The Emergence Of The Private Prison System - 1992 Words

The emergence of the private prison system in the early 1980s was in reaction to the problem of overcrowding within the federal prisons due to the Regan eras strong anticrime policies. The main issue that the federal prisons were faced with was that the prison population was increasing rapidly due to the war on drugs with a mandatory minimum sentencing law and later the three strikes law. The war on drugs is thought to have begun under the under the Regan administration; however, it more adequately dates back to the Nixon administration. The policies of the Regan administration built onto the foundation of the Nixon White House and further strengthen the policy put in place under Nixon’s term in office. President Nixon coined the term war†¦show more content†¦In fact, President Regan only needed to expand the foundation that was already in place, which he would do with the expansion of the drug war that would mark his presidency as one of outrageous increase in the ra te of incarceration â€Å"The number of people behind bars for nonviolent drug law offenses increased from 50,000 in 1980 to over 400,000 by 1997† (â€Å"A Brief History of the Drug War†). However, the number of prisons did not increase; hence, the private prison system emerged as a solution to the problem which was the lack of facilities to house prisoners. In addition to the war on drugs, the three-strikes laws that came about under the Clinton administration allowed the private sector to gain financial access to the prison system which had a direct effect on the rate of incarceration and prisoner recidivism. â€Å"Bill Clinton, in maneuvering to the center, he signed all those crime bills, he made the American gulag, as vast as it is, with a lot of his legislation against the drug war, and he made it so that these disposable people could become grist for that horrible mill† (Moyers Company). The three-strikes laws basically stated that if a person has two prior convictions the third would sentence them to life in prison. Faced with the issues of finding space to house all these new offenders of the drug war as well as offenders of the three-strikes laws, the system needed answers. This opened the door for the Correction Corporation of America (CCA) to come in and offer