13th (2016) on Netflix

Plot summary

The Thirteenth Amendment ended slavery in the United States except as punishment for convicted criminals. That exception, the film argues, was used to continue forced labor, beginning with convict leasing after the Civil War and continuing through Jim Crow segregation, disenfranchisement and lynching. It follows the shift from civil rights legislation in the 1960s to the war on crime and the war on drugs, which brought mandatory and lengthy sentences. The prison population grew sharply from the 1970s even as crime rates fell. Private prison companies entered the market, and rural towns sought prisons for jobs. The film also looks at the American Legislative Exchange Council and the role of corporate money in drafting laws. It considers how political rhetoric demonized poor minorities and how police violence against minority communities became a focus.