DescriptionThis work examines the phenomenon of mass incarceration in the United States. Particularly, it analyzes the new Jim Crow analogy, which claims that mass incarceration serves as a form of social control of people of color similar to that which existed during Jim Crow and that is carried out through the War on Drugs. To determine the merit of the Jim Crow analogy, the paper examines Michelle Alexander's leading work, The New Jim Crow, and other secondary works around this issue. Additionally, it examines primary documents of legislative committees in New York City from the years 1957 - 1973, prior to the passage of the 1973 Rockefeller Drug Laws in New York State. On the whole this paper acknowledges the value of the New Jim Crow analogy in bringing to light many of the gross injustices in the War on Drugs, yet argues that the system of mass incarceration is much more complex than the authors of the New Jim Crow analogy make it out to be.