 In this lecture, we'll look at post-World War II Texas, some of the changes economically and politically that result as a result of the civil rights movement from the 1960s to the 1970s. First, when we look at civil rights, we have to look at a couple of Supreme Court decisions. One is Hernandez v. Texas. This was in 1954, just before the Brown v. Board of Education in 1954 decision. In these decisions, they both looked at Hispanics and African Americans respectively, so they both looked at minority civil rights. In Hernandez v. Texas, because a man was convicted of murder without any other Hispanics on the jury, the Supreme Court decided that Hispanics needed to be represented and that excluding them from the jury, simply because they were Hispanics, was discrimination. In Brown v. Board of Education, of course, it overturned the Plessy v. Ferguson decision that had allowed for separate but equal facilities in public schools. The Brown decision was about, and so the Brown decision overturned that. Now, in 1955, they said the Supreme Court said integration should occur with all deliberate speed. And so when Texas schools like in Mansfield, which is just south of Fort Worth, tried to integrate a handful of African American students, there were protests and riots and commotion that brought in the National Guard. The governor sided with the white population and in the end, the students were sent to Fort Worth's integrated schools. So there were problems. And this came right a year before the Little Rock incident in 1957. Ironically enough, the Texas governor and the Attorney General for Texas both urged federal intervention in order to resolve the Little Rock crisis, although when Texas had its crisis opposed to it. So as you see how politics changes. In 1957, the United States Congress and Senate passed the Civil Rights Act of 57, which was the first civil rights act since Reconstruction. However, as a result of efforts by the federal government, the state government, the Supreme Court to begin integration and to start challenging Jim Crow segregation, a lot of business people in towns and cities started White Citizens Council. And these were organized groups that were aimed at maintaining the status quo of race relations. I mentioned Felix Tijena, the Lulac president from here in Houston, and his little schools, the 400. These were attempts to better prepare Mexican American children for school by teaching them at least 400 words of English before they begin classes. So they would not be behind. Political changes for Mexican Americans. You see the election of Henry B. Gonzalez as the first Mexican American to the San Antonio City Council and then to the Texas State Senate in 56. But he stands up in favor of civil rights throughout his long career in Texas politics. And an example in 1957, when the Texas Senate tried to stop integration attempts and legislation that would facilitate integration, Gonzalez stopped this from happening through a filibuster in the Texas Senate. In 1960, you also see the end of one party rule in Texas, John Tower, becomes the first Republican Texas U.S. Senator since Reconstruction. And so you see a change, the growth of the Republican Party that is now able to get a U.S. Senator elected. In 1963, Texas also, unfortunately, became once again in the spotlight with the Kennedy assassination. This happened in Dallas. And so Texas felt a lot of shame and guilt over the assassination. But Texas also saw her first president as a result of this. Now Eisenhower was from Texas as well. But Lyndon Johnson had spent all of his life in Texas and had been involved in Texas politics since the 1930s, first in the House of Representatives. And then after the bitter and controversial 1948 Senate election, he was in the Senate until 1961. In the 61 campaign, the 60 campaign for president, he had emerged as a candidate. But as you should know, John Kennedy from Boston was nominated by the Democrats to be their presidential candidate. And so Kennedy picked up Johnson because of his support to be the vice president. And then when the assassination happened, Johnson emerged as president. Now many people were afraid of what Johnson, a southern or a Texan, a good old boy was going to do. But during his finishing up of Kennedy's term and whenever he ran on his own in 1964, Johnson emerged as quite a leader as far as civil rights was concerned. He was also known as the education president because he passed over 60 pieces of legislation and signed them into law that changed the educational system for the nation. He tried to battle poverty, the war on poverty, to end want and need in the United States when the nation had so much wealth and also to begin the great society. Also aimed at job programs, at food programs to help the needy, and other programs to help people who were in poverty. But this was marred by the U.S. involvement in Vietnam, which we had been involved in Vietnam since the 1950s under Eisenhower escalated under Kennedy and then escalated again under Johnson. And so the conflict between whether or not we were going to use resources for Vietnam or use our resources to help people in the United States became known as the guns or butter issue. Are we going to spend money on weapons for military or are we going to spend money on social services like free lunch and free butter programs? Other economic changes that affected Texas, the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956 signed by President Eisenhower, which established interstate transportation. Eisenhower had long been concerned of a lack of good roads in the United States, especially in times of military need. And so the interstate highway system sought to change that and provide better roads. And as we all benefit from that now, we can see how that worked. One of the worldwide issues that surprised Texans and people from around the United States was the Soviet Union's launch of Sputnik 1 in 1957. This started the Cold War, the battle between the United States and Russia in space, sometimes known as the Space Race. Who would be the first to put a man on the moon? John Kennedy promised that we should do it in the United States before the end of the decade, before the end of the 60s. And in fact, we did. And this is a picture here of Buzz Aldrin landing on the moon in 1969. And as many of you know from the movies and TV shows, you know, Houston, the Eagle has landed. Houston became the first word in the space race because of the Johnson Space Center in Clear Lake. Also the Astrodome changed the racial situation and economic situation in Texas. In order to get major league games in Texas and major league sports in Texas, Houston businessmen supported the building of this Astrodome, this multi-purpose field. However, we had to be aware of the fact that many of the major league sports teams did not want to come to the south, did not want to come to Texas because of segregation and racism. And so if Texas was going to have, if Houston was going to have an Astrodome, they needed to confront racism and segregation and overcome it and begin integrating hotels, restaurants and other areas. For Mexican-Americans, as I mentioned earlier, you had the little schools of the 400, but also one of the other issues was a series of revolts starting in South Texas by Hispanics, one being the 1966 minimum wage march. Agricultural workers marched from the Rio Grande Valley to the capital in Austin in order to meet with the governor to get support for a minimum wage. The minimum wage that they were asking for was only $1.25. It doesn't sound like a lot, but many agricultural workers were paid even less. This was sponsored by the United Farm Workers, says Archavez's organization. The governor refused to meet them in Austin, so instead he came down 45 miles to New Braunfels and met them at the New Braunfels Courthouse. In Crystal City in South Texas, there were a couple of revolts in the 60s, first over city council and later cheerleaders at the high school. In both cases, the argument was that in a town that was at least 90% Mexican-American, all the seats on the city council, all the cheerleaders were Anglo. So this represented clearly in the minds of many of the Hispanics segregation and discrimination. And so you have people who are arguing that the city council needs to be more integrated and more representative of the population and likewise in the high school as well. And both of these were successful. If we look at issues for African-American and women during this period, we see some of the issues are tied together. In 1966, the first African-Americans as state representatives were elected since reconstruction. Those were Curtis Graves, who had participated earlier in civil rights protests and sit-in movements in Houston, and Joe Lockridge. The most famous African-American representative, however, was Barbara Jordan of Houston. She became the first African-American elected to state senate, served as governor for a day, and was also the first African-American woman elected to US Congress from Texas that happened in 1973. She was very influential, very well respected, and her many honors and awards reflect that. She delivered a speech in Congress during the Watergate hearings that encouraged many people that the need to vote for impeachment for the president was important and that it wasn't un-American or unpatriotic to do so. So she was a very important person throughout her life and throughout her service in the US House of Representatives, in the US Congress, and in Texas as well. Finally, Hermine Tobolowski. This woman fought for civil rights for women. The Texas Equal Rights Amendment sought to get a constitutional amendment that would guarantee that women would not be discriminated against in jobs, in wages, or in a host of other areas related to employment, voting, and civil and social issues. It never passed. And although today women's equality in women's rights seems like a foregone conclusion, in the 1960s and 70s it was a very much an uphill battle for Tobolowski, the National Association of Women, the Texas Association of Women, and other groups who were fighting for civil rights for women.