prisoners' rights

Conjugal visits were first allowed as incentives for the forced labor of incarcerated Black men, the practice expanding from there. Is human touch a right?

How was the famous prisoner uprising and its aftermath depicted in the prison press? The American Prison Newspapers collection on JSTOR has answers.

If this nation hopes to achieve a justice system that is just, it must remain ever vigilant for any echo from Attica.

It has been nearly 50 years since New York’s jails erupted in protest, but the lessons of that era feel more relevant than ever.

Black Muslims have been an influential force in the prisoners' rights movement and criminal justice reform.

An Alabama man faces execution by nitrogen gas—the first U.S. execution by gas in a quarter-century, 100 years after the practice began.

How decades-old decisions to build two California prisons in a dry lakebed and a chaotic climate left 8,000 incarcerated people at risk.

Critiques of the Thirteenth Amendment have roots in a long history of activists who understood the imprisonment of Black people as a type of slavery.

Prisoners not only supported the war effort in surprising ways during World War II, they fought and died in it.

In 1970, Angela Davis was arrested on suspicion of murder. The trial — and her eventual victory — proved to everyone that the justice system was corrupt.

The story of George Jackson and his radical politics that challenged the American Government in an age of political repression.

The Nation of Islam is controversial. Its practical purposes for incarcerated people transcend both politics and religion.

Prisons have been controversial since their beginnings in the late 1700s — why do they keep failing to live up to expectations?

The best-selling musical artist in the world in 1969, Johnny Cash sang of (and for) the "forgotten Americans": the imprisoned men of all races.

It’s time to demand law enforcement accountability for the death of unarmed citizens not just on America’s streets but also in our prisons.

During the war in Vietnam, there was a notorious American prison on the outskirts of Saigon: a prison for American soldiers.

The devastating cruelties these stories reveal also contain a fundamental truth about prison.

The longer a camp system stays open, the more likely it is that vital things will go wrong.

Proponents believe lethal injection to be a medical marvel, but in reality it’s junk science.

An updated prison syllabus in response to the national prison strike of 2018.