LAND OF THE FREE?

In schoolrooms throughout the USA children are taught to be patriotic and learn to sing with pride the verses about "Home of the Brave, Land of the Free", but the reality is somewhat different according to recent statistics. "Today, 2.3 million Americans are behind bars; the United States has the world's highest rate of incarceration. Convictions for non-violent crimes and relatively minor drug offenses - mostly possession, not sale - have accounted for the bulk of the increase in the prison population since the mid-1980s. African-Americans are far more likely to get prison sentences for drug offenses than white offenders, even though studies have consistently shown that they are no more likely to use or sell illegal drugs than whites." (New York Times, 14 May) RD