In the United States, lawmakers introduce legislation to revise 13th amendment against forced prison labor

Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkley and Georgia Rep. Nikema Williams reintroduced legislation Thursday to revise the 13th Amendment, which bans enslavement or involuntary servitude except as a form of criminal punishment. That exception, which has been recognized since 1865, has led to the common practice of forced prison labor. [...] The amendment’s loophole for criminal punishment encouraged former Confederate states, after the Civil War, to devise ways to maintain the dynamics of slavery. They used restrictive measures known as the “black codes,” laws targeting Black people for benign interactions from talking too loudly to not yielding on the sidewalk. Those targeted would end up in custody for these minor actions, and would effectively be enslaved again. [...] The so-called “abolition amendment” was introduced as a joint resolution in December. Mostly supported by Democrats in both the House and Senate, it failed to gain traction before the session’s end. The hope this time around, Merkley said, is to ignite a national movement.
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