“Altogether, millions of mostly obscure entries in the public record offer details of a forced labor system of monotonous enormity. Instead of thousands of true thieves and thugs drawn into the system over decades, the records demonstrate the capture and imprisonment of thousands of random indigent citizens, almost always under the thinnest chimera of probable cause or judicial process.”

“Altogether, millions of mostly obscure entries in the public record offer details of a forced labor system of monotonous enormity. Instead of thousands of true thieves and thugs drawn into the system over decades, the records demonstrate the capture and imprisonment of thousands of random indigent citizens, almost always under the thinnest chimera of probable cause or judicial process.”

— Douglas A. Blackmon