The Post Liberal Era begins with the presidency of Ronald Reagan. Although Ronald Reagan was one of the most popular president in United States history, the years he served were not beloved by many. One example of this was Reverend Jerry Falwell. Reverend Falwell believed that “our grand old flag from going down the drain.” according to the Reverend Jerry Falwell, Moral Majority Fundraising Letter. He was against homosexual people and the distribution of pornography and R/X rated movies. He seemed to believe that the sex and violence they contained were bad for America as a whole. Lastly, he brought up the controversial subject of abortion, believing it to be synonymous with murder. Something extremely chilling that was shown in the …show more content…
Another huge, relevant problem that began budding under the presidency of Ronald Reagan was mass incarceration. Incarceration rates rose quickly during his term but skyrocketed when President Bill Clinton passed the “Crime Bill” according to the sources. The post-war period revealed huge rises in the number of people imprisoned. From a mere 338,029 in 1970, the figures rose to a shocking 2,042,479 in 2001 according to the information supplied by Dr. Barrett. In the document Why Mass Incarceration Matters by Heather Ann Thompson, it states that “Between
1970 and 2010 more people were incarcerated in the United States than were imprisoned in any other country.” What was not surprising was the fact that African Americans once again were the ones who were the most unfortunate, recording the highest imprisonment rate among all races and sexes. The numbers before the 1960s do not even compare to the numbers following. For example, numbers taken from the document show that 35 years before the 1960s, the number of American people imprisoned had increased by 52,249 people. However, the 35 years after, the same group had increased by a drastic 1,266,2435. Even with the massive numbers documented in statistics of the numbers of American citizens incarcerated, historians have ignored this integral piece of the post-war period and failed to recognize its impact. For example, mass incarceration had a direct effect on how thriving American urban centers became full of poverty
Then liberalism in the United States was also expanded through President Lyndon B. Johnson during the 1960s with his Great Society. Liberalism under President Johnson became a form of social liberalism, which meant that President Johnson thought that liberalism should include social justice. So he expanded liberalism through the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Community Reinvestment Act, as well as the Voting Rights Act of 1965. He transferred liberalism into neoliberalism, meaning that it became more focused on the business aspect of the nation that would help determine the political and economic priorities
The incarceration rates have grown tremendously since the last time someone can remember. The largest jailer in the world is the United States. Philadelphia, however, has the nation’s highest incarceration rates. Surprisingly, 60% of them are still awaiting trial but 72% of them are black. Research has show’s that mass incarceration rates goes hand in hand with segregated cities.
The second point is that liberalism upholds the principle of equality for all regardless of name, social status, and gender, racial, cultural, or ethnic background. Liberalists advocate for a level playing ground which calls for the government to strictly control the economy and also have more power in the social arena so as to protect people from economic exploitation. Liberalists strongly push for controlled corporations, an economy that is well
Mass incarceration became a public policy issue in the United States in the early 2010s. Now in 2016, there is still much debate over the country’s incarcerated population and incarceration rate. The nation has the highest incarcerated population in the world, with 2,217,947 inmates, in front of China with 1,649,804. America incarcerates 693 inmates per 100,000 residents, only the African island nation Seychelles incarcerates at a higher rate, with 799 for every 100,000 residents. The problem of mass incarceration continues to be assessed in various contexts. Recent analyses are historian Elizabeth Hinton’s From the War on Poverty to the War on Crime, legal scholar Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow, and criminologist Dr. Elizabeth Brown’s “Toward Refining the Criminology of Mass Incarceration: Group-Based Trajectories of U.S. States, 1977—2010.”
Imprisonment is more common in some social groups than others and makes it easier for racial groups to fall into that stereotype. It becomes more widely expected for groups such as Black males and even Hispanics when they live in the low income communities. At some point one in three Black males and one in six Hispanics will be incarcerated at some point in their life (Berg, & DeLisi, 2006). Nationwide, African American men are confined at 9.6 times the rate of White men.
“The Growth of Incarceration in the United States: Exploring Causes and Consequences” by Jeremy Travis,
For my analysis, I decided to read the 2006 book Punishment and Inequality in America by author Bruce Western. The book takes a look into the relationship among crime, incarceration, and inequality and what really connects them together. Western shows that although there was a decrease in crime rates about 20 years ago, the reason behind this decrease is not what it may seem and that the decrease may of even come at a significant cost to those effected by the prison boom. Through my analysis, I hope to explore and convey what Western has claimed and examine if his arguments hold truth or not in dealing with our prison systems. On top of this, I will attempt to connect a few theories we as a class have learned about throughout the semester to what Western has has claimed in his book.
The United States accounts for 5% of the world population, but our prison population makes up 25% of the world’s (Nagin, 2014). African Americans account for the largest percent of our prison population because they have the highest incarceration rate compared to other races. This essay will argue that African Americans are incarcerated at a higher rate than Caucasians. Proven by statistical data, there are grounds to establish that the racial disparity in incarceration rates is a social problem. To address this social problem, public policy should be implemented by the Federal Government.
Mass incarceration became a public policy issue in the United States in the 2000s. Now in 2016, there are still many questions about America’s incarceration rate, 698 prisoners per 100,000 people, which is only surpassed by Seychelle’s at 868 for every 100,000. They concern the phenomenon’s beginning, purpose, development, and essentially resolution. In her book published this year, assistant professor of history and African and African-American studies at Harvard Elizabeth Hinton challenges popular belief that mass incarceration originated from Reagan’s War on Drugs. Mass incarceration’s function as a modern racial caste system is discussed in a 2010 book by Michelle Alexander, an associate professor of law at Ohio State University, civil
Mass incarceration is a term primarily associated with the United States of America’s policy trends beginning around the 1970’s. During that time, there is a dramatic shift in the rhetoric regarding crime, causing a wave of policy changes that have set the course for the United States’ current 2.3 million people incarcerated. In California in 1976, then Governor Brown followed this trend and
In the eyes of many, mass incarceration constitutes a brutal technique of punishing individuals for excessive periods of time. There are many reasons to be doubtful that the system of mass incarceration has helped the nation in any form. Rather, locking up millions of people for nonviolent crimes seems just too excessive and redundant. According to “The Black Family in the Age of Mass Incarceration” by Ta-Nehisi Coates published in The Atlantic magazine, the majority of those incarcerated are minorities mainly African American. More clearly, the technique of mass incarceration is used to limit the numbers of minorities in society or control the minority population. Regulations regarding incarcerating millions must be reviewed thoroughly on a federal level and refine precedent to a better future. What major actions must be taken into account to change the turmoil of mass incarceration? Is it possible to adjust the law in reparation for a better future?
“As the walls of the ghetto shook and threatened to crumble, the walls of the prison were correspondingly extended, enlarged and fortified. . .” (Wacquant 2002:52). In his account, Wacquant implies that once ghettos began to disperse, American society required a new place for African Americans to reside: prison. Reading this article, one would never know that African Americans existed outside ghettos and prisons. The concept of African Americans in suburbia or anywhere of decent living standards is ignored completely. There is no dispute over the “racially skewed mass imprisonment” (Wacquant 2002:56) of black men and women, but not only African Americans inhabit ghettos and the “inner city.” However, the “centuries-old
Throughout the last forty years high incarceration rates have been a major issue in the criminal justice field. There are many factors that attribute to the rates increasing in such an alarming matter, as well as theories that support and explain why the factors play the role they do in high rates. In the following paper it will show the affects high incarceration has on the different groups of criminal justice as well as the African American population.
Looking at the United States in 1965, it would seem that the future of the liberal consensus was well entrenched. The anti-war movement was in full swing, civil rights were moving forward, and Johnson's Great Society was working to alleviate the plight of the poor in America. Yet, by 1968 the liberal consensus had fallen apart, which led to the triumph of conservatism with the election of President Reagan in 1980. The question must be posed, how in the course of 15 years did liberal consensus fall apart and conservatism rise to the forefront? What were the decisive factors that caused the fracturing of what seemed to be such a powerful political force? In looking at the period from 1968 to the
On the other hand, modern day Conservatives, as their title suggests, are “resistant to [overly radical] progress [and generally speaking, are] hostile to the increase of governmental power [(in terms of regulating commerce and the like)], defensive of tradition and [are] supportive of free market capitalism".1 They “…believe in individualism… [, meaning] little government intervention in [terms of] economy [as well as] society… [and] tend to believe in the virtue of the status quo and [subscribe to] traditional moral… and religious values [as a bases for their political statements and beliefs].”2