Chain gang

<p>A chain gang or road gang is a group of prisoners chained together to perform menial or physically challenging work as a form of <a href="/facts/Penal_labor/prMQz611">punishment</a>.  Such punishment might include repairing buildings, building roads, or clearing land. The system was notably used in the <a href="/facts/Convicts_in_Australia/qy6gdGrw">convict era</a> of <a href="/facts/Australia/qLHpbppq">Australia</a> and in the <a href="/facts/Southern_United_States/ppnGuAtB">Southern United States</a>. By 1955, it had largely been phased out in the U.S., with <a href="/facts/Georgia_(U.S._state)/KKnTDY6F">Georgia</a> among the last states to abandon the practice. Clallam County, Washington, U.S. still refers to its inmate litter crew as the "Chain Gang." <a href="/facts/North_Carolina/VhKNTULI">North Carolina</a> continued to use chain gangs into the 1970s. Chain gangs were reintroduced by a few states during the 1990s: In 1995, <a href="/facts/Alabama/1Xk8EveN">Alabama</a> was the first state to revive them. The experiment ended after about one year in all states except <a href="/facts/Arizona/6ayM3swJ">Arizona</a>, where in <a href="/facts/Maricopa_County/lw6VHMkB">Maricopa County</a> inmates can still volunteer for a chain gang to earn credit toward a <a href="/facts/High_school_diploma/8dMgxNnU">high school diploma</a> or avoid disciplinary lockdowns for rule infractions.
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Chain gang open-in-new

Chain gang