War for the City

In 1978, more than six hundred men held in Illinois' Pontiac prison revolted, leaving three guards dead. State prosecutors responded by issuing capital murder indictments against more than a dozen prisoners, nearly all of them leaders of Chicago street gangs. From behind bars, Black Panther Party members and other militants not only led a defense campaign that helped to win their acquittal but also seized the opportunity to politicize their fellow prisoners. Drawing on the example of the largest death penalty trial in Illinois history, War for the City shows how 1960s-era movements did not simply decline when faced with repression but persisted inside prisons during the 1970s. In turn, state officials sought to head off future revolts through sentencing reforms and sustained prison building during the 1980s and 90s.

Historian Toussaint Losier demonstrates how efforts to contain radical movements—and the broader struggle for Black Liberation—helped to spur the punitive turn towards mass incarceration. Ultimately, Losier shows how the consolidation of the carceral state—grounded in heavy-handed policing and prosecution, as well as longer prison terms and a greater reliance on solitary confinement—has been one of the most significant, and seemingly inexplicable, developments in postwar US history.