Why This Matters
The fate of incarcerated people often depends on their ability to understand, use, and influence the laws that affect their lives in and after prison. The law dictates nearly every aspect of life in prison, from challenging a sentence to securing necessary healthcare, maintaining family relationships, challenging abuses, getting released from incarceration, and obtaining housing, education, and employment upon release. However, most incarcerated individuals lack access to legal representation and must navigate the system on their own or with the assistance of jailhouse lawyers and prison law clerks.
The Jailhouse Lawyers Manual, published by the Columbia Human Rights Law Review, has long been the most comprehensive and respected resource for providing legal information to people in prison. It includes 41 chapters covering every aspect of law governing the lives of people in prison. It is widely distributed both in New York State and around the country. But the JLM’s reach and impact have been limited by language that many people find inaccessible and hard to use, and by a disconnect between the law on the books (as it is supposed to operate) and law as it actually operates in prisons and jails.
