that's overstating the case, consider this: there are more african-american adults under correctional control today in prison or jail, on probation or parole than were enslaved in 1850, a decade before the civil war began. as of 2004, more black men were disenfranchised than in 1870, the year the 15th amendment was ratified, police sitly denying the right to vote -- implicitly denying the right to vote. the 15th amendment prohibited all laws, explicitly denied the right to vote. but during the jim crow era, poll taxes and literacy tests circumvented the 15th amendment and operated to deny african-americans a chance to vote. well, today in many states felon