The majority of Americans assume that slavery ended in 1865 with the passage of the 13th amendment. Unfortunately, slavery just changed its name. One small loophole in the amendment’s wording has allowed forced labor to continue in this country. The documentary 13th, various books, and stories of former incarcerates have all demonstrated that prison labor, biased crime laws, and mass incarceration have kept the institution of slavery alive and well. There are no better examples of this than by looking at plantation prisons in the south. Following the Civil War, these penitentiaries were built on former slave plantations and allowed slavery to continue under new laws. Parchman, or Mississippi State Penitentiary, is just one example of these plantation prisons. Even the facility itself was constructed by prison labor. It produces cotton, soybeans, livestock, and various other crops. Throughout its history, it has been the site of countless controversies, lawsuits, and court cases. Parchman’s historical connection to de facto slavery and its continued failure to meet its inmates’ basic human needs has been proven time and time again from legal cases and the media. Despite participating in structures of mass incarceration and discrimination, one would have no idea by looking at the ways in which the prison presents itself. The negligence to fix its structural deficiencies is a prime example of how institutions can market themselves and lessen the atrocities of the past. Public history projects could change this dynamic. By looking at Parchman’s past in comparison to what the Mississippi Department of Corrections presents, this divide is strikingly clear.
Parchman presents a very neutral story of itself that is generic enough to work for any prison in the nation. While it was designed to profit off of prison labor, even this was justified for the general public. Getting inmates to work on old slave fields was supposed to prevent “prison idleness”. In the 1900s, the Mississippi public thought highly of the penitentiary due to the perception of labor as convict punishment. The millions of dollars of revenue it generated for the state also helped with public image. Currently, the focus on prison labor is highlighted much less as the website for Mississippi State Penitentiary is quite straightforward. In the brief overview of the prison the number of prisoners and visiting hours are mentioned. Right after that is information on the various vocational courses inmates can enroll in, their abuse treatment program, and medical facility. All are highlighted as wonderful aspects of the institution that help benefit and rehabilitate prisoners. The centerpiece of the prison’s description of itself; however, is their core values. These pillars are: Integrity, Accountability, Fairness, Competence, and Consistency. It is detailed that under these employees serve as positive role models, are ethical, responsible for their actions, do not practice discrimination, are knowledgeable, and promote moral conduct. It is clear that Parchman is trying to present itself in a positive light after years of scandal.
It doesn’t take that much searching to find countless evidence of the penitentiary’s more complicated history. If the title of “plantation prison” was not enough evidence, Parchman and similar institutions have been designed to imprison black Americans and continue the long cycle of slavery. After emancipation, Black Codes and various Jim Crow laws made it much simpler to arrest people. Loitering, vagrancy, and other actions were criminalized for the first time with the intentions of making it easier to label African Americans as criminals. These tactics were successful as 85 percent of the prison population was black during Parchman’s start. Apart from arresting former slaves and enslaving them again in prisons, regard for their well-being plummeted. Before it was in a slaveowner’s best interest to prevent their labor force from dying as slaves were far from cheap. However, in a prison you never needed to buy your labor source, so the lives of prisoners were disregarded. As the prison was constructed 1 out of 6 black inmates died. The system did not care for them. Laboring for 15 hours a day under the supervision of armed guards in the intense southern climate led inmates to drop dead from “exhaustion, pneumonia, malaria, frostbite, consumption, sunstroke, dysentery, gunshot wounds, and ‘shackle poisoning’ (the constant rubbing of chains and leg irons against bare flesh)”. Flash forward, and Parchman’s targeting of minorities remains. In the 1970s, two thirds of the prison population was black while African Americans only made up 35% of the Mississippi population. In every way Parchman emulated pre-emancipation slavery and in some conditions was an even worse sentence.
While prison labor often transcends race, racial segregation and discrimination continues to make the system one that targets minorities. Parchman is no exception. Segregation and harmful working conditions have been facets of the prison’s operation. Prisoners were split up based on their race for work and cell assignments. When Martha Alice Stewart visited the farm in the 1930s, she extensively documented the daily life of prisoners and employees through photographs. These pictures are evidence of segregation as in every single photo you never find black and white prisoners together. Inmates were never found laboring on the same jobs or even socializing together. Even government files and prison records were segregated. When looking at the 1940s census, Parchman’s section clearly showed the prison’s racial bias. While a census would normally be organized alphabetically, Parchman was divided by race. All of the white inmates were listed first and then the black inmates followed. The penitentiary was categorizing them as different inmates so much so that they needed to be separated in government surveys. Segregation was happening outside and inside the prison’s walls. The inmates themselves were quite aware of this unequal treatment as well. When renowned folklorist and ethnomusicologist, Alan Lomax, went into Parchman to record an album with testimonies from inmates he was flooded with the sights and sounds of prison labor. Echoes of struggle and voices singing in unison are what make up most of the tracks that I was able to find. This historical background has been the foundation of the various controversies that institution has faced over the years.
More recent controversies surrounding Parchman have included recent pictures as well as well as a high number of prison deaths. Photos from the Mississippi Health Department show rotting food, mildew, rats, missing ceiling tiles, and a lack of air conditioning. These are just some of the poor standards found this year. If there were not prisoners in some of the photos, one could easily assume that the property had been abandoned. However, larger issues have been surrounding the thirty inmates who have died from violence or poor care since 2019. The unit where most of the deaths occurred, Unit 29, was supposed to be shut down but that has yet to happen. This unit also happens to be the farming unit where most African American inmates have been sent to work. The most dangerous unit also is the most segregated.
Segregation, poor conditions, and the general failures of Parchman can all be wrapped up in the court case Gates v Collier from 1972. The case regarded the unjust treatment of inmates at Mississippi State Penitentiary and that they had been denied their rights granted by the First, Eight, Thirteenth, and Fourteenth amendments. Discrimination and the racial divide within Parchman was at the center of the claim. During the investigation, facilities were still found to be segregated and work details were still assigned by race. Files, housing, and general records were separate as well. Outside of racial issues, the investigation found that the amenities to be in terrible condition. Electrical wiring was frayed, mail was censored, heating systems broken, and most spaces were rarely cleaned. Rats and disease were widespread. Sewer systems and other forms of sanitation were found dysfunctional or damaged. Even the medical facility was not adequate enough to deal with spreading sickness as inmates with contagious illnesses mingled with healthy inmates. According to the case file, “administration practices tend to discourage inmates from seeking needed medical assistance. For example, some of the sergeants regularly punish inmates by sending them to MSU after an examination by a physician does not reveal any obvious injury”. The threats, poor protections, segregation, and crumbling facilities were extremely clear to the court and it was decided that the prison was in violation of the U.S Constitution. It was ordered for there to be an immediate end to these practices, specifically the “beating and shooting of prisoners; the deprivation of mattresses, hygienic materials and adequate food; the practice of handcuffing or otherwise binding inmates to fences, bars, or other fixtures; and the use of cattle prods to keep prisoners standing or moving, as well as several other inhumane practices”. Even despite this enormous investigation and clear case proceeding, the prison has not fixed itself all that much or mentioned every issue.
“beating and shooting of prisoners; the deprivation of mattresses, hygienic materials and adequate food; the practice of handcuffing or otherwise binding inmates to fences, bars, or other fixtures; and the use of cattle prods to keep prisoners standing or moving, as well as several other inhumane practices”.
Gates v Collier (1972)
Despite their complex and dark history, Parchman does not handle many current or systemic problems to this day. There is little addressing the current problems with prisoner deaths, facility conditions, or any other issues. The ones that are present, are harder to find. Deeper on the website is a page that outlines the history of the prison. They do explain that they have tried to make changes after the Gates v Collier case, but all the problems from the lawsuit were not handled until years later in 1998. The prison itself has tried to be as silent as it can on these issues.
It is clear that there are differences between how the prison presents itself and how history does. Obviously, the prison cannot hide all of its past issues, cases like Gates v Collier are simply too large to hide. Still, these past problems are only briefly mentioned. Parchman makes no effort to apologize or acknowledge their connection to mass incarceration and racial segregation. The idea that all past problems are gone is evident within the prison’s history, but if you move to outside sources one can find that this is not true. It makes sense why a place like Parchman would want to lighten their own history and current conditions. It is in their best interest to market themselves just like any other business. This does not make it excusable though.
Public history efforts can help solve issues with places like Parchman. Since many people do not spend their time looking into prison conditions or the history of incarceration, these inconsistencies can slip under the radar. Mississippi State Penitentiary is not the only place that is much worse off than people think. Public history projects make history more accessible to the public and can help spread the true history of incarceration in the United States. By informing the public with installations, pop-up museums, film, and media, citizens can start to learn the truth and demand changes. No longer will court investigations be the only way to hold institutions accountable. Everyone deserves to know the complicated histories.
Mississippi State Penitentiary has contributed to mass incarceration and its continued mistreatment of inmates is disregarded by staff at Parchman and the institution itself. This dynamic between what is presented and what really happened is likely present with other penitentiaries as well and institutions worldwide. It is in the best interest of businesses, countries, governments, and others to rewrite their past. Informing the general public about complicated histories is often challenging, but public history changes how people view the past and the present. History is all interpretation and depending on the sources, authors, context, and motivations the past can change drastically. Presenting more detailed views of history is not only beneficial for learning, but also for how we live in the here and now. What happened before is still affecting the present.
Zoë Grandy, Junior, History and Education.
For Further Reading
1947. Parchman Farm: Photographs and Field Recordings. Dust-to-Digital, 1959, disc. Alan Lomax. https://cargorecordsdirect.co.uk/products/parchman-farm-photographs-and-field-recordings-1947-1959
“A Brief History of the Mississippi Department of Corrections.” Mississippi Department of Corrections. Accessed November 29, 2020. https://www.mdoc.ms.gov/About/Pages/Brief-History.aspx.
Elliott, Debbie. “Mississippi Prison System Faces Investigation, Lawsuits After Rash Of Inmate Deaths.” NPR. NPR, April 18, 2020. https://www.npr.org/2020/04/18/837855215/mississippi-prison-system-faces-investigation-lawsuits-after-rash-of-inmate-deat.
Gates v Collier (US District Court for the Northern District of Mississippi September 13, 1972). https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/349/881/1501708/
Innocence Staff. “The Lasting Legacy of Parchman Farm, the Prison Modeled After a Slave Plantation.” Innocence Project, June 3, 2020. https://innocenceproject.org/parchman-farm-prison-mississippi-history/.
Mancini, Matthew. The American Journal of Legal History 42, no. 4 (1998): 444-46. Accessed November 29, 2020. doi:10.2307/846060. https://www.jstor.org/stable/846060?seq=1
“Mississippi State Penitentiary.” Mississippi State Penitentiary Visiting hours, inmate phones, mail. Accessed November 29, 2020. https://www.prisonpro.com/content/mississippi-state-penitentiary.
Staff, The Clarion-Ledger. “An inside Look at Parchman in Mississippi, One of Nation’s Most Notorious Prisons.” Parchman prison in Mississippi: Photos from the inside. The Clarion-Ledger, July 17, 2020. https://www.clarionledger.com/picture-gallery/news/local/2020/01/08/parchman-prison-mississippi-photos-inside/2838156001/.
State Prisons. Mississippi Department of Corrections. Accessed November 29, 2020. https://www.mdoc.ms.gov/Institutions/Pages/State-Prisons.aspx.
Stewart, Martha. 1930. “Time on Parchman Farms.” Digitized. University of Mississippi. https://egrove.olemiss.edu/parchman/
U.S. Census Bureau 1940. National Archives. Retrieved from https://1940census.archives.gov/.
U.S. Census Bureau 2010. Retrieved from https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/MS.
