“I hold this slow and daily tampering with the mysteries of the brain, to be immeasurably worse than any torture of the body: and because its ghastly signs and tokens are not so palpable to the eye and sense of touch as scars upon the flesh; because its wounds are not upon the surface, and it extorts few cries that human ears can hear; therefore I the more denounce it, as a secret punishment which slumbering humanity is not roused up to stay.”

—Charles Dickens, “Philadelphia, and its Solitary Prison,” Ch.7 in American Notes (1842)

These words, written over 170 years ago, describe the horrific conditions witnessed by Dickens at Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia, the first American prison to incorporate solitary confinement cells. Since then, the US Supreme Court has never ruled the practice unconstitutional, despite its clear violation of the Eighth Amendment’s ban on “cruel and unusual punishments.” Today, Dickens’ words accurately describe the daily torture inflicted upon upwards of 100,000 prisoners presently held in solitary confinement across the American gulag system.