Porter Broyles

“This chapter examines why the State of Texas considered the social segregation of Mexican Americans an ordinary part of life. It begins by examining two landmark cases in which Texas courts ruled that it was not unconstitutional to segregate Mexican Americans. Independent School District v. Salvatierra (1930) illustrates how district zoning laws were used to segregate Mexican American students. Terrell Wells Swimming Pool v. Rodriguez (1944) explores exclusion laws applied to public accommodations and the state’s application of these laws to Mexican Americans.”
― Martha Menchaca, The Mexican American Experience in Texas: Citizenship, Segregation, and the Struggle for Equality

“Overall, out of the nineteen senior public colleges in Texas, seven had desegregated by 1959, and twelve refused to do so. Desegregation”
― Martha Menchaca, The Mexican American Experience in Texas: Citizenship, Segregation, and the Struggle for Equality

“In Pecos County, the county commissioners banned people of Latin American descent from using community swimming pools reserved for whites. Attorneys for the consul-general of Mexico informed Governor Stevenson that the Pecos ordinance was unlawful because under federal law, a segregation ordinance could not be enforced in a government-owned facility. Segregation ordinances were legal only if they involved private property. Because the swimming pools in question were owned by the county and the ordinance had been passed by county officials, the commissioners were clearly violating federal law. Furthermore,”
― Martha Menchaca, The Mexican American Experience in Texas: Citizenship, Segregation, and the Struggle for Equality

“Schools on military bases and public schools accepting the children of service members also desegregated. Many of these schools had no choice in the matter, since they were ordered by the Department of Defense to integrate or close down. The secretary of defense, Charles E. Wilson, ordered that all military base schools and all public schools attended by military dependents be integrated by September 1, 1955, or prepare to be sanctioned.46 These schools were not allowed to submit choice plans.”
― Martha Menchaca, The Mexican American Experience in Texas: Citizenship, Segregation, and the Struggle for Equality