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1984 U. Ill. L. Rev. 389 (1984)
Prison Overcrowding and the Courts: A Roadmap for the 1980s

handle is hein.journals/unilllr1984 and id is 399 raw text is: PRISON OVERCROWDING AND THE COURTS: A ROADMAP FOR THE 1980s Rod Smolla* It is against the very nature of Man to be confined from normal activities, grouped together with other men, and denied the associ- ation of women. Such a system will always breed hatred, animos- ity, resentment, frustration, inferiority complexes, homosexuality, and general inhumanity to man. Where these energies will be di- rected is another issue, but they will be present; the prison will always be a powder keg. Louis X. (Holloway), Inmate, Parchman Prison Camp, Mississippi' The pendulum swings in corrections just as it does in every other social and behavioral discipline, moving from one point on the continuum to the other and eventually coming back to the center. Norman Carlson, Director, Bureau of Prisons, United States Department of Justice2 I. INTRODUCTION American society has always approached prison reform grudg- ingly. Prisoners are rarely visible,3 have no political power, and are socially threatening to the nation's mainstream middle class.4 Over the last two decades, courts have often preceded the public in advocating prison reform. In the cultural ferment of the 1960s the federal judiciary displayed a new activism in the protection of constitutional rights, and as part of that agenda federal courts became increasingly sympathetic Associate Professor of Law, University ofArkansas, Fayetteville School of Law. B.A. Yale, 1975; .ID. Duke, 1978. 1. Louis X. (Holloway), Prison Abolition or Destruction is a MAust, 45 Miss. L.J. 757, 758 (1974). 2. Carlson, Striking a Balance in Corrections, in 2 PRISONERS RIGHTS SOURCEBOOK 485 (I. Robbins ed. 1980). 3. In a ground-breaking prison case, Chief Judge Henley of the federal district court in Arkansas observed that the people of Arkansas knew little or nothing about their penal system. Holt v. Sarver, 309 F. Supp. 362, 367 (E.D. Ark. 1970), aff'd, 442 F.2d 304 (8th Cir. 1971). 4. Prisoners have no political leverage. They do not vote, and they are socially threatening. The imprisoning power is overwhelming; the prisoner is reduced to isolation, helplessness, and subservience. N. MORIS, THE FutruRtl OF IMPRISONMENT 19 (1974).

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