Prison farm
Encyclopedia
A prison farm is a large correctional facility where penal labor convicts are put to economical use in a 'farm' (in the wide sense of a productive unit), usually for manual labour, largely in open air, such as in agriculture, logging, quarrying, etc. Its historical equivalent on a very large scale was called a penal colony
Penal colony
A penal colony is a settlement used to exile prisoners and separate them from the general populace by placing them in a remote location, often an island or distant colonial territory...

.

The agricultural goods produced by prison farms are generally used primarily to feed the prisoners themselves and other wards of the state (residents of orphanages, asylums, etc.), and secondarily, to be sold for whatever profit the state may be able to obtain.

In addition to being forced to labor directly for the government on a prison farm or in a penal colony, inmates may be forced to do farm work for private enterprises by being farmed out through the practice of convict leasing
Convict lease
Convict leasing was a system of penal labor practiced in the Southern United States, beginning with the emancipation of slaves at the end of the American Civil War in 1865, peaking around 1880, and ending in the last state, Alabama, in 1928....

 to work on private agricultural lands or related industries (fishing, lumbering, etc.). The party purchasing their labor from the government generally does so at a steep discount from the cost of free labor.

Depending on the prevailing doctrine on judicial punishment and penal harm
Penal harm
Penal harm, an intentionally harsher form of the "deprivation of liberty", is the belief that during custodial sentences , inmates should endure additional pain and suffering, not just having their basic rights taken away, to make the punishment deliberately harder.While this improves the desirable...

, psychological and/or physical cruelty may be a conscious intent of prison farm labor, and not just an inevitable but unintended collateral effect.

Convicts may also be leased or enslaved for non-agricultural work, either directly to state entities, or to private industry. For example, prisoners may make license plates under contract to the state Department of Motor Vehicles
Department of Motor Vehicles
In the United States of America, a Department of Motor Vehicles is a state-level government agency that administers vehicle registration and driver licensing. Similar departments exist in Canada...

, or may perform data processing for outside firms. However, these practices tend to be referred to as prison industries rather than prison farming.

Legal framework

The 13th Amendment
Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution officially abolished and continues to prohibit slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime. It was passed by the Senate on April 8, 1864, passed by the House on January 31, 1865, and adopted on December 6, 1865. On...

 to the United States Constitution
United States Constitution
The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the United States of America. It is the framework for the organization of the United States government and for the relationship of the federal government with the states, citizens, and all people within the United States.The first three...

, which ended slavery, specifically perpetuated the concept of "penal servitude" — i.e., unfree labor as a punishment for a crime.

Britain
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland was the formal name of the United Kingdom during the period when what is now the Republic of Ireland formed a part of it....

 had a long history of penal servitude even prior to the passage of the Penal Servitude Act
Penal Servitude Act
Penal Servitude Act is a stock short title which was used in the United Kingdom for legislation relating to penal servitude. The abolition of penal servitude has rendered this short title obsolete in that country.-List:...

 of 1853, and routinely used convict labor to settle its conquests, either through penal colonies or by selling convicts to settlers to serve as a slave for a term of years as indentured servants.

Scope

This type of penal institution has mainly been implanted in rural regions of vast countries, often with a tradition of physical punishment
Physical punishment
Physical punishment is any form of penalty in a judicial, educational or domestic setting that takes a physical form, by the infliction on the offender of pain, injury, discomfort or humiliation...

, such as the Deep South
Deep South
The Deep South is a descriptive category of the cultural and geographic subregions in the American South. Historically, it is differentiated from the "Upper South" as being the states which were most dependent on plantation type agriculture during the pre-Civil War period...

 of the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 and Canada.

For instance, the 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica reported on the North Carolina penal system(which at the time still openly separated inmates by race):
"The state prison is at Raleigh, although most of the convicts are distributed upon farms owned and operated by the state. The lease system does not prevail, but the farming out of convict labor is permitted by the constitution; such labor is used chiefly for the building of railways, the convicts so employed being at all times cared for and guarded by state officials. A reformatory for white youth between the ages of seven and sixteen, under the name of the Stonewall Jackson Manual Training and Industrial School, was opened at Concord in 1909, and in March 1909 the Foulk Reformatory and Manual Training School for negro youth was provided for. Charitable and penal institutions are under the supervision of a Board of Public Charities, appointed by the governor for a period of six years, the terms of the different members expiring in different years. Private institutions for the care of the insane, idiots, feeble-minded and inebriates may be established, but must be licensed and regulated by the state board and become legally a part of the system of public charities."


Though the prison farms of the American South were notorious for their cruelty and corruption, northern states also have a tradition of prison farming. In 21st-century Illinois, several prisons continue to run farms to produce food for wards of the state, including the prisoners themselves. The 1911 Britannica also reported that the state of Rhode Island had a farm of 667 acres (2.7 km²) in the southern part of Cranston City housing (and presumably taking labor from):
"the state prison, the Providence county jail, the state workhouse and the house of correction, the state almshouse, the state hospital for the insane, the Sockanosset school for boys, and the Oaklawn school for girls, the last two being departments of the state reform school."

In fiction

Movies featuring prison farms and forced prison labor:
  • Prison Farm (1938)
  • Gone with the Wind
    Gone with the Wind (film)
    Gone with the Wind is a 1939 American historical epic film adapted from Margaret Mitchell's Pulitzer-winning 1936 novel of the same name. It was produced by David O. Selznick and directed by Victor Fleming from a screenplay by Sidney Howard...

    (1939) scenes of Scarlett O'Hara's leased convicts at work in her lumber mills
  • City Without Men (1943)
  • Cool Hand Luke
    Cool Hand Luke
    Cool Hand Luke is a 1967 American prison drama film directed by Stuart Rosenberg and starring Paul Newman. The screenplay was adapted by Donn Pearce and Frank Pierson from Pearce's 1965 novel of the same name. The film features George Kennedy, Strother Martin, J.D...

    (1967)
  • They Went That-A-Way & That-A-Way
    They Went That-A-Way & That-A-Way
    They Went That-A-Way & That-A-Way is a 1978 slapstick comedy film written by and starring Tim Conway.-Plot summary:Dewey and Wallace are small-town lawmen who are ordered by the governor to go undercover as prison inmates to find out where a gang of thieves have hidden their loot...

    (1978)
  • Brubaker
    Brubaker
    Brubaker is an American 1980 film about a prison in distress and the Warden Henry Brubaker who attempts to reform the system....

    (1980)
  • Life
    Life (film)
    Life is a 1999 American comedy-drama film directed by Ted Demme, and starring Eddie Murphy and Martin Lawrence. The supporting cast includes Obba Babatundé, Bernie Mac, Anthony Anderson, Miguel A. Núñez Jr. and Bokeem Woodbine...

    (1999)
  • O Brother, Where Art Thou?
    O Brother, Where Art Thou?
    O Brother, Where Art Thou? is a 2000 comedy film directed by Joel and Ethan Coen and starring George Clooney, John Turturro, Tim Blake Nelson, John Goodman, Holly Hunter, and Charles Durning. Set in 1937 rural Mississippi during the Great Depression, the film's story is a modern satire loosely...

    (2000)
  • Civil Brand
    Civil Brand
    Civil Brand is a 2002 film written by Joyce Lewis and Preston A. Whitmore II and directed by Neema Barnette. It features N'Bushe Wright, Da Brat, Mos Def, LisaRaye McCoy, and Monica Calhoun. The film is about a group of female inmates fighting back against their abusers and taking over Whitehead...

    (2002)

See also

  • Trusty system
    Trusty system
    The "trusty system" was a strict system of discipline and security in the US made compulsory under Mississippi state law as the method of controlling and working inmates at Mississippi State Penitentiary at Parchman, Mississippi's...

  • Tom Murton
    Tom Murton
    Thomas O. Murton , generally known as Tom Murton, was a penologist best known for his wardenship of the prison farms of Arkansas...

  • Care farming
    Care farming
    Care farming is the therapeutic use of farming practices. Care farms utilise the whole or part of a farm, provide health, social or educational care services for one or a range of vulnerable groups of people and provide a supervised, structured programme of farming-related activities.The purpose of...



External links

  • Thomas, Nicki (Producer: Scott Croteau) "Prison farms facing execution." Capital News Online. Carleton University
    Carleton University
    Carleton University is a comprehensive university located in the capital of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario. The enabling legislation is The Carleton University Act, 1952, S.O. 1952. Founded as a small college in 1942, Carleton now offers over 65 programs in a diverse range of disciplines. Carleton has...

    School of Journalism and Communication. March 5, 2010.
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