Headline Roundup • October 24th, 2022
Voters to Decide on Removing Slavery Exception from 5 State Constitutions
Summary from the AllSides News Team
Voters in Alabama, Louisiana, Oregon, Tennessee, and Vermont are voting this year on removing language from state constitutions that allows slavery and involuntary servitude as punishments for criminals.
Key Quotes: "At the time when our Founding Fathers prescribed that all men were created equal, over half a million Black Americans remained enslaved," said the lead organizer of the Abolish Slavery National Network at a recent press conference. Alabama's Republican House Speaker said that "for several years, we’ve been working on cleaning up the Constitution and the wording in it, and this will move us forward with helping to accomplish that."
For Context: The 13th Amendment, which outlawed slavery after the Civil War, states that "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction." Voters in the five aforementioned states will decide whether to remove that exception from their state's constitution. The U.S. currently has the highest incarceration rate of any country in the world, and outlawing forced labor in prisons is a key objective of the movement to remove the exception. Nearly 20 state constitutions still allow forced labor as punishment for certain crimes.
How the Media Covered It: Left- and center-rated sources highlighted the news more prominently than right-rated sources. Many headlines from outlets across the political spectrum said that "slavery is on the ballot."
Featured Coverage of this Story
Washington Examiner
Nearly 157 years after the 13th Amendment was ratified to prohibit slavery and involuntary servitude, five states will ask voters to decide on measures banning slavery — in the form of prison labor.
Advocates who petitioned to add such questions to the ballots in Alabama , Oregon , Louisiana , Tennessee , and Vermont hope to remove provisions in state constitutions that provide for slavery or involuntary work in the criminal justice system. The practical upshot would be to make prison labor voluntary.
Although the 13th Amendment was ratified in 1865, the exception clause in the Constitution allowed authorities in the 19th...
Michael Brennan via Getty Images
This midterm elections, voters in five states will decide whether to remove from state constitutions language allowing slavery and involuntary servitude as criminal punishments.
The big picture: Over 150 years after the U.S. abolished slavery, nearly 20 state constitutions still allow forced labor as punishment for certain crimes.
Context: Across the U.S., incarcerated people often endure back-breaking labor only to be paid pennies per hour — or none at all.
They aren't afforded the same kinds of protections, such as minimum wage and benefits, and in many cases lose visitation privileges or face solitary confinement if...
Andi Rice/Bloomberg/Getty Images
When slavery was outlawed in the US in 1865, the 13th Amendment included one exception.
“Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction,” the amendment reads.
The penalty has remained on the books in more than a dozen states, even though it hasn’t been enforced since the Civil War. But next month, voters in Alabama, Louisiana, Vermont, Oregon and Tennessee will be given the opportunity to exorcise the...
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