Social Control

Paper Summary:

This essay takes a close look at the criminal legal system in the United States of America and considers whether it is in fact a criminal justice system. Using readings by David Masci on trial courts and the prison-building boom, as well as personal case studies by Susan Richards Shreve, Daniel Wideman and John Edgar Wideman, this paper takes a liberal stance on the U.S. criminal system.

From the Paper:

"In her memoir of sitting on the jury that convicted an "innocent" young black man of drug possession and intent to sell said drugs entitled "The Silent Juror," Susan Richards Shreve makes the following observation: If such a thing as justice is possible, it belongs to God and not to human beings, is written on our consciousness by God and is, in any case, whatever our personal beliefs, out of our control. (Shreve 152) Such a helpless, tragic attitude of resignation to the whim of some blind lady Justice, of feeling that as a citizen, each of us has no real say in how and when justice is served, even when on a jury of peers, is the focal point of this paper."

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