"This powerful account of the history of the Mississippi penal system examines the factors that have molded and continue to mold, penal law and administration in that state and sheds new light on the contemporary debate on correctional policy." "Beginning with the birth of the Mississippi territory in 1798, Brokered Justice addresses first the continuing legacy of racial inequity in public law from the days of slavery and Jim Crow to the federal judiciary's attempt to confront the problem. The study goes on to explore the specific conflict in Mississippi, a conflict that pits a pragmatic republican political process against the callings of a nobler moral and jurisprudential heritage. Finally, it examines the weaknesses of the correctional ideal within the framework of the state political process and the plight of a convict population subject to an ever-changing body politic." "Essential reading for criminologists, public policymakers, historians, correctional practitioners, and all those who care about the inequities in the way society treats offenders, especially African-Americans, Brokered Justice challenges prevailing views of the relationship between criminal justice and the political system and shatters simplistic notions of crime and punishment."--BOOK JACKET.