Photos: Book Cover
In 1821 Afro-Native William Freeman found himself convicted of horse theft he vehemently denied and sentenced to five years of hard labor in Auburn State Prison (New York) — without pay and in total silence. It was the first prison built for solitary confinement, and it was in this oppressive environment that Freeman dared to challenge the system. Driven to extremes, he murdered a white family, explaining that “someone must pay.” Freeman’s Challenge: The Murder That Shook America’s Original Prison for Profit, from distinguished Harvard Professor Robin Bernstein, unveils this gripping saga of defiance and its lasting effects on our penal system.
The forthcoming release of Bernstein’s newest book from The University of Chicago Press in May 2024 is highly anticipated, on the heels of her previous book, which received numerous awards, including the Lois P. Rudnick Book Prize from the New England American Studies Association. As Chair of Harvard’s doctoral Program in American Studies, Bernstein brings to bear her expertise in U.S. racial formation from the nineteenth century to the present. Through meticulous research, she tells an explosive story about the tangled web of oppression and racism that still underpins our society’s institutions.
Freeman’s story represents an early, yet often overlooked, instance of Black resistance in America that warrants commemoration. “In this narrative tour de force, Bernstein offers a riveting and heartbreaking account of one Afro-Native adolescent’s refusal to be broken by an inhumane New York prison. Freeman’s Challenge is itself a challenge, presenting a bold new argument about the Northeastern roots of an exploitative carceral labor system and the racialized ideology of criminality that followed the formal end of slavery. This study shines a bright light on the interconnected histories of US prisons and economic development; race, indigeneity, land loss, and uncompensated work; and the complications of abolitionist rhetoric, representational politics, and Black community defense,” says Tiya Miles, author of All That She Carried: The Journey of Ashley’s Sack, a Black Family Keepsake.
Bernstein follows Freeman’s ensuing trial, examining how narratives intertwined race with criminality, deflecting attention from the exploitative practices of Auburn. These narratives didn’t just permeate the trial, they became entrenched in culture throughout the US, perpetuating harmful notions such as the myth of inherent Black criminality and providing justification for racialized mass incarceration.
As civil rights icon Angela Davis aptly puts it, “By disengaging the emergence of the prison from what has become its inevitable partner — ‘rehabilitation’— Bernstein deftly reveals the deep connections between imprisonment, racism, and the development of the capitalist economy.”
Compellingly written and thought-provoking, this timely and necessary story of Black resistance against the nexus of incarceration, racial capitalism, and slavery will further inspire the prison abolitionist movement. It’s an essential read for anyone seeking to understand the complexities of our modern prison system from one of the most prominent experts on racism in America.
