Day: November 13, 2023

Slavery and the New Chain Gang: “A Tribute To Ruchell Magee” (RIU)_Video Edu. Playlist and The Labor of Doing Time, by Julie Browne (pdf. read) and 4STRUGGLEMAG Issues 11-21

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…Slavery is being practiced by the system under the color of law…. Slavery 400 years ago, slavery today; it’s the same thing, but with a new name. They’re making millions and millions of dollars enslaving blacks, poor whites, and others–people who don’t even know they’re being railroaded.–Political Prisoner Ruchell Magee

To the Man-Child, Tall, evil, graceful, bright eyed, black man-child- Jonathan Peter Jackson-who died on August 7, 1970, courage in one hand, assault rifle in the other; my brother, comrade, friend- the true revolutionary, the black communist guerrilla in the highest state of development, he died on the trigger, scourge of the unrighteous, soldier of the people; to this terrible man-child and his wonderful mother Georgia Bea, to Angela Y. Davis, my tender experience, I dedicate this collection of letters; to the destruction of their enemies I dedicate my life. George L. Jackson

August 7, 1970, just a few days after George Jackson was transferred to San Quentin, the case was catapulted to the forefront of national news when his brother, Jonathan, a seventeen-year-old high school student in Pasadena, staged a raid on the Marin County courthouse with a satchelful of handguns, an assault rifle, and a shotgun hidden under his coat. Educated into a political revolutionary by George, Jonathan invaded the court during a hearing for three black San Quentin inmates, not including his brother, and handed them weapons. As he left with the inmates and five hostages, including the judge, Jonathan demanded that the Soledad Brothers be released within thirty minutes. In the shootout that ensued, Jonathan was gunned down. Of Jonathan, George wrote, “He was free for a while. I guess that’s more than most of us can expect.”

Azadeh Zohrabi, Resistance and Repression: The Black Guerrilla Family in Context, 9 Hastings Race & Poverty L.J. 167 (2012).
Available at: https://repository.uchastings.edu/hastings_race_poverty_law_journal/vol9/iss1/7

Graphics of slideshow: https://4strugglemag.org/

Despite a chilling official silence, 1995 was a bombshell in the “war on crime.” In this one year alone, 150 new prisons were built in the United States and 171 existing prisons were expanded. This was the year the crime bill was passed, mandating that 100,000 additional police officers be added to the already enormous law enforcement establishment. In California, this was the first year that the state budget allocated more money for prisons than higher education. Most astonishingly, with one short day of media attention, 1995 was the year that Alabama’s governor Fob James, and other state officials, made the callous and horrifying decision to reinstate the nationally abolished chain gang.

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RBG Communiversity eLibrary| 4STRUGGLEMAG_Issues 11-21 _Read/Study/Download

Slavery in America: The Montgomery Slave Trade_ Video Edu. and Full Report (Equal Justice Initiative)

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“The myth of racial difference created to sustain American slavery persists today. Slavery did not end in 1865, it evolved. The Equal Justice Initiative works to end mass incarceration, excessive punishment, and racial inequality.” Visit our website to learn more: https://eji.org

Beginning in the 16th century, millions of African people were kidnapped, enslaved, and shipped across the Atlantic to the Americas under horrific conditions. Nearly two million people died at sea during the agonizing journey. Over two centuries, the enslavement of Black people in the United States created wealth, opportunity, and prosperity for millions of Americans. As American slavery evolved, an elaborate and enduring mythology about the inferiority of Black people was created to legitimate, perpetuate, and defend slavery. This mythology survived slavery’s formal abolition following the Civil War.
Source: https://eji.org/reports/slavery-in-america/

Overview

In the South, where the enslavement of Black people was widely embraced, resistance to ending slavery persisted for another century following the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment in 1865.Today, 150 years after the Emancipation Proclamation, very little has been done to address the legacy of slavery and its meaning in contemporary life. In many communities like Montgomery, Alabama—which by 1860 was the capital of the domestic slave trade in Alabama—there is little understanding of the slave trade, slavery, or the longstanding effort to sustain the racial hierarchy that slavery created. In fact, an alternative narrative has emerged in many Southern communities that celebrates the enslavement era, honors enslavement’s principal proponents and defenders, and refuses to acknowledge or address the problems created by the legacy of slavery. Slavery in America: The Montgomery Slave Trade documents American slavery and Montgomery’s prominent role in the domestic slave trade. The report is part of EJI’s project focused on developing a more informed understanding of America’s racial history and how it relates to contemporary challenges.

EJI believes that reconciliation with our nation’s difficult past cannot be achieved without truthfully confronting history and finding a way forward that is thoughtful and responsible.

This animated short film by acclaimed artist Molly Crabapple, with narration by Bryan Stevenson, illustrates how the elaborate mythology of racial difference that was created to justify and sustain enslavement evolved after abolition.

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Learn more in RBG Communiversity eLibrary|Attorney Bryan Stevensonon Folder