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No racism in the justice system

PATRICK A LANGAN

WHETHER OR NOT America’s criminal justice system is biased against blacks today, it clearly was in the past. Between 1930 and 1964, for example, six southern jurisdictions— Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia—put to death 67 men for the crime of rape. Not one of the 67 was white. All were black. Is it conceivable that not a single white man committed rape in any of these places? Over a 35-year period? Surely not.