'I’m going to be paying it down until I die.'

  The women incarcerated in Corinth, Mississippi have a phrase for it: “sitting it out.” We have another name for it: “debtors’ prison.”

  Since the 1970s, the Supreme Court has been clear that it’s unconstitutional to jail people simply because they can’t afford to pay fines and fees.

  But in states across the South — and across the country — that’s exactly what cash-strapped municipalities are doing.