Racism

Prisons and Abolition in the North

Overrepresentation of people of color, especially women of color, has been a defining feature of U.S. prisons at least since the birth of the modern penitentiary in the late 18th century. In 1790, Walnut Street Jail was transformed from Philadelphia's city jail into what is generally considered to be the first state prison. Ten years earlier, the Pennsylvania legislature had passed An Act for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery, the first such enactment in the nation. Even though Philadelphia was home to a vibrant free black community, the largest at that time in the country, many white Philadelphians continued to view their fellow citizens of African descent as inferiors.

Blacks constituted less than 3% of the population in Pennsylvania, and never more than 6% of the population in Philadelphia throughout the 45 years that Walnut Street served as a state prison. Yet, as abolition progressed in the state, their proportion of the prison population rose steadily from 15% to nearly 50% (reaching 70% among female inmates) by the time Walnut Street was closed in 1835. (See Figures 1 and 2.)

Figure 1 Percentage of Blacks in Pennsylvania and in Walnut Street Jail, 1790–1830

Adapted from Patrick-Stamp (1989).

Figure 2 Percentage of Black Women out of all Women in Pennsylvania and at Walnut Street Jail, 1820, 1830

Adapted from Patrick-Stamp (1989).

Eastern State Penitentiary, a successor to Walnut Street Jail, was perhaps the most important of all early prisons in the United States. One observer at the time reported that the first inmate admitted to the prison was a “light skinned Negro…born of a degraded and depressed race” (quoted in Mauer, 1999, p. 3). Not only was the first male inmate admitted to the prison black, but so were all four of the first women. During the 19th century, the inmate population at Eastern State Penitentiary ranged between 20% and 50% black. The keepers, meanwhile, remained entirely white. Throughout the North, prisons and abolition advanced in step during the early years of the republic.

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