Question
For the sake of Religious obligations, at what point is one considered a slave? Are prisoners in U.S. jails slaves? In America the Constitution includes an amendment (13th) that abolishes general ownership of slaves, however, the amendment contains a provision which allows an exception in the case of convicted criminals. In the case of a convicted criminal he/she enters into servitude to the government, and is treated as a slave. In every instance that the law refers to the slave, the actual word slave is changed for prisoner, offended, inmate, felon, convict, etc. the application is the same, however. The slave is forced to perform under threat of punishment or harsh treatment, and the government reserves the right to loan the slave for profit, with no right of the slave to rewards or compensation. Very few Americans actually think of this form of slavery as a form of slavery, they are not usually aware of the nature of it. So what exactly makes a slave a slave? If you do not call a slave a slave, is it still a slave, even if you call it something else?
Answer
Despite the oppression and exploitation by the government, prisoners are not slaves in the literal sense. While the government may 'loan' a prisoner, exploit him, punish him, it does not own him. The government even in terms of its own law, does not have the right to sell the prisoner thereby assigning him to the ownership of someone else. A slave in the true sense of its meaning is the property of a person who has the right to sell the slave and to emancipate him. A slave does not own and cannot own any assets. Whatever the slave has or earns is the property of the master. Prisoners are released from custody after they have served their sentence. Their freedom is dependent on the termination of their sentence. The government then has no further rights over them whereas a slave attains freedom from his master's ownership only if the latter sets him free. The Islamic laws applicable to slaves do not apply to prisoners.
- Source
- themajlis.co.za
- Published in
- Al-Haq Bulletin No. 53
- PDF page
- 11
Appears under ARE PRISONERS SLAVES?.