200
<v Speaker 1>I had a guy at the airport recently, and you know,

0:49:42.239 --> 0:49:44.319
<v Speaker 1>boarding an airplane in the United States is just one

0:49:44.320 --> 0:49:46.879
<v Speaker 1>of the worst things that can happen, especially after I've

0:49:46.880 --> 0:49:48.640
<v Speaker 1>seen how they do it in Australia, which is to

0:49:48.680 --> 0:49:52.600
<v Speaker 1>say sybil and friendly. And this guy was standing behind us,

0:49:52.840 --> 0:49:56.000
<v Speaker 1>Me and Emily and Ruby like in the line really

0:49:56.080 --> 0:49:58.320
<v Speaker 1>to get like to get on not the crowd that

0:49:58.560 --> 0:50:01.560
<v Speaker 1>huh goes before they now, and he just like all

0:50:01.600 --> 0:50:03.920
<v Speaker 1>of a sudden just walked right around us and jumped

0:50:03.920 --> 0:50:06.640
<v Speaker 1>in front or tried to and I like sort of

0:50:06.680 --> 0:50:10.120
<v Speaker 1>just bodied up a little bit. Yeah, and you want

0:50:10.120 --> 0:50:13.120
<v Speaker 1>to see and in sense human is I don't know

0:50:13.160 --> 0:50:15.920
<v Speaker 1>if it's all ten year olds, but my daughter when

0:50:15.960 --> 0:50:20.560
<v Speaker 1>someone tries to jump a line, she was furious. Did

0:50:20.560 --> 0:50:23.560
<v Speaker 1>you see that guy try to break in line? It

0:50:23.680 --> 0:50:25.720
<v Speaker 1>was like the almost no worse offense at that age.

0:50:26.320 --> 0:50:27.920
<v Speaker 2>Was he in your side? Did he hear say that?

0:50:29.200 --> 0:50:31.160
<v Speaker 1>Wow? I don't think so, but I repeated it loudly,

0:50:31.200 --> 0:50:33.319
<v Speaker 1>so Emily could hear. Did you hear what Ruby just said?

0:50:33.680 --> 0:50:35.440
<v Speaker 1>She's calling out this guy behind us?

0:50:36.840 --> 0:50:38.160
<v Speaker 2>Man, why would you do that?

0:50:38.880 --> 0:50:41.360
<v Speaker 1>I don't know, It's just I don't know.

0:50:41.440 --> 0:50:45.040
<v Speaker 2>I don't know, Josh. I mean, I get the drive

0:50:45.280 --> 0:50:47.719
<v Speaker 2>to get on board as fast as possible, to get

0:50:47.719 --> 0:50:50.080
<v Speaker 2>some overhead space, so they don't check your carry on

0:50:50.160 --> 0:50:52.080
<v Speaker 2>bag because it's all you have, and you don't want

0:50:52.080 --> 0:50:54.200
<v Speaker 2>to stand around waiting for it because you got to

0:50:54.200 --> 0:50:56.400
<v Speaker 2>get out of the airport as soon as possible. But

0:50:56.480 --> 0:50:59.600
<v Speaker 2>you still don't walk around people that you're in my mind.

0:51:00.239 --> 0:51:02.560
<v Speaker 1>I know, And we were in that sort of you know,

0:51:04.160 --> 0:51:06.040
<v Speaker 1>whether they do zones now, I think we were zone

0:51:06.080 --> 0:51:07.520
<v Speaker 1>one or two, so it wasn't like we were at

0:51:07.560 --> 0:51:09.000
<v Speaker 1>the back of the plane and it was going to

0:51:09.040 --> 0:51:10.640
<v Speaker 1>be dog eat dog for that space.

0:51:10.760 --> 0:51:14.080
<v Speaker 2>Yeah. Maybe he just could not wait to get some pretzels.

0:51:14.560 --> 0:51:17.480
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, the mustard anyways, Sorry rant over?

0:51:18.280 --> 0:51:23.040
<v Speaker 2>Was that the end of Kimberly's email too? Yeah, great idea, Kimberly.

0:51:23.080 --> 0:51:25.440
<v Speaker 2>I think we will do one on crowds eventually and

0:51:25.520 --> 0:51:27.880
<v Speaker 2>we will try like heck to remember to credit you

0:51:27.920 --> 0:51:30.560
<v Speaker 2>with the idea because it was one hundred percent yours.

0:51:31.360 --> 0:51:31.719
<v Speaker 1>That's right.

0:51:31.760 --> 0:51:33.360
<v Speaker 2>If you want to be like Kimberly and give us

0:51:33.400 --> 0:51:35.920
<v Speaker 2>a great idea, we love that kind of thing, you

0:51:35.920 --> 0:51:44.560
<v Speaker 2>can send it off to Stuff Podcasts at iHeartRadio dot com.

0:51:44.719 --> 0:51:47.000
<v Speaker 2>Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio.

0:51:47.520 --> 0:51:50.720
<v Speaker 1>For more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app,

0:51:50.920 --> 0:51:53.800
<v Speaker 1>Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

0:52:00.080 --> 0:52:00.120
<v Speaker 2>M