Assignment:
part 1
1. What were Jim Crow Laws? Why did they emerge even after the Emancipation Prociamation was signed?
2. What were the initial economic reasons behind slavery?
3. What was the result of Bacon's Rebellion?
4. Slaves were considered how much a man?
5. What is the relationship between the Black Codes and Convict Leasing laws?
5. What was the position of the Populists concerning segregation laws?
6. What were the results of the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964?
7. What was the purpose of President Roosevelt's New Deal?
8. How did Presidents Nixon and Reagan convince the public that Blacks and poor people were dangerous, lazy and druggies? Please site several examples for full credit.
9. What is the relationship between the increase in crack cocaine and the kind of unemployment caused by globalization and deindustrialization?
10. Which President implemented the Three-Strikes-Your-Out Law as well as TANF?
Part 2
11. What is your opinion about the Fourth Amendment and the Supreme Court decision in the Florida vs Bostick case in which the Court stated "a reasonable person would have denied access to their bag."
The Fourth Amendment
"The right to of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the person or things to be seized.
12. What is pretext stop?
13. What is Operation Pipeline intended to do?
14. How did the Reagan administration get law enforcement agencies to make drug enforcement top priority?
15. During the 1984 Administration, state and local law enforcement agencies were granted authority to keep, for their own use, the vast majority of cash, and assets they seized with the war on drugs. This led to a revolution in drug busting. What is your opinion about this incentive?
16. Would you likely consent to an impromptu search of your vehicle if you were pulled over for a minor traffic violation. Why or Why not? Do you think your answer would be different if you were an African American?
17. What is plea bargain?
18. How is plea bargaining related to Prosecutors who "load up" defendants with charges?
Part 3
19. Human Rights Watch reported in 2000 that in 8 states, African Americans constitute 80~90% of all drug offenders sent to prison. How would the author argue that this is a misleading figure?
20. Illegal drug use is different than most other types of crimes because the buyer and seller are consensual. What do you think about the above statement? Is it an infringement of individual freedom?
21. Nietzsche said "there is no immaculate perception". How does his quote apply to drug enforcement and the "criminalblackman"?
22. What was the Edward Clary case about? What was the first result and then the final result?
23. What were the 2 pieces of evidence provided by the defense in Armstrong V The Unites States?
24. What are Peremptory Strikes? How do they affect jury diversity?
25. What is The Occupation?
26. What are indoor and outdoor markets? Who frequents which?
27. What happened in the Lyons case?
28. What was the situation concerning Amadou Diallo?
29. Why was Alexander V Sandoval such a big case?
Part 4
30. Which social group do Americans have permission to hate?
31. What do you think of the quote by Frederick Douglass: " Men are so constituted that they derive their conviction of their own possibilities largely from the estimate formed of them by others. If nothing is expected of people, that people will find it difficult to contradict that expectation."
32. What types of discrimination do ex-felons experience?
33. What can happen to those released from prison if they can't find a job?
34. Why are construction and manufacturing jobs hard to get?
35. What are the fees ex-offenders face when released from prison?
36. What were the results of presidentClinton's welfare reform legislation?
37.. How does the shame of being an ex-offender affect communities?
38. Poor people of color, like other Americans, like everyone in the world-want safe streets, peaceful communities, healthy families, good jobs, and meaningful opportunities to contribute to society.
39. How are the minstrel shows of slavery and Jim Crow era related to negative type rap and ‘acting out' of young blacks-gangsta love? Why do Blacks go?
Part 5
40. what is the bird cage analogy?
41 what are the three stages of how poor blacks are forced into cages?
42. what were the results of Dred Scott v Sandford and Plessy V Ferguson?
43. Why does it sound strange to say "We really need to do something about the problem of white crime" and it seems ‘normal' to say black crime?
44. How can there be white victims of racial caste?
45. when researchers have controlled for joblessness, what happens to violent crime rates between young black and white men?
46. what is the evolution alexander refers to on page 207?
Part 6
47. what was the situation with rosa parks? Was she the first?
48. Do poverty and unemployment figures include people behind bars? Why would this make a difference?
49. corrections corporation of America- what is it?
50. what other entities are prison profiteers?
51. what does alexander says needs to happen to end the system of control?
52. why is alexander against "colorblindness"? what did martin luther king have to say about blindness?
53. what is black exceptionalism?
54. what does alexander mean by whites giving up their "racial privilege"?