Archive Repost: An interesting fact to point out about political disenfranchisement that affects Blacks in america today as it did during times of slavery & the Jim Crow era, particularly with a state such as Pennsylvania (where I reside) which is the 32nd geographical sized state of the 50 but 3rd in amount of state penitentiaries behind California & Texas...oik Because most new prison construction occurs in predominantly white, rural areas, white communities benefit from inflated population totals at the expense of the urban, overwhelmingly minority communities from which the prisoners come. YES, the Census Bureau counts imprisoned individuals as residents of the jurisdiction in which they are incarcerated This has enormous consequences for the redistricting process. White rural communities that house prisons wind up with more people in state legislatures representing them, while poor communities of color lose representatives because it appears their population has declined. This policy is disturbingly reminiscent of the three-fifths clause in the original constitution, which enhanced the political clout of slaveholding states by including 60% of slaves in the population base for calculating congressional seats and electoral votes, EVEN THOUGH THEY COULD NOT VOTE
Posted on: Thu, 21 Nov 2013 10:37:39 +0000
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