Black Men, Intergenerational Colonialism, and Behavioral Health by Donald E. Grant Jr

Author:Donald E. Grant Jr.
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9783030211141
Publisher: Springer International Publishing

A Despotic Trifecta: Sharecroppers, Debt Peons, Leased Convicts

The thirteenth amendment to the American Constitution states that “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 place subject to their jurisdiction” (US Const. amend. XIII, sec. 1). The amendment clearly and decisively criminalizes the practice of slavery under any name in the USA or any of its protectorates. Prominently imbedded in this amendment is the unambiguously strategic exception to the nations’ right to enslave a portion of its citizenry. Prior to 1865 in the USA, enslavement was a mandated condition predicated upon race, ethnic origin and the status of one’s birth mother. As of January 1866, according to the 13th Amendment to the US Constitution, slavery was solely defined as a “punishment for crime” after one has been convicted. During the exact same moment in American history, eligibility for enslavement came to require a criminal conviction, the Southern states passed the Vagrancy Act of 1866 which was one part of a larger group of laws and regulations that strategically criminalized the formerly enslaved.

America would soon reclaim its crown as the number one producer and exporter of cotton in the world. By 1880, they were not only producing more cotton than they had in 1860, they had also grown cotton manufacturing plants in numbers never before seen in the country (Beckert, 2014). How is it possible that a business built upon the foundation of slave labor is able to not only sustain itself, but grow and thrive when the free-labor market upon which it was built is no longer at its disposal? The simple answer is a set of business continuity interventions that would secure free to low cost labor for small plantations and farms, large plantations and the Southern states whose infrastructure was severely damaged during the Civil War. Networks of small abandoned farms and plantations relied upon systems of sharecropping and debt peonage to reestablish their business. Many large unmanned plantations once imprisoned 200 plus enslaved people. Their scope of need could not be sufficiently met with the sharecropping model so they relied upon convict leasing programs. State governments and southern manufacturers also relied on convict leasing programs to repair roads, railroads and buildings severely compromised and rendered inaccessible by the war. The need for cheap labor was pronounced. How would this picture-perfect strategy be employed to ensure future prosperity given this critical change in the landscape (Blackmon, 2008).

As in most cases, it is hard to determine the intent of historic actions and decisions. What is not debatable is the fact that the most cost-effective labor plan in the American South had ended. In today’s world, changes in laws and regulations that impact the labor force or availability of workers occur regularly. Most responsible business owners, c-suite executives and trustee boards have in place business continuity plans in the case internal or external factors lead to significant changes in their discipline or areas of responsibility.

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