Black Juveniles Research Articles

Separate and Unequal: America's Children, Race, and Poverty

Fifty years ago, the Supreme Court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education that: Segregation of white and Negro children in the public schools of a State solely on the basis of race, pursuant to state laws permitting or requiring such segregation, denies to Negro children the equal protection of the laws guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment--even though the physical facilities and other 'tangible' factors of white and Negro schools may be equal. (1) Even with a half-century to digest this notion and implement and enforce policies to make equality a reality, the United States today is still a country of separate and unequal. In fact, there is a growing gap between rich and poor children, and between black, white, and Latino children. The United States is top of the list of industrialized nations when it comes to the number of poor children. (2) There are more children living in poverty today than there were 40 years ago when the war on poverty was officially declared. As noted in the article by Nightingale and Fix in this journal issue, black children are still twice as likely as white children to be poor, and a record number of black children are living in extreme poverty. In 2001, nearly one million black children lived in families with an annual income of less than half the federal poverty level (disposable income below $7,064 for a family of three)--the highest number in 23 years. (3) The portrait of inequality is astounding. (See Box 1.) Poverty accentuates racial disparities in children's health, and poor health and poverty spiral together in a vicious cycle that injures all children. The situation in the classroom reflects a similar gaping demographic schism. Fifty years after the Brown decision, black children are still almost twice as likely as their white peers to become dropouts. (See the article by Fuligni and Hardway in this journal issue.) Box 1 A Portrait of Inequality Health: * Young black children are twice as likely as white, Native American, Asian American, or Latino babies to be born with low birth weight. * Babies born to Latinas and Native Americans are twice as likely as those born to whites to have mothers who receive late or no prenatal care. * Young black children are twice as likely as their white peers to die from influenza or pneumonia. * Black young adults are three times as likely as white young adults to die from complications of diabetes. * Black children and teens are five times as likely as their white peers to die of chronic lower respiratory disease, and almost twice as likely to die of heart disease. Education: * Latino fourth graders are two to three times as likely as their white classmates to be performing below the basic level in mathematics. * White fourth graders are three to four times as likely as their black and Latino classmates to be reading at the proficient level. Juvenile Justice: * Black juveniles are about four times as likely to be arrested as their white counterparts. * Black males ages 15 to 19 are four times as likely as their white peers and twice as likely as their Latino peers to die from firearms injury. * Black juveniles are five times as likely as white youths to be incarcerated. Source: Children's Defense Fund. The state of America's children: Yearbook 2004. Washington, DC: CDF, 2004. The result of this disparity is a direct pipeline from school to prison. Many high schools have become prep schools for jail. Pushouts, dropouts and expulsions all create an underclass of children who are ready-made for prison cells rather than dorm rooms. Society can no longer feign surprise when confronted with glaring overrepresentation of children of color in our juvenile justice system. A black boy today has one chance in 55 of earning a master's degree, but one chance in 5 of going to prison before age 30. (4) It is reprehensible that a country such as the United States is home to more than 12 million children who live below the poverty line, (5) and more than 9 million children who lack health insurance. …

Introduction: America's Disposable Children: Setting the Stage

The connection of crime and prejudice is neither simple or direct. The (Negro) boy who is refused promotion in his job as a porter does not go out and snatch somebody's pocketbook. Conversely the loafers... and the thugs in the county prison are not usually graduates of high schools who have been refused work. The connections are more subtle and dangerous; it is the atmosphere of rebellion and discontent that unrewarded merit and reasonable but unsatisfied ambition make. The social environment of excuse, listless despair, careless indulgence and lack of inspiration to work is the growing force that turns Black boys and girls into ... rascals. (DuBois, 1899, p. 351) Childhood is generally perceived of as a time of innocence. The intersection of childhood and criminality in our society has created some uncomfortable tensions and unwarranted solutions. When violent crimes are committed by young offenders, what is a society to do? Shall we sentence children as though they were adults? Shall we warehouse them or shall we attempt to rehabilitate them? Complicating matters is the nexus between race, class and the overrepresentation of children of color, young African American males, in particular, committed to residential facilities in the justice system. Because of their disproportionate representation in the justice system, African American males in the juvenile justice system is the focus of this special issue of The Journal of Negro Education. Information on residents in juvenile custody, drawn from the Census of Juveniles in Residential Placement, indicates that nationally, custody rates for Black juveniles is twice the rate for Latinos and five times the rate for Whites (U.S. Department of Justice, 2000). Related data report minority proportions of the total population of juveniles in residential placement at 75% or greater in seven states: California, Connecticut, Delaware, Louisiana, New Jersey, New Mexico and Texas (U.S. Department of Justice, 2000). In maximum-- security facilities, the rates are even higher. America's young Black males have become America's disposable children. As our society enters the millennium, because of increasing immigration and a second baby-boom generation, our youth population will double, primarily among juveniles of color. One can only speculate as to the potential consequences of an exploding juvenile population of color in a growing climate of intolerance. Generically speaking, the topic of juveniles of color in the justice system intersects some of the crucial issues of the day: disproportionate sentencing for the same crime, racial profiling, inadequate legal representation, mandatory minimums, the War on Drugs, family instability, academic underachievement, dropout rates, female offenders, and the role of race, poverty and gender in juvenile sentencing as well as incarceration. Often overlooked is the staggering increase of Black female offenders in the justice system. The high recidivism rate of juvenile offenders in maximum facilities, who graduate into adult facilities, speaks to a profound loss and waste of human potential, of human capital. That youth from certain racial groups bear the brunt of disproportionate arrests and incarceration deeply impacts social interaction and social cohesion in a democratic society. The intended and unintended consequences of our present policies of discarding and disposing of certain segments of our population have and will continue to have dire consequences on both an individual as well as societal scale. In the wake of America's climate of law and order, policymakers have taken steps to ensure the safety of children and of society. However, in the haste for swift and immediate punishment, rhetoric has replaced logic. The result is zero tolerance, a policy adapted from criminal justice policies, that has set in motion a series of events disproportionately affecting children of color, their families, and their communities (The Harvard University Civil Rights Proiect. …

Race, female headship, and delinquency: A longitudinal analysis

Two recent studies support the hypothesis of a positive association between the “broken family” and crime; one repeats an earlier finding that this relationship is stronger for blacks than for whites. The alarm over the upsurge in female family headship in the United States led to a test of the hypothesis with previously neglected longitudinal data. For the years 1971 to 1986, despite tremendous increases in female family headship among blacks, only one of eight index offenses (arrests) showed an increase among black juveniles. Among white juveniles, increases in three of eight index offenses accompanied the increase in female headship. More important, multiple regression analysis yielded no significant relationship between female headship and any of the eight index offenses or total index offenses for black or white juveniles. The findings may be explained in part by changing attitudes toward birth outside marriage, divorce, and women's competence to rear children by themselves. Also, proposed explanatio...

Black Homicides in Baltimore 1974-1986: Age, Gender, and Weapon Use Changes

Criminal homicides in the city of Baltimore during the period 1974 through 1986 are analyzed, focusing on those homicides that involved black offenders or black victims. Absolute numbers of black homicides, as well as black offender and victim rates and the percentages of all homicides involving black offenders or victims, declined somewhat from their highs in 1974 through 1977. These figures achieved a relative stability by 1980, but their levels remained higher than the comparable figures from the 1950s and 1960s. Black female involvement has declined, and the use of firearms in black homicides has increased substantially over comparable levels from the 1950s. The average age of offenders and victims is substantially lower, although the involvement of black juveniles in homicide appears to have declined somewhat. The suggestion is made that increased firearm use may be a key factor in the changing patterns of black homicide.

Review of The Inner World of the Black Juvenile Delinquent: Three Case Studies.

Review of The Inner World of the Black Juvenile Delinquent: Three Case Studies.

Race and the Impact of Juvenile Deinstitutionalization

In a study of 32,000 referrals to juvenile court, the effects of a program to deinstitutionalize status offenders on detention decisions, intake screening, and final dispositions were examined. Although the results of a general comparison of preprogram and postprogram court actions showed relatively little change in court policies, the data did indicate a slight general trend toward less use of secure detention, a greater use of informal hearings, and a lower rate of juveniles placed on probation or in institutions. Differential treatment based on race was evident throughout the 5-year period. Whereas the rate of secure detention of black juveniles declined overall, it increased for black status offenders, especially females. There was a substantial decrease in the use of formal hearings and in the severity of final dispositions for all cases involving black juveniles.

SELECTING DELINQUENTS FOR CAUTIONING IN THE LONDON METROPOLITAN AREA

SELECTING DELINQUENTS FOR CAUTIONING IN THE LONDON METROPOLITAN AREA

The East Baltimore study. II. Familial aggregation of plasma lipid levels in juveniles in a black inner-city population.

Familial aggregation of plasma lipid levels among 676 black juveniles, aged less than 20 years and residing in 202 households in East Baltimore, Maryland, was assessed by the intraclass correlation coefficient of residuals from sex-specific cubic regressions on age. Significant aggregation of both plasma cholesterol (r = 0.23, p less than 0.005) and plasma triglyceride (r = 0.27, p less than 0.005) levels were found. In addition, no effect on familial aggregation was found for each of several measures of family structure: number of juvenile household members, closeness in age, all children over 9 years of age, or shared surname. Two methods of classifying juvenile household size were compared. An association between classification method and juvenile household size was demonstrated (p less than 0.005) for the distributions of households and of children. The intraclass correlation coefficients for plasma cholesterol and plasma triglyceride for households classified by number of juveniles were higher than the coefficients for the house grouped by the number of juveniles admitted to the study, when compared for each classification number, 2 through 4. Evidence for an effect on familial aggregation of the socioeconomic status was shown by a comparison of intraclass correlation coefficients from households in East Baltimore with those from white and black households from the Columbia Medical Plan which have higher levels of occupation and education. Higher correlations were shown for the groups with higher socioeconomic status, regardless of race.