The 13th Amendment Is Still Affecting African Americans

In the documentary, 13th, scholars, activists, and politicians scrutinize the 13th amendment and how it affects African Americans. The 13th amendment states, “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted shall exist within the United States, or any subject to their jurisdiction.” The “except as a punishment for crime” part was stressed heavily in the documentary. This section of the amendment created a loophole that led to prison boom over the years. The prison boom was basically a legal way to enslave African Americans again since America was now “land of the free.”

When African Americans were freed after the Civil War it caused an economic problem. People thought

I knew of the 13th amendment, but I never really paid attention to what it meant until this documentary. I knew that the system was set up for mostly black men to be in jail or prison, but I did not realize that it was just to have another form of slavery. I was surprised to see that corporations we constantly use, like AT&T, JcPenney, and Victoria Secret were making profit off of the people incarcerated. Which is interesting because I do not understand how some white people can profit off people of color and hate them at the same time. From what I see, white people wouldn’t be able to function without them. There are a lot of things that society uses, that were made by people of color. According to Crystal Tucker, without black people things like agriculture, shoes, technology, and music would not be the same, in fact some things might not have even

People should know that slavery did not end because people all of a sudden had a change of heart and thought black people or people of color were now equal. Slavery ended because white people began to realize that they were bringing so many Africans into America, that Africans began to overpopulate them. However, African Americans were only considered to be three-fifths of a person. So, when you really think about it, there was actually way more African Americans than they thought. Therefore, mass incarceration was the solution to that problem. So, that with the 13th amendment they were no longer citizens with rights, they were criminals. For these reasons, the law enforcement system needs to be fixed, not reformed, but reconstructed as Ava DuVernay