Chain gang

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1894 illustration of chain gang performing manual labor.
1894 illustration of chain gang performing manual labor.
For other uses, see Chain gang (disambiguation).

A chain gang is a group of prisoners chained together to perform menial or physically challenging labor, such as chipping stone, often along a highway or rail bed. This system existed primarily in the United States, and by 1955, had been phased out of use nationwide except in Arizona.

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[edit] Synonyms and disambiguation

Female convicts in Dar es Salaam chained together by their necks, c.1890-1927
Female convicts in Dar es Salaam chained together by their necks, c.1890-1927

A single ankle shackle with a short length of chain attached to a heavy ball is known as a ball and chain and was meant to limit prisoner movement and impede escape.

Two ankle shackles attached to each other by a short length of chain are known as a hobble or as leg irons. These could be chained to a much longer chain with several other prisoners, creating a work crew known as a chain gang. The walk required to avoid tripping while in leg irons is known as the convict shuffle.

A group of prisoners working outside prison walls under close supervision, but without chains, is a work gang. Their distinctive attire (stripe wear or orange vests or jumpsuits) serves the purpose of displaying their punishment to the public, as well as making them easily identifiable if they attempt to escape. Whatever deterrent effect that may have on potential criminals, the lack of actual chains makes a modern work gang much safer than a traditional chain gang.

The use of chains could be extremely hazardous. Some of the chains used in the Georgia system in the first half of the twentieth century weighed twenty pounds. Some prisoners suffered from shackle sores — ulcers where the iron ground against their skin. Gangrene and other infections were serious risks. Falls could imperil several individuals at once.

Modern prisoners are sometimes put into handcuffs or wrist manacles (similar to handcuffs, but with a longer length of chain) and leg irons, with both sets of manacles (wrist and ankle) being chained to a belly chain. This form of restraint is most often used on prisoners expected to be violent, or prisoners appearing in a setting where they may be near the public (a courthouse) or have an opportunity to flee (being transferred from a prison to a court). Although prisoners in these restraints are sometimes chained to one another during transport or other movement, this is not a chain gang — although reporters may refer to it as such — because the restraints make any kind of work impossible. Prisoners restrained this way may have their hands chained so close to the waist that they cannot use a pen, or touch their own faces; they cannot work.

[edit] History of chain gangs

1842 illustration of chain gang going to work near Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
1842 illustration of chain gang going to work near Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

Various claims as to the purpose of chain gangs have been offered, some unsubstantiated. These include:

The use of chain gangs in the United States generally ended in 1955.[citation needed] Chain gangs experienced a resurgence when Alabama began to use them again in 1995.[1]

[edit] Reintroduction and criticisms

Some jurisdictions, such as Alabama and Arizona, have re-introduced the chain gang. In recent years, Maricopa County, Arizona, which is the county that covers Phoenix, Arizona, and its controversial sheriff Joe Arpaio, has drawn attention from human rights groups for its use of chain gangs for both men and women. Arizona's modern chain gangs, rather than chipping rocks or other non-productive tasks, often do real work of economic benefit to a correctional department. Opponents note that the gangs often work outside in oppressive desert heat; others note that participation in Maricopa County's chain gangs is voluntary, not mandatory, and that everyone else who does outdoor work there must do so in heat as well.[citation needed]

A year after reintroducing the chain gang in 1995, Alabama was forced to again abandon the practice pending a lawsuit from, among other organizations, the Southern Poverty Law Center. "They realized that chaining them together was inefficient; that it was unsafe", said attorney Richard Cohen of the organization. However, as late as 2000, Alabama Prison Commissioner, Ron Jones has again proposed reintroducing the chain gang. Like historical chain gangs, their reintroduced cousins have been compared to slavery in academic circles.[2]

[edit] Culture

[edit] Motion Pictures & Television

[edit] Books

Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred Taylor

"Les Misérables" by Victor Hugo

[edit] Music

[edit] Dance

  • "Rainbow 'Round My Shoulder" is a modern dance piece choereographed by Donald McKayle about chain gangs.

[edit] See also

[edit] Further reading

  • Burns, Robert E. I Am a Fugitive from a Georgia Chain Gang! University of Georgia Press; Brown Thrasher Ed edition (October 1997; original copyright, late 1920s). ISBN 0820319430. Autobiography on which movie of the same name was based; best-seller responsible for exposing abuses of Southern chain gang system to national readership, leading to their termination.
  • Colvin, Mark. Penitentiaries, Reformatories, and Chain Gangs: Social Theory and the History of Punishment in Nineteenth-Century America. Palgrave Macmillan (2000). ISBN: 0312221282.
  • Foucault, Michel. Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. Vintage Books (1979). ISBN: 0394727673.
  • Lichtenstein, Alex. Twice the Work of Free Labor: The Political Economy of Convict Labor in the New South. Verso (1995). ISBN: 1859840868.
  • Mancini, Matthew J. One Dies, Get Another: Convict Leasing in the American South, 1866-1928. University of South Carolina Press (1996). ISBN: 1570030839.
  • Oshinsky, David M. Worse than Slavery: Parchman Farm and the Ordeal of Jim Crow Justice. (1997). ISBN: 0684830957.
  • Curtin, Mary Ellen. Black Prisoners and Their World : Alabama, 1865-1900. University of Virginia Press (2000). ISBN: 0813919843

[edit] External links

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b Gorman, Tessa M. (March 1997). "Back on the Chain Gang: Why the Eighth Amendment and the History of Slavery Proscribe the Resurgence of Chain Gangs". California Law Review 85 (2): 441-478. doi:10.2307/3481074. 
  2. ^ Meares, Tracey (February 1996), “Weak Link”, The University of Chicago Magazine 88 (3), <http://magazine.uchicago.edu/9602/9602Voices.html>. Retrieved on 26 September 2007