George I. Sánchez by Carlos Kevin Blanton

Author:Carlos Kevin Blanton
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Yale University Press
Published: 2014-03-14T16:00:00+00:00

CIVIL RIGHTS IN TEXAS

No Tejano supported African American civil rights more than George I. Sánchez in the 1950s. For example, in 1951 Gus Garcia lobbied Sánchez on formulating an updated version of the Second World War–era Caucasian Race Resolution. But by the 1950s Sánchez was done with this approach. He wrote, “You cannot give privileges to one class of people that are denied to another class. Under this bill, Anglos could be discriminated against and so could Negroes.” He went on, “What’s the use of picking a fight for something that isn’t going to do anybody any good? This is like the old Join [sic] Resolution that a legislature pasted [sic] several years ago—pretty words with absolutely no application. I don’t think that a bill can be drawn up that does not include Anglos and Negroes within its protection.” Furthermore, he continued, “personally, I don’t want to be put in the position of saying that you must not discriminate against Mexicans, but you can go ahead and discriminate against other classes of people. I just don’t think that way, and I don’t think that the position is a wise one to take from a great many standpoints.” He made the case that “if we are going to lose before the legislature or even before the courts, let us lose supporting a defensible principle. And, lose we will—so let us lose with self-respect instead of without it. I just can’t see myself supporting a measure that, on its face, is a violation of the 14th Amendment while at the same time we are yelling loudly that the Amendment should be upheld!” 46

Sánchez transferred these beliefs to the political realm. While U.S. Senator Ralph Yarborough has gone down in Texas political lore as one of the standout liberals of the twentieth century, his campaigns of the 1950s failed to embrace African Americans. And this neglect came in spite of Sánchez’s advice. Yarborough hedged on civil rights in his gubernatorial races of 1952 and 1954, first, by ignoring the issue and then by settling on a vague Jim Crow stance. In 1956 Yarborough hedged yet again, this time without the excuse of being blindsided by a blockbuster Supreme Court decision in the middle of the campaign. The liberal activists like Sánchez remained far ahead of the liberal politicians. Sánchez supplied Yarborough with a two-page refutation of the segregationist constitutional theory of interposition, writing that it allowed the powerful to discriminate against “Mexicans, Jews, Catholics, hill-billies, damyankees [sic], as well as Negroes.” In other words, interposition allowed discrimination against any people regarded as a class apart.47

The election of 1956 elevated former Delgado-era attorney general Price Daniel to the governor’s office. It also whipped up an anti-integration hysteria commonly referred to as massive resistance. Late in the legislative session of 1957 a cancerous lump of segregationist bills that had been bottled up by the governor and other fearful moderates broke through the legislative roadblocks. In this highly charged environment two state senators, Henry B. Gonzalez

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