Running head: JUST MERCY 1

Just Mercy

Students Name

Course Title

Instructors Name

Date
JUST MERCY 2

The book 'Just Mercy' is a story of the civil rights attorney Bryan Stevenson. He fought

for justice for the Blacks who did not have enough money for suitable legal representation;

therefore, they were wrongfully convicted and imprisoned. The book clearly shows that

systematic racism is deep-rooted in some societies, and the justice system is not an exemption.

Therefore, what happens when racism affects the assumption of guilt? Stevenson shows his

readers that the accurate measurement of our character is shown in how we treat the

underprivileged, the poverty-stricken, the suspects, the imprisoned, and the convicted. The book

'Just Mercy' is an indicator of America's history of racial bias and inequality and the uncountable

injustices in the criminal justice system leading to unrest among the people of America. The

events of the book can be related to the following historical events: civil rights movement,

slavery, and convict leasing.

Bryan in the book Just Mercy is an advocate for the harsh sentences awarded to inmates

some of which are harsh and wrongful convictions. Brian mentions a character’s true measure is

observed in how we treat and associate ourselves with the poor, those that are disfavored, those

that are accused, those that have been incarcerated and condemned. 1 Poor people were suffering

and were trying to get by in jail with the largest influencer of wrongful convictions being that

they cannot afford good and fair representation. 2The author holds that Capital punishment was

awarded especially to those without the capital. In many parts of the society especially nowadays

we find elements of systematic racism in almost all these parts of the society. In the book Just

Mercy by Bryan Stevenson, the author fights for justice for the Blacks who are systematically

racially abused by lacking proper representation. The book acts as a pointer of the injustices that

occur in the criminal justice system as well a number of such injustices that have contributed to a

1
Bryan Stevenson, Just Mercy (New York, 2014) P:10
2
Stevenson, just mercy, P:2
JUST MERCY 3

lot of unrest in America today. An example being the Case of MacMillan where Macmillan

provided evidence of having not committed the offence of the charges brought against him, the

murdering of a young white woman, but despite his efforts to mount this evidence which is

deemed to exonerate him, he ends being locked up and jailed. The book also brings forward

other clients all whom are represented by Stevenson some of whom include Herbert Richardson

who was a veteran later executed in the year 1989. Richardson despite having strong evidence

suggesting that he suffered from PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) along with mental

illness. 3In chapter 10 there’s a quote that holds that the prisons in America can be compared to

ware houses especially for those suffering from mental illness. Ray Hinton is another client ho is

exonerated in the year 2015 after having been sentenced to 30 years on the death row at Alabama

the sad part being that he was sentenced for crimes that he did not commit.

As the crusader and the founder of Equal Justice Initiative, Bryan has worked tirelessly to

try and reform the criminal justice system by defending those convicts that are on death row. He

points out that slavery is a non-ending phenomenon as it just takes a different shape over time.

He writes that punishment of the already broken people only contributes them to remain broken

as everyone has bad things they have done and the assumption tat each of us is more than the

worst thing that we have done. People have enslaved themselves in thinking about racism. Are

racial patterns and things that are looked to as being racial patterns? Despite there being a racial

event that is slavery, The Civil Rights War, The Civil Rights Movement, racism can be said as to

having remained the same and has been unchanged. Black men are more likely to be incarcerated

and locked up just because of their affiliations and skin color. Most Black people are subjected to

wrongful convictions and death penalties. Bryan points out that a lot of people are against

inequality and injustice most of which is subjected towards certain ethnic subgroups. The
3
Stevenson, just mercy, P:169
JUST MERCY 4

country needs create a better justice system that is non-bias and which can be relied upon by all.

The history of the death row sentences is that nearly 42% of the inmates are black bringing about

the debate of racial injustices.

The prisoners became people on the pages of Just Mercy in the authors own humanity,

humility, compassion, and courage from every paragraph. The author touches on slavery and

how the racial terrorism of lynching, and convict leasing especially towards the end of the 19th

century creates a link to the mass incarcerations observed. The system is broken and as it breaks

there are casualties who experience breakage in their bodies and spirits it leaves in its wake. The

author is all about the power of redemption and the justice possibility that make him challenge

the justice system even more along with others like him. 4He argues that there exists an unbroken

chain of brutality in the American Law and the society at large changing its form from chattel

slavery to the current era of mass incarcerations where in the current times blacks are the most

incarcerated people. This chain has been un through the supremacist terrorism of lynching that

happened after the fall of post-civil reconstruction of the war and by the codes of black of

convict leasing where we find Blacks being charged with crimes that were imaginary like

vagrancy which were convicted in the kangaroo courts. Large numbers of black and brown

Americans are the subjects of draconian law where they are locked away for mandatory

sentences.

References.

Stevenson, B. (2014). Just mercy. Random House Publishing Group.

4
Stevenson, just mercy, P:318
JUST MERCY 5