Solitary confinement should be abolished in American prisons, jails

“The degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons,” wrote Fyodor Dostoevsky in 1862.  By that measure, America’s prisons reveal a rather abysmal state of affairs in what is supposed to be a highly advanced society.
According to a recent prison census, around 75,505 people are incarcerated in solitary confinement on any given day in America’s prison systems.
As it sounds, the practice entails the isolation of people in often small, rudimen