ustxtxb_obs_1965_06_11_50_00002-00000_000.pdf

THE TEXAS OBSERVER A Journal of Free Voices Texas Observer Co., Ltd. 1965 59th YEAR ESTABLISHED 1906 A Window to the South Vol. 57, No. 12 740* June 11, 1965 Our Boys Are Not Much Change Washington, D.C. They were very careless about bringing us timely bulletins at the back table in the Iron Gate Inn Club, but from what I recall of my recent trip to Austin the Texas legislature is not much a changed place. When last heard of our $4,800-a-year miracle men had enacted a congressional redistricting bill that gives rise to the gone ghost of Goldwaterism, and as I recall the bartender’s report had passed an industtrial safety bill so funkily drawn it got a large dose of social disease from the Texas Manufacturers’ Association. I suppose a conscientious boy would have tarried longer in legislative chambers as witness to the mischief. But then, I been sick. The one quick peek I did risk into the Texas House of Commons found what seemed like a hundred and fifty zonked high school sophomores hooting and howling over whether or not girls should be permitted to attend Texas A&M. \(I kept hoping somebody with more wit than diplomacy would rise to inform his distinguished colleagues that nobody should be permitted to attend A&M regardless of sex, race, color, or creed. Alas, nobody spake While I may be meaner than your average Gestapo agent at an underground bar mizvah, I am none-the-less a fair man. And so I don’t want to be too hard on Our Boys in matters educational. They are, in their fashion, trying. Witness how they worked to upgrade the educational level of the Speakership, through bestowing the magic title of lawyer on Speaker Ben Barnes and without troubling him with the burdrens of finishing law school. This may not have been exactly what Governor Connally had in mind when he campaigned to better the educational system in Texas, but it is at least a start. When my attendant served up one of many fresh Lone Star libations he brought rumors of a particularly shoddy trick Rep. Jake Johnson had just played on the House floor. Ole Jake,’who is one of those smartalecs who can read and write and has a sense of humor besides, lifted the Bill of Rights en toto and introduced the document as a resolution. The best I understand the game, some twenty-odd of our pine-thicket Churchills voted against the thing before word seeped out of the document’s original roots. This caused ‘some sneering and displays of contempt among some cynics, who seemed to think the incident illustrates that a rather low-born group of buffoons are charged with the conduct of public business in Texas. No such thing. In the days of Allan Shivers a majority would have voted against the Bill of Rights, even if they’d been told in front what they were voting against. All this goes to show you ean’t stop Progress. STILL, exhibitions in the lower body were generally so unnerving that I did not risk entering the portals of our House of Lords, though I did pay surreptitious call on two of its more stately mem Larry L. King bers. State Senator Don Kennard was discovered in exhibition of a ceremonial bottle of Carling’s beer all done up in red ribbons and flown directly from factory vats to himcommemorating, I suppose, the Peepul’s victory in the Great Brewery Fight achieved only after a fierce battle put up by that well-known pious person Sir Doyle Willis and other folk of exceedingly high morals. One simply does not take up the time of so busy a public man as Senator Kennard with mere prittleprattle, so while he was filling his snuff box I wandered off saddened by thoughts of how Red China is making bombs and Fort Worth is making beer. You ask me, the world is going to Hell in a silk chapeau. Senator Babe Schwartz greeted me with mumbles of how sorry a session had the legislature, but one has to consider the source. After all, I would swear the Senator was reading a book when I crept up on him and there didn’t seem to be a picture in it. While this may not be sufficient grounds for a recall petition against Senator Schwartz, it is enough to make him dis\\ trusted by The Leadership, and I, for one, am delighted they are so much on their toes. \(You don’t nip them Radicals in the bud no tellin’ whur he had locked up his book Senator Schwartz offered the smartest thought to come out Incorporating the State Observer and the East Texas Democrat, which in turn incorporated the State Week and Austin ForumAdvocate. We will serve no group or party but will hew hard to the truth as we find it and the right as we see it. We are dedicated to the whole truth, to human values above all interests, to the rights of man as the foundation of democracy; we will take orders from none but our own conscience, and never will we overlook or misrepresent the truth to serve the interests of the powerful or cater to the ignoble in the human spirit. Editor and General Manager, Ronnie Dugger. Partner, Mrs. R. D. Randolph. Business Manager, Sarah Payne. Contributing Editors, Elroy Bode, Bill Brammer, Larry Goodwyn, Franklin Jones, Lyman Jones, Larry L. King, Georgia Earnest Klipple, Willie Morris, James Presley, Charles Ramsdell, Roger Shattuck, Dan Strawn, Tom Sutherland, Charles Alan Wright. Staff Artist, Charles Erickson. Contributing Photographer, Russell Lee. Subscription Representatives: Austin, Mrs. Helen C. Spear, 2615 Pecos, HO 5-1805; Dallas, Mrs. Cordye Hall, 5835 Ellsworth, TA 1-1205; El Paso, Mrs. Jeanette Harris, 5158 Garry Owen Rd., LO 5-3448; Houston, Mrs. Shirley Jay, 10306 Cliffwood Dr., PA 3-8682; Lubbock, Doris Blaisdell, 2515 24th St.; Midland, Eva Dennis, 4306 Douglas, OX 4-2825; Odessa, Enid Turner, 1706 Glenwood, EM 6-2269; Rio Grande Valley, Mrs. Jack Butler, 601 Houston, McAllen, MU 6-5675; San Antonio, Mrs. Mae B. Tuggle, 531 Elmhurst, TA 6-3583; Tyler, Mrs. Erik Thomsen. of this session of the legislature. He suggested we go below decks in the Capitol Building and eat us a hero sandwich. AT THE HAZARD or upsetting Texas’ very dry Campbellites, your ace correspondent must report that most of his contact with state legislators came in such grog-shops as Scholz Beergarten and at private wing-dings where more than milk punch was served. I found the gentlemen and their ladies to be very charming social critters well-versed in such diverse topics as Sonny Liston’s recent public fainting spell, the unveiling of President Johnson’s bigger-than-God portrait in the House of Representatives, and the witticism of somebody named Cactus Pryor. Rep. Bob Eckhardt and yours truly backed into a neutral corner to mutter low of social reforms and whisper snatches of the Greek classics to each other, covering our subversion when Gene Hendryx or other Team Players swaggered by through bawled declarations in favor of retaining the sacred Right-to-Work law’ or in loud praise of Sul Ross State College. At a very later hour Rep. Eckhardt risked his public reputation by driving me through rain and fog to my place of temporary abodein Austin, the trip made in an old red jeep and over winding backroads. One can’t be too careful, however, if one is a member of the Texas Viet Cong. 3832 Lynwood, LY 4-4862; Cambridge, Mass., Victor Emanuel, 33 Aberdeen Ave., Apt. 3A. The editor has exclusive control over the editorial policies and contents of the Observer. None of the other people who are associated with the enterprise shares this responsibility with him. Writers are responsible for their own work, but not for anything they have not themselves written, and in publishing them the editor does not necessarily imply that he agrees with them, because this is a journal of free voices. The Observer publishes articles, essays, and creative work of the shorter forms having to do in various ways with this area. The pay depends; at present is is token. Unsolicited manuscripts must be accompanied by return postage. Unsigned articles are the editor’s. During the current legislative session, unsigned legislative stories nay sometimes embody or be the reportage of Capitol reporters who cover some events for the Observer. The Observer is published by Texas Observer Co., Ltd., biweekly from Austin, Texas. Entered as second-class matter April 26, 1937, at the Post Office at Austin, Texas, under the Act of March 3, 1879. Second class postage paid at Austin, Texas. Delivered postage prepaid $5.00 a year; two years, $9.50; three years, $13.00. Foreign rates on request. Single copies 25c; prices for ten or more for students, or bulk orders, on request. Editorial and Business Offices: The Texas Observer, 504 West 24th St., Austin 5, Texas. Telephone GR 7-0746. Change of Address: Please give old and new address and allow three weeks.