Though the Civil War dismantled the politics that pitted “slave states” against “free states,” the effect of the punishment-exception clause in the Thirteenth Amendment sanctioned the preservation of slavery and involuntary servitude - and extended it nationwide, writes Deborah G. Plant in an opinion piece for The Lens in New Orleans. Plant’s book, Of Greed and Glory: In Pursuit of Freedom for All, published earlier this year, examines the Slavery Clause of our Constitution.
Through letters from her brother, Bobby Plant, about his experiences of arrest, detention, and eventual incarceration at the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola, Plant's book explores the racial and economic oppressions that are at the root of the punishment-exception clause. Yet it’s even broader than those oppressions, she writes. “The badges of slavery that subjugate, exploit, and humiliate are anathema to the creed of freedom and justice for all. Injustice is not 'a Black thing,' and locking up (white) police officers, celebrities, corrupt and misogynistic politicians, and corporate moguls/tycoons — female and male alike — doesn’t make America’s corrupted justice system less corrupt, nor does it make the country’s carceral status more acceptable. Making orange the new black doesn’t make any of it right.”
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