Abstract

In 1950s America, it was remarkably easy for police to arrest almost anyone for almost any reason. The criminal justice system — and especially age-old law of vagrancy — served not only to maintain safety and order but also to enforce conventional standards of morality and propriety. A person could be arrested for sporting a beard, making a speech, or working too little. Yet by end of 1960s, vagrancy laws were discredited and American society was fundamentally transformed. What happened? Vagrant Nation answers that question by showing how constitutional challenges to vagrancy laws shaped multiple movements that made the 1960s. Vagrancy laws were so broad and flexible that they made it possible for police to arrest anyone out of place: Beats and hippies; Communists and Vietnam War protestors; racial minorities and civil rights activists; gays, single women, and prostitutes. As hundreds of these vagrants and their lawyers challenged vagrancy laws in court, laws became a flashpoint for debates about radically different visions of order and freedom. In describing those challenges, Vagrant Nation offers a new, integrated history of civil rights, peace, gay rights, welfare rights, sexual, and cultural revolutions. It also demonstrates how ordinary people, with help of lawyers and judges, can change meaning of Constitution. The Supreme Court's 1972 decision declaring vagrancy laws unconstitutional continues to shape conflicts between police power and constitutional rights, including clashes over stop-and-frisk, homelessness, sexual freedom, and public protests. Since downfall of vagrancy law, battles over what, if anything, should replace it, like battles over legacy of sixties transformations themselves, are far from over.

Full Text
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