Incarceration because of emotional gratification

A while back I wrote about high incarceration costs in some states. Here is a map looking at incarceration rates, followed by one showing percentage of non-white population by state. The author contrasts the two maps with this premise (my summary):

Most of American politics is influenced by race and most of that is the white majority's fears of non-whites. Places with large minority populations that seem to pose a threat to whites are more likely to support laws driven by emotional gratification ("lock up the bastards!"). That is shown by the higher incarceration rates for non-whites. But in places with miniscule non-white populations (North Dakota), most prisoners are white and it is more difficult to rouse the population with "lock up the bastards!" when the bastards look a lot like everyone else. States in which whites are not in the majority (Hawaii) also avoid the highest incarceration rates.