Hispanic Activists You Should Know

In honor of National Hispanic Heritage Month, which today enters its final week, we are shining a spotlight on four important Hispanic activists who are not attorneys, but who have had an impact on United States law.

Joan Baez, the daughter of a prominent Mexican-American physicist, was born on Staten Island in 1941. In her late teens, she found herself immersed in the deeply political folk music scene of Cambridge, Massachusetts. Her debut album was released by Vanguard Records 60 years ago this month. In 1963, she entered households all over America through her performance of We Shall Overcome at the March on Washington. As discussed in No Direction Home, Baez radicalized Bob Dylan and introduced him to the folk scene. Often through interpretation of his songs, Baez and Dylan together created an iconic soundtrack to various political movements, including draft reform and lowering the age to vote. Baez has worked tirelessly for a wide variety of civil rights causes in the decades since, and these days posts images of her politically-charged paintings to her official Instagram as she continues to shape policy changes through her compelling art.

Raffi Freedman-Gurspan is not a lawyer, but has influenced the law as an LGBT activist and a White House staffer during the Obama administration. Born in Honduras in 1987, she was adopted by Americans as an infant, and raised in Brookline, an urban town that borders Boston. After a rise to prominence working with the National Center for Transgender Equality, Freedman-Gurspan accepted a position under President Obama as the Senior Associate Director for Public Engagement and the White House LGBT Community Liason. The Obama administration oversaw numerous regulatory changes that improved legal outcomes for transgender Americans. For example, prior to Freedman-Guspan’s tenure, in 2010 the Housing and Urban Development regulatory guidelines were updated to include transgender people under the Fair Housing Act protections against discrimination based on sex. Freedman-Guspan is currently a leader in the fight to reform gerrymandering laws, as a Deputy Director at All On the Line.

Dolores Huerta may be 90, but she remains an active advocate for labor reform and civil rights improvements. She may be best known for co-founding the National Farm Workers Association with Cesar Chavez in 1962. Huerta had previously founded the Agricultural Workers Association. Though originally from New Mexico, Huerta is now closely associated with California. One of the first successful campaigns she worked on was the 1960 effort to get California to provide its driver licensure exam in Spanish. Her decades of activism and lobbying efforts were crucial to the passage of the California Agricultural Labor Relations Act of 1975, a national labor law landmark. In 2002, she founded the Dolores Huerta Foundation, which promotes civic engagement so that average citizens can impact the legislative process through which laws are created.

Sylvia Mendez started her life as an activist at age 8, as the plaintiff in Mendez v. Westminister School Dist., 64 F. Supp. 544 - Dist. Court, SD California 1946. In that monumental case, the Ninth Circuit held that the policy of segregation in public schools was unconstitutional, paving the way for the 1954 ruling in Brown v. Board of Education. Mendez was among the first Hispanic students to attend a previously “all-white” public school in California. In 2011, President Obama awarded her a Presidential Medal of Freedom. Now age 84, she continues to speak out about her important experience as a young civil rights pioneer.

Lone Star Labor Day

Texas is well known as a Right to Work state with a long and successful history of anti-union activity, but the Lone Star state has a parallel history of organized labor that has improved worker conditions stemming back to the Republic of Texas.

As Anglo settlers began to stream into the territory on the heels of the Texas Revolution, they brought significant knowledge of the labor organization occuring in their home states and territories. Texas’ first strike occurred in the fall of 1838, when the Texas Typographical Association won a 25% wage increase only a few months after forming.

Still, Texas did not experience widespread labor organization until the Philadelphia-based Knights of Labor managed to recruit not only farm workers, but over half of the state’s non-farm workers, by the middle of the 1880s. Per capita, this was the peak of union participation in Texas. By late 1886, however, the Knights of Labor found itself irrevocably damaged by its connection to the Haymarket riot in Chicago, and this impacted its influence in Texas as much as anywhere else, and the demise of the Knights likely contributed to the inability of Texas organized labor to stop the use of anti-union labor to build the state house in Austin.

In January of 1900, years of attempts to form a statewide union finally came to fruition when the Texas State Federation of Labor formed in Cleburne. However, Texas employers also organized through the Open Shop movement, and proved a formidable match for organized labor throughout the state. Texas workers additionally found themselves outmatched by the national influence and strength of the railroad tycoons who provided so many of the Lonse Star state’s jobs.

World War I brought a proliferartion of manufacturing jobs and other types of labor-based work to Texas, and while this resulted in some relatively improved conditions, Texas workers were unable to match the success of workers in other states. For example, in 1917, offshore workers in California successfully used strikes to negotiate $4, 8 hour days. Faced with extreme anti-labor tactics, however, Texas offshore workers were unable to hold a strike long enough to be effective, and could not improve upon a $2, 12 hour day.

As a result of changed national leadership, as well as a shift in Texas labor leadership, unions once again began to experience some success during the Franklin Roosevelt presidency. This notably included Mexican-American agricultural workers organizing for the first time. Still, Texans in this time period could not match the fervor and efficacy of Texas worker organization 50 years prior under the Knights of Labor.

In fact, Texas workers had been organizing for more than a century before they finally managed a major demonstration of political power in 1957 when pro-union Ralph Yarborough was sent to Washington DC to serve as Senator from Texas. That same year, the Texas State Federation of Labor merged with the Texas State CIO Counsel, consolidating union power in the state.

We at the Harris County Law Library wish you a great and safe Lone Star Labor Day! Here is some further reading to fill your holiday weekend:

• Right to Work Laws in Texas

• The Labor Movement in Texas Collection: 1845-1954, at the Dolph Briscoe Center for American History at UT

• Labor Organizations Handbook at the Texas State Historical Association

• Walking the Line: The Diverse History of Organized Labor in Texas, at the University of Texas at Arlington Libraries Special Collections

I Have a Dream

Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. — Martin Luther King, Jr., March on Washington, August 28, 1963

The organizations linked below feature information and resources about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., his life, and his legacy. Today, on the anniversary of Dr. King’s famous I Have a Dream Speech, 100,000 demonstrators are expected to gather at the footsteps of the Lincoln Memorial for the 2020 National Action Network Commitment March. View the live stream of the event here.

Votes for Texas Women Celebrates Today's 19th Amendment Centennial Anniversary

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Suffragists gather in Houston, Texas, in 1912.

The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.

— United States Constitution, Amendment XIX, Ratified August 18, 1920

On August 18, 1920, Tennessee became the 36th state to ratify the 19th Amendment, thereby adding it to the Constitution of the United States. Finally, after decades of campaigning for the right to vote, protesting and petitioning their representatives, and facing opposition and, even, imprisonment, suffragists achieved their goal of a national constitutional amendment.

Today, to commemorate the centennial of the ratification of the 19th Amendment, the Harris County Law Library is hosting virtual symposium featuring three accomplished women from our local legal community, Marie Jamison, Partner at Wright Close & Barger, Professor Renee Knake Jefferson, and Justice Frances Bourliot. They will discuss the history of voting rights for women and the importance of diversity and inclusion in the legal profession.

For details on the symposium, please visit Votes for Texas Women online.

A list of Further Reading, available here and at the link below, will connect you to resources that trace the fight for women’s suffrage from its origins at the Seneca Falls Convention of 1848 to the full ratification of the 19th Amendment in 1920.

Harris County Law Library Offers 19th Amendment Centennial Symposium to All

For Immediate Release
August 14, 2020

The Harris County Law Library announces a virtual 19th Amendment Centennial Symposium on Tuesday, August 18, from 2pm to 4pm. The event, titled “Votes for Texas Women,” will focus on the history of women’s suffrage and the importance of inclusion in law and government.

“We are thrilled to offer this educational opportunity to everyone on the 100th anniversary of the day the 19th Amendment was ratified,” Law Library Director Mariann Sears said. “We hope that sharing the stories from the historical and legal texts of the brave women who fought for the right to vote by protesting and reaching out to their representatives, even as the 1918 pandemic raged on, can connect more people with the rich history surrounding the amendment.”

Mariann Sears, the first woman to serve as director of the Law Library, will welcome three distinguished women from the local legal community to share their expertise. Marie Jamison, a partner at Wright Close & Barger, will share her research into the history of the 19th Amendment and the progress made in the century that followed. Professor Renee Knake Jefferson, the Joanne and Larry Doherty Chair in Legal Ethics Director at University of Houston Law Center and author of Shortlisted: Women in the Shadows of the Supreme Court, will discuss her research concerning the overlooked history of the nine women who were shortlisted for nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court, but not nominated between the 1930s and 1980s. Justice Frances Bourliot, Fourteenth Court of Appeals Texas, will discuss the importance of inclusion on the bench and her experience as an appellate justice.

“The passage of the 19th Amendment, which prohibited denying a person the right to vote on the basis of sex, was an important step toward protecting voting rights in America,” County Attorney Vince Ryan said. “We are pleased with the Law Library’s efforts to celebrate the legacy of women’s suffrage and the contributions of women in law and government over the last century.”

Registration is now open and free to all at https://www.harriscountylawlibrary.org/19thamendment. The program is accredited by the State Bar of Texas for 2.0 hours of continuing legal education credit with 1.0 hour of ethics credit. In addition to the Harris County Attorney’s Office, this Law Library program is made possible with the support of the Houston Bar Association, League of Women Voters of Houston, and Women of Law.

About the Harris County Law Library

The Harris County Law Library opened in 1915 and has continued to serve Harris County’s legal information needs for more than a century. After joining the Office of Vince Ryan, Harris County Attorney, in 2011, the Law Library greatly expanded its technology offerings and services to the public. Ryan’s support for the revitalization of the Law Library was recognized by the American Association of Law Libraries in 2016 when he was named the Law Library Advocate of the Year. To learn more about services and digital collections, visit the Harris County Law Library Virtual Reference Desk at https://www.harriscountylawlibrary.org.