Punishments

=//Chain Gang Punishment//=

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//A chain gang is a group of prisoners that are chained together to do menial or physically challenging work. The punishment might include building roads, digging ditches, or chipping stone. This punishment was in the southern parts of the United States. By 1955 it had been phased out nation wide. Georgia was the last state to abandon the practice.//======

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//Chain gangs were reintroduced by a few states during the "get tough on crime" 1990s. Alabama was the first state to revive them in 1995. The experiment ended after about one year in all states except Arizona. In Maricopa County inmates can still volunteer for a chain gang to earn extra cridit. They can put it towards a high school diploma or avoid disciplinary lockdowns for rule infactions.//====== =**//Southern Black Codes//**=

Black Codes were unofficial laws in the United States to limit basic human rights and civil rights to the black community. Even though the constitution originally discriminated against blacks and both the north and the south had passed discriminatory legislation in the 19th century, Black codes is used more often to reform to legislation in the south at the end of the civil war to control the labor and migration of newly freed slaves. In Texas, the Eleventh Legislature produced the codes in 1866 after the civil war. The reason these codes were made was to reaffirm the inferior position of the newly freed slaves. They symbolized the unwilligingness to except blacks as equals in the country. The black codes were put into affect right after the civil war, though they varied from state to state although they were all intended to make them work hard for little money. The black codes originated from the slave codes that had already been in effect. Blacks had very little to no rights. The slave codes were seen as an effective tool for slave unrest especially for uprisings and runaways. Enforcement varied but punishment was widely and harshly enforced to great effect. Sources: [])

=// Lynching in the United States //= Lynching is killing somebody that has been accused by mob action. The term lynching comes from Charles Lynch. Lynching was a system of discipline used by white people against African American slaves. Whites that protested against lynching were also in danger of being lynched. On November 7th, 1867 Elijah Parish Lovejoy, editor of the Alton Observer, was killed after publishing articles criticizing lynching and the abolition of slavery.   After the establishment of the k.k.k in 1867 the total number of lynching of the African American people increased dramatically. It has been estimated that from 1880 to 1920, about two African Americans were lynched a week. In 1884 Ida Wells carried out an investigation into lynching. She soon found out that over a short period of time 728 black men and women were lynched. Out of all 728 deaths, two-thirds were because of small offences such as public drunkenness or shoplifting.