The 13^th Amendment of the Constitutionstates, “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.”

Is slavery or involuntary servitude really abolished in the 21^st century? Let's pay close attention to the word 'except.' The 13^th Amendment has in it a condition. If a person in the United States is convicted of a crime, it is legal for that person to perform involuntary services for another. Involuntary is something done against a person's will and control, and servitude is the state of being a slave.

According to statistics by the U.S. Department of Justice, Black people make up 12%-13% of the American population, but Black males make up over 40% of the approximate 2.3 million male inmates. Over 50% of Black youth are sent to adult prisons. The prison system is a business, and private prisons make tens of millions of dollars off of the labor of prisoners.

The school-to-prison pipeline only makes matters worse for Black youth.

According to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), “The "school-to-prison pipeline" refers to the policies and practices that push our nation's schoolchildren, especially our most at-risk children, out of classrooms and into the juvenile and criminal justice systems. This pipeline reflects the prioritization of incarceration over education.”

Black youth go to school under the public education curriculum, and they don't learn the knowledge of themselves. The textbooks teach students an extensive and thorough history of White people and all they have accomplished. Black youth do not learn about Black mathematicians, scientists, doctors, engineers, artists, writers or anything other than being a slave. Because of the lack of education of self, Black students begin to take on an inferior mindset from the cradle onward.

While Black males are slaving away in the prison system and the schools are pushing Black youth into prison, Black people in general are being preyed on by self-proclaimed vigilantes, officers of the law, and sadly, with the infestation of Black on Black crime, their own selves.

Will legal slavery continue to exist or will the prey be taken from the mighty? The question has already been answered in the Book of Isaiah, Chapter 49 verses 24-26:

“Shall the prey be taken from the mighty, or the lawful captive delivered? But thus saith the Lord, Even the captives of the mighty shall be taken away, and the prey of the terrible shall be delivered: for I will contend with him that contendeth with thee, and I will save thy children.”