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Michelle Alexander Quotes

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Michelle Alexander is a distinguished professor of law at the University of California, Berkeley. Born on October 7, 1967, she is recognized for her expertise in criminal justice and civil rights. Alexander has authored numerous articles and books on the subject of mass incarceration in the United States and its effects on African American communities.

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Famous Michelle Alexander Quotes

“All people make mistakes. All of us are sinners. All of us are criminals. All of us violate the law at some point in our lives. In fact, if the worst thing you have ever done is speed ten miles over the speed limit on the freeway, you have put yourself and others at more risk of harm than someone smoking marijuana in the privacy of his or her living room. Yet there are people in the United States serving life sentences for first-time drug offenses, something virtually unheard of anywhere else in the world.”

Source: The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness

“The War on Drugs, cloaked in race-neutral language, offered whites opposed to racial reform a unique opportunity to express their hostility toward blacks and black progress, without being exposed to the charge of racism.”

War Opportunity Language Black Race Progress Drug Unique Racism Reform Exposed Hostility War On Drugs Unique Opportunities

Book:The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness

Source: The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness

“Mandatory minimum sentences give no discretion to judges about the amount of time that the person should receive once a guilty verdict is rendered. Harsh mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenses were passed by Congress in the 1980s as part of the war on drugs and the "get tough" movement, sentences that have helped to fuel our nation's prison boom and have also greatly aggravated racial disparities, particularly in the application of mandatory minimum sentences for crack cocaine.”

“The wave of punitiveness that washed over the United States with the rise of the drug war and the get tough movement really flooded our schools. Schools, caught up in this maelstrom, began viewing children as criminals or suspects, rather than as young people with an enormous amount of potential struggling in their own ways and their own difficult context to make it and hopefully thrive. We began viewing the youth in schools as potential violators rather than as children needing our guidance.”

“The bigger picture is that over the last 30 years, we have spent $1 trillion waging a drug war that has failed in any meaningful way to reduce drug addiction or abuse, and yet has siphoned an enormous amount of resources away from other public services, especially education.”

Way Years War Lasts Amount Drug Resources Abuse Bigger Addiction Meaningful Enormous Public Service Drug Addiction War On Drugs Drug Addict Bigger Picture