The 1860 census counted just over 4 million enslaved African Americans in the South, out of a population of about 31.4 million.[0][1]

There are about 1.9 million people incarcerated in jail or prison in the United States today.[2]

The scale of incarceration in the US today is mind-boggling, but is itself under half the number of people enslaved at the height of the Southern slave economy.

[0]https://usafacts.org/articles/the-1860-census-counted-4-mill... [1]https://www.census.gov/library/publications/1864/dec/1860a.h... [2]https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2023.html