Monday Map: Prison Proliferation

by Matt Kelley · 2008-12-08 05:37:00 UTC
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This week the map looks at the exponential growth of prisons across the U.S. during the 20th century. These four maps show 100 years, but the last two decades of the 20th century really tell the story. From 1980 to 2000, as sentences became tougher year after year and the War on Drugs locked up non-violent offenders by the thousands, the number of people in prison in the U.S. quadrupled. And the numbers on this map don't include jails. When you count prison and jail, 1 in 100 Americans is behind bars. Between 1990 and 1999, according to the Real Cost of Prisons Project, a new prison was opening in the U.S. every two weeks.

This trend can change if we begin to explore alternatives to incarceration for non-violent drug offenders, for the mentally ill and for juveniles. Tell President-elect Obama today that you believe in alternatives to incarceration.

Thanks to the Prison Policy Initiative for this map.

Matt Kelley is the Online Communications Manager at the Innocence Project and a graduate of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. Follow him on Twitter @mattjkelley.
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