It’s not “like” slavery, but technically is slavery. “Slavery or involuntary servitude” in the 13th amendment is a permission structure and not a loophole. A hole is something not there; this allowance to enslave a human being for a crime for punishment of a crime is sitting right there, not invisible or absence, like a loop or a hole. Lawyers and legislatures starting law around this permission structure right away, allowing the state governments to strip away the unalienable rights of Black Americans and leasing out these enslaved people to plantations and industry. White railroad entrepreneurs leased black convicts for the brutal work of grading the rail lines for the new South. This cheap labor source brought in new northern capital, allowing investment to rebuild the old south and start a new one. The coal industry built up quickly around this black enslaved labor.
The conditions were more “barbaric” then under “chattel” slavery. Black enslaved humans were worked round the clock in mines until death. Here in In Texas, they work in the sugar fields and mill, there dead bodies thrown radmonly into shallow graves (the Sugarland 95). They were often hogtied and beaten with broom handles instead of whips, and died from the severe beatings. Since the state owned the title to their labor instead of individuals, they were more expendable and one died, they ordered a bunch more from the state or local government.
The practice never stopped. It transformed in ownership titling, and was still “chattel,” a moveable piece of property. This new white state government slavery has been going on for 159 years now and never stopped. The image of it has transformed. Only public perception has changed. The slavery amendment sponsored in the Senate Senator Brooks and Merkley and introduced in Congress by Congresswoman Williams of Georgia must not be allowed to slip down the agenda.
Our country is a disgrace that it enslaves most black Americans. Abolish slavery now. And yes, the firefighters pictured are mostly black as seen in a 2009 article, with the others being Hispanic. Yes, they were black Americans working that Louisiana kitchen without pay. Yes, black hands have been picking cotton on the same stretch of land in Angola for the white owners for 180 years, and no the conditions have not changed that entire time.
