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NY Says No to Shackled Prison Births: 44 States To Go
Are America’s law-and-order pols finally getting some humanity? Well, at least this week, at least in New York state, where Gov. David Paterson has signed a bill banning the shackling of incarcerated pregnant women during labor and recovery. Ever give birth? I haven’t, of course, but my wife can tell you it pretty much sucks. Now try it while cuffed to a hospital bed. At the time, our 2008 prison package, entitled Slammed: The Coming Prison Meltdown, noted that 48 states allowed shackling, which the College of Obstetricians and Gynecologist noted puts “the health and lives of women and unborn children at risk.”
This week, the American Civil Liberties Union told the Associated Press that, with New York, six states—including Texas, Illinois, California, Vermont, and New Mexico—will have prohibited the practice; two others, Massachusetts and Tennessee are considering bans. (The New York law still allows women to be shackled if their behavior is deemed a threat to hospital or prison guards, which is reasonable enough, although in the AP article, an ACLU laywer cited continuing complaints of shackling even in states where it is limited.)
In any case, it's a small, humane step for a very, very troubled American institution.
Follow Michael Mechanic on Twitter.
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California's Prison Disaster
Judges have told California to radically reduce its inmate population. What's next?
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Fiore Cartoon: U.S., #1 in Prisoners!
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Jailing Toddlers in Texas
Close readers of MotherJones.com know that a year ago the government began incarcerating small children for months at a time...
Wait, did I read that
Wait, did I read that correctly?
Texas more progressive than most of the rest of the country (including Massachusetts)?
Ha! While driving around LA
Ha! While driving around LA in my chauffeur driven limosine, showing off my Rolex, I often wonder about those fake pregnant prisoners escaping from the Harbor Medical Center and County USC Medical Center. We need those handcuffs on them to protect the rest of us!!
Few things in this country
Few things in this country are more shameful on a grand scale than the cost, brutality, and rehabilitative ineffectiveness of our adult and juvenile prison systems. I am all for punishing and sequestering those who've willfully harmed society, but it must be done in a way that reduces that behavior instead of encouraging it. Treating people worse than animals and then releasing them back into society only multiplies our problems and victims.
America's destiny
When historians look back on "modern" civilizations, they'll undoubtably base their assessments on the relative successes and failures on literacy rates , infant mortality, affordable access to education, health care, and rates of incarceration. I fear our nation will be veiwed as a miserable failure. But as our previous president observed. why should we care? "In history, we'll all be dead".
How can I get the
How can I get the corrections system, in Idaho to grow a conscience,towards these women, and these innocent babies,who didn't exactly have a choice, when it came to their parents?