Abstract
The systematic disenfranchisement of convicted felons in Florida and other states is examined in this paper. The practice is deemed undemocratic and racist, and its manipulation by the parties in power is discussed.

From the Paper
"The disenfranchisement of convicted felons in the United States is a racist tactic used by those in power to dilute minority voting and rig elections. As such it is morally reprehensible and profoundly undemocratic ..."

Tags:Disenfranchisement, Felons, Florida

Abstract
The paper discusses how disenfranchisement denies a convicted felon the right to vote, and due to racial disparities in our criminal justice system, this results in an estimated 13% of Black men unable to vote. The paper argues that the rights prohibited to ex-felons really deny them the chance to begin their lives again as fully integrated citizens of their city, state and country, and encourage them to repeat their illicit cycle of crime. The paper even contends that in a sense, it is a cruel and unusual punishment.

Outline:
Abstract
Results of Disenfranchisement

From the Paper
"Disenfranchisement denies a convicted felon the following nine rights or areas of life: the right to vote, parenting, public employment, divorce, serving on a jury, holding public office, firearm ownership, criminal registration, and civil death.
"Probably the most arguable of all these denials, is the right to vote, which in many people's minds, strips the ex-felon of his citizenship and violates the 14th and 15th Amendments to the US Constitution (Mitchell, 2004).
"An estimated 5.3 million Americans, or one in forty-one adults, are denied the right to vote because of laws that prohibit voting by people who have been convicted of felonies. What some would call a fundamental obstacle to participation our democratic way of life is aggravated by racial disparities in our criminal justice system, which result in an estimated 13% of Black men unable to vote."

Tags:voting, communities, alienation, crime

Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to introduce, discuss, and analyze the book "Frankenstein: Or the Modern Prometheus", by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley. The paper addresses how Frankenstein's creature compares to or resembles women and criminals as members of the disenfranchised classes of the Romantic period. The paper concludes that Frankenstein is alone and lonely, with no hope for a "normal" life. In this, Frankenstein is like the women and criminals of the Romantic period that he represents.

From the Paper
"The novel is quite relevant to modern readers for a number of compelling reasons. First, society may have mellowed a bit, but overall, many of the societal judgments that were common in the Romantic period still exist. Women have a higher level on the social ladder, but they are still judged on their appearances rather than their abilities. Criminals are still an ostracized segment of society, in fact, they cannot vote in elections if they are felons. There are many aspects of modern society that have not truly modernized at all. In addition, the novel makes the reader look at how people judge others in society. The time period does not matter so much in this novel, because society is still incredibly judgmental and disapproving of anything out of the ordinary."

Tags:ostracized, creature, violent, monstrous, weak

From the Paper
"The leprechaun of Irish folklore is familiar to all who have ever sat among a green-wearing crowd on St. Patrick's Day. According to this modern-day popular telling of fairy tale, the leprechaun came into being something like this:

In the beginning, before there was humankind in the form even of Adam and Eve, God had created the angels to worship Himself. That all did not do so is well known: The Archangel Lucifer thought himself an equal to Himself and fomented a rebellion amongst the angel legions, arch and otherwise. It was touch and go for a while - not because God was ever in doubt of losing, mind you, but because the Almighty Father wanted to see who among his heavenly creations had faith in Himself - and humility in themselves (jealousy, you see, being the root of Lucifer's failings). The Archangels Michael and Gabriel were, of ..."

Abstract
"An important feature of the Mexican Revolution was its broad base of support. Revolution was brought about because, after more than 30 years in power, Porfirio Diaz succeeded in disenfranchising almost all socioeconomic groups who were not members of the power elite. Revolution occurs when individuals are pressed to the limits of their endurance

From the Paper
"An important feature of the Mexican Revolution was its broad base of support. Revolution was brought about because, after more than 30 years in power, Porfirio Diaz succeeded in disenfranchising almost all socioeconomic groups who were not members of the power elite. Revolution occurs when individuals are pressed to the limits of their endurance; such a situation existed in Mexico under Diaz, which explains why so many segments of society risked personal safety to participate.

Diaz pandered to foreign influence to such an extent that being a Mexican became a disadvantage, particularly the more than ninety percent mixed breed Indian population. The government regarded itself as superior to the common people: "The government must be an aristocracy, an aristocracy of brains, technicians, wise and upright elders, scientists" (Brenner, 1971 ..."

Abstract
The paper examines several articles and studies that illustrate the relationship between America's decline in economic fortunes, its diminished attention to policy matters impacting urban poverty, its War on Drugs and its Mexican immigration policies with the persistence of gang violence on its streets. The paper shows how the gang organization creates a sense of solidarity and self-empowerment for many young people with few apparent alternatives. The writer of this paper expresses the hope that new policies will be instituted to address the violence, drug abuse, poverty, despair, racial division and political disenfranchisement which have encouraged gang membership.

From the Paper
"The occurrence of community crime is very rarely isolated or phenomenological. The involvement of individuals, communities and demographics in drug-dealing, substance abuse, gang violence and legal maladjustment of all variety does not occur in a vacuum, but is likely to be the product of patterned conditioning and sociological stimuli. A set of circumstances contextualizing a person, a family and a neighborhood will not just have a formative impact on the way the individual is able to integrate into mainstream society, but will likewise influence the decisions, behaviors and consequences shaping his future. This is the underlying reality which persists in the self-perpetuating cycle of violence and bloodletting that is America's ongoing and encompassing gang war. A core association between the negative conditions in which many Americans are living and the expansion of gang violence denotes a reciprocal relationship between American culture and organized street crime."

Tags:crime, murder, drug, trade, race, immigration, disenfranchisement

Abstract
In this article, the writer compares and contrasts W.H. Auden's "The Unknown Citizen," Sophocles' 'Philoctetes', Tsitsi Dangarembga's 'Nervous Conditions', and Mehdi Charef's 'Tea in the Harem', examining the disenfranchisement of the characters and their rites of passage.

From the Paper
"Rites of passage are a recurrent theme in modern literature highlighting difficult transitions in status or thinking that become a turning point in the lives of the characters. Four works that typify the rite of passage are W. H Auden's poem 'The Unknown Citizen' Sophocles' play 'Philoctetes' and the novels 'Nervous Conditions' by Tsitsi Dangarembga and 'Tea in the Harem' by Mehdi Charef. In each of these works the main character undergoes a change and while that change is different in each ..."

Tags:Philoctetes, The Unknown Citizen, Tea in the Harem, Nervous Conditions, rites of passage, alienation, characters, disenfranchisement, poem, novel

Abstract
This paper explains that African-American men and women quite often are exposed to war not because of their patriotism and love of military life, but rather because of economic desperation and political disenfranchisement from the American dream. The author points out that Martin Luther King's speech upon the nature of the Vietnam War called for an end to the war and the draft because it was disproportionately waged upon the backs of America's desperate, poor black men, who could not afford a university education to obtain a deferral and did not have the political connections to obtain service in the National Guard. The paper relates that, in Owen Dodson's WWII poem, "Black Mother Praying", the great post-Harlem Renaissance poet's last poem in dialect, Dodson's fictive mother weeps for a son whose death is only for a nation that hates him.

From the Paper
"Early on in his speech, King highlights the dangerous divide that America is causing by going to war in Vietnam, stating that the war was doing far more than devastating the hopes of the poor at home. It was sending their sons and their brothers and their husbands to fight and to die in extraordinarily high proportions relative to the rest of the population. We were taking the black young men who had been crippled by our society and sending them eight thousand miles away to guarantee liberties in Southeast Asia which they had not found in southwest Georgia and East Harlem. So we have been repeatedly faced with the cruel irony of watching Negro and white boys on TV screens as they kill and die together for a nation that has been unable to seat them together in the same schools."

Tags:wwii, iraq, disenfranchisement, economics, disproportion

Abstract
This paper examines the lives of the authors James Baldwin, Edward Said, and Gloria Anzaldua. It attempts to find commonality between authors, noting that that none is a white, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant living in America, and none of them ever was. It shows how, despite the fact that Said is the only immigrant from foreign shores, all can be said to view their own native culture in relation to American culture, at least to some extent, and how each is a stranger to American mainstream culture in his or her own way. It also looks at how the common thread between them is being an outsider and an observer of the mainstream culture and how all three are eloquent in describing their disenfranchisement.

From the Paper
"Said is a stranger of a different sort. Of the three writers, only he was not born in the U.S.A., but rather chose to come here as an adult. And Said's homeland is not a multicultural hodgepodge as is the United States; in fact, at this point it might fairly be said that his homeland doesn't exist, except in the hearts and minds of the various Muslims, Jews and Christians who at one time "in this generation or the last" might have called themselves Palestinians, referring both to a culture and to a set of national boundaries. Of the three, Said can most easily be seen as a stranger in a strange land, no matter where he is. This is a difference from the status of the late James Baldwin and Gloria Anzaldua. Both Baldwin and Anzaldua claim estrangement only from one native land."

Tags:america, disenfranchisement, culture

Abstract
This paper discusses the use of the U.S. Supreme Court by Blacks, Chinese and others to end discrimination, segregation and disenfranchisement by initiating and challenging regional legal decisions. The paper describes important U.S. Supreme court cases of this period: Roberts vs. the City of Boston ("separate but equal" doctrine), Ho Ah Kow vs. Nunan (discrimination against Chinese), Plessy vs. Ferguson (state's rights to enact its own laws) and Buchanan vs. Warley ( states cannot officially segregate African Americans into residential districts).

From the Paper
"For example, the Chinese, who comprised a critical element in building the fortunes of the West, were denied many of the rights whites freely enjoyed. The Chinese persevered in this hostile climate and succeeded in broadening the definition of "American." The Chinese achieved Constitutional rights and led the way for other immigrant groups yet to come. In Ho ah Kow vs. Nunan, Ho Ah Kow sued a San Francisco sheriff who followed a racially-motivated law that decreed all prisoners have their hair cut at the uniform length of one inch long upon entering jail."

Tags:Roberts, vs., the, City, of, Boston, disenfranchisement, separate but equal, doctrine, Plessy, vs., Ferguson, Buchanan, vs., Warley