In the last 15 years, the prison population in the U.S. increased by more than 188 percent. The increase has been fueled largely by increases in the number of individuals convicted of drug-related offenses. These offenders constitute a disproportionate number of recidivists who, in turn, are responsible for a relatively large proportion of criminal activity in our society. The vast majority of these offenders were arrested for committing violent crimes, and most of the offenders are poor, unemployed, uneducated, come from dysfunctional families, and are African-American. Contrary to public...

Suicide among African Americans occurs at about half the rate with which it occurs among white Americans. Why is the black rate of suicide so much lower, particularly when one considers the effects of racism and other socio-economic factors on African Americans? One answer that has been offered is that churches within the African-American community have a greater influence than among white Americans and that they provide amelioration of social forces that would otherwise lead to suicide.

To date no other book has provided an in-depth ethnographic study of the buffering effect of the...

This study examines the legal discrimination suffered in the United States by children born out of wedlock. The authors analyze the Supreme Court's equal protection birth status decisions from 1968 to 1992 and, in a case-by-case analysis, trace the development of the Court's rulings, examine the pattern of equal protection tests utilized, and evaluate the consistency of the Court's position. In addition, the work examines the related discrimination suffered by the families of non-marital children, especially single parents and alternative family units, and concludes that it is impossible...