Introduction
Systemic racism is a form of discrimination based on the colour of the skin, and it is a belief rooted in society and perceived as usual. Police brutality, on the other hand, violence directed at civilians by the police and which entails the use of deadly force that results in damage to property, injuries, loss of lives, among others. After the American Civil War, there was a need for equality in America. As a result, slavery became abolished in the United States of America. However, the 13th amendment had some shortcomings as it still allowed convicts into slavery and servitude (Gigantino II, 2020). It, therefore, lead to the incarceration of Black Americans, especially during the era of Jim Crow.
Imperialism by Another Name
According to Parmar, in his book "Imperialism by another name," immediately after abolishing the slave trade, the whites from the South realized that the 13th amendment abolished slavery knew they had lost black labour in their farms, mines and factories. They, therefore, embarked on designing a method of bringing back blacks into working for them by lobbying legislation through politicians, merchants and business people. Through the bill, these people ensured that the legislation violated provisions that had earlier been brought by 14th and 15th amendments like equality for all, including blacks. Besides, whites in leadership wrongly applied the 13th amendment that exposed prisoners to slavery and servitude to their advantage. They thus maximized the penal code preceding the American Civil War to come up with a convict lease mechanism as a way of using blacks' labour to amass wealth.
Through this new system, the state allowed the police to arrest black Americans. They were later accused in courts and convicted using the Black Codes that criminalized even the trivial offences and which tied the freed African Americans to their former masters and so condemned the convicted prisoners into working on the plantations of their old masters. Further, to necessitate this, the code ensured higher fines that African Americans could not pay as a way to get freed from this involuntary servitude (Gordon-Reed, 2018). Also, the code illegalized vagrancy, which criminalized unemployment and therefore forced black people to work on the white farms, mines and industries. And so through the convict lease system, the African Americans who were convicted were let out to private individuals who owned mines, factories and farms. While working under the lease system, the convicts were exposed to poor conditions where they were beaten, starved, sexually exploited and torture causing the death of some of them. The black convicts through the system of convict lease ensured substantial revenues for the state by way of providing cheap labour.
Contrary
In contrast, the poor working conditions ensured a reduction in expenses involved in ensuring housing and care for the prisoners. And so the difference in the convict lease system and the previous form of slavery is that the first one only provided that they were subjects of their owners and were free once the payment of fines was complete. Therefore, these masters ensured that the convicts worked beyond endurance and disposed of once weakened by diseases.
Secondly, statistics show that black Americans are more than twice a victim of police violence and brutality compared to their white counterparts. Particular attention is on the use of deadly force by the police on the minority African-Americans that involve extrajudicial killings of the black people, especially men and the youth. Nearly 42 million blacks get killed through shooting by the time of research, which is the highest in comparison to other races. Consequently, due to the police brutality, there has been rice of civil rights movements like the Black Lives Matter that have emerged to fight for the civil rights of the blacks.
Further, the application of criminal justice in the United States characterized by racial impartiality against African Americans. Moreover, black Americans are likely to face arrest and detention compared to white Americans. Also, once convicted, they usually experience longer sentences than whites. Further, research has shown that African Americans are more than five times to be incarcerated. Most people believe that criminal justice in America serves two distinct groups of people; the rich and the poor, who are usually black people. Contrary to what the judicial system should do in observing the rights of all people as provided in the constitution, the truth is that the law only prevails in undermining the rights of the poor African Americans who are also the minority.
According to reports by Jones in his article "Judicial Racism and Judicial Antiracism," it is evident that black Americans face imprisonments at a rate that is more than any other race in America. Research shows that blacks got incarcerated more than five times the rate of white people in the United States. Also, convictions on black Americans have longer sentences compared to their white counterparts who get more lenient punishments (Jetter & Mesa-Osorio, 2016). An example is where a judge in California state gave a Stanford student a conviction of six months' sentence after sexually assaulting a woman. The decision led to an outcry from most of the public as the verdict seems lenient, considering that the defendant had been charged and found guilty of three counts. Even though the prosecutors pleaded that the defendant gets convicted for six years for the assault, the judge decided that the defendant only to serve six months.
Finally, due to the pervasive racism, black Americans face in the judicial system they are exposed to psychological and physical damages (Chisholm-Burns, 2020). Apart from very discriminatory laws imposed on black Americans, the police also played a role in administering racial brutality on them by enforcing the legislation that undermined the rights of the blacks by shooting them in the streets, among other bad things (Alang, McAlpine, McCreedy & Hardeman, 2017). Recent research has shown that there exists a psychological ideal that links an individual's experience with racial prejudice to the increased danger of committing more crime. Also, racial socialization and readiness for bias contribute towards a person's conscience effect on personal, racial discrimination. Also, due to prejudice in convictions together with very harsh treatments administered on the blacks who offended the whites caused physical damage on black Americans (Blackmon, 2017). Such maltreatment done on African Americans included maiming, being exposed to inhumane conditions and even being beaten.
Conclusion
Conclusively, as illustrated systemic racism is a form of discrimination based on the colour of the skin, and it is a belief rooted in society and perceived as usual. After the American Civil War, there was a need for equality in America. As a result, slavery became abolished in the United States of America. However, the 13th amendment had some shortcomings as it still allowed convicts into slavery and servitude (Gigantino II, 2020). It, therefore, lead to the incarceration of Black Americans, especially during the era of Jim Crow. For this reason, amendments need to be done to ensure the effectiveness of the provision in ensuring there is no slavery.
