conditions remained unjust. Despite attempts at reform, investigations through the 1940s continued to report the same problems of unsanitary conditions,
References
inhumane treatment, faulty record keeping, and political interference.
Berry, Dana Raimey. 2014. In Texas, history of slavery is unique - but not
Although the initial purpose of the prison agricultural programs was to offset the costs of housing inmates in state prisons, following the Civil War, state officials criminalized petty crimes for the purpose of maintaining slave labor for state and corporate profit. The history of prison agriculture cannot be separated from its entanglement with the history of systemic racism in the United States - a history that continues still today.
'brief.' MySa. Davis, Angela. 1983. Women, Race, and Class. Vintage Books. DuBois, W.E.B DuBois. 1935. Black Reconstruction in America: Toward a History of the Part Which Black Folk Played in the Attempt to Reconstruct Democracy in America, 1860-1880. Transaction Publishers. Ava Duvernay & Jason Moran. 2016. 13TH. Netflix Studios. Jach, Theresa R. 2005. Reform versus
The historical use of slave and prisoner labor is also tied to a history of exploiting land for profit. Within this enterprise, the land, along with people and animals, are exploited through a power dynamic in which legal violence is sanctioned as a means to control and coerce criminalized violence. Recent moves toward restorative justice models led by activists and scholars such as Angela Davis seek alternatives to the violent punitive model. An essential part of restorative justice includes bearing witness to the historical state and corporate exploitation of the many for a profit margin and ideology that benefits the few.
Reality in the Progressive Era Texas Prison. The Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era Perkinson, Robert. 2010. Texas Tough: The Rise of America’s Prison Empire. Metropolitan Books. New York. Prints and Photographs Collection, 1976/31-168. Texas Department of Corrections Photographs. Archives and Information Services Division, Texas State Library and Archives Commission. Order of the House of Representatives. 1910. Report of the Penitentiary Investigating Committee including All Exhibits and Testimony Taken by the Committee. Legislative Reference Library of Texas.
In the next issue of Cultivate San Antonio, the 2nd installation of this series will examine mass incarceration, for-profit prisons, and agricultural programs from the 50s to the present day.
42 | Spring 2021 | Cultivate SA
Fear, Force, and Leather - The Texas Prison System's First Hundred Years, 1848-1948. 2019. Texas State Library and Archives Commission.