ustxtxb_obs_1974_12_27_50_00047-00000_000.pdf

the woes and wiles of Negro laborers. For a while Gonzalez spelled him with a passage from a personal sketch by W. E. B. DuBois in An Anthology of Negro Literature . . . At 9:50 Gov. and Mrs. Daniel came in. Daniel talked with everybody, chewed on his cigar, listened to the filibuster. Hardeman, by this time, was reading The American Bastille, a book on the Lincoln era’s civil rights abuses. Gonzalez said of Daniel, “He’s wavering a little bit; if he just stays with us long enough we might convert him.” .. . Owen launched a search for Et Al, “co-author of the bill.” “If Al were here tonight I’m sure he would disclaim any connection with this bill. Al is a good friend of mine,” said Owen. “But perhaps here is a man gone astray.” A couple of newspapermen played poker in a committee room for half an hour. One gentleman of the fourth estate fell down as he left the chamber and was helped home. “You know what rain does to cantaloupe?” Kazen asked. “Sine die? That any kin to Et Al?” asked Herring. And so it went until Henry Gonzalez was wakened and came to the chamber at 5 a.m. Lane grumbled about Gonzalez’ big words. “Maybe he’ll strangle on one of them,” he said hopefully. Kazen gave Gonzalez his lemons, his Hershey bars, and his Schools in Transition. Herring gave him the American Bar Association Journal. Then Kazen sat down after 15 hours straight. THE ARGUMENT was advanced, Gonzalez said, that the bills had to be passed of necessity. “Necessity is the creed of slaves and the argument of tyrants. They have sown to the wind and reaped a whirlwind!” he shouted. A voice from the third floor behind the chamber shouted out to him to be quiet. It was Kazen, trying to sleep in his office .. . Gonzalez told of times he had been discriminated against because of his ancestry. “The Irish have a saying, ‘It’s easy to sleep on another man’s wounds,’ ” he said. “Well, what’s the difference? Mexican, Negro, what have you. The assault on the inward dignity of man, which our society protects, has been made . . . We all know in our hearts and our minds that it is wrong.” At 9 o’clock Kazen returned from his rest, and at 9:07 Gonzalez got his first relief with a long question. All day, as citizens and representatives flowed in and out, he held forth, now repeating himself more : . . In mid-afternoon he read from the Columbia Encyclopedia on anthropology. He chewed on a lemon rind and ate from two boxes of raisins. About 3:30 negotiations started for a compromise. At 5:07 Lane asked him if he had yielded the floor because he was sitting against his desk. At 5:13 his friends came to him and asked him to quit. They had received a firm offer from the majority to pass the annual sessions annual pay resolution; Gonzalez’ slum clearance bill, which is still pending, had been mentioned to him. Lane wanted one bill passed then and one more Monday with no promises on the others. Otherwise, they threatened, they would pass three or four when he quit. “Henry,” said Reagan to Gonzalez, “I think we ought to go.” Willis told him they were going to move the previous question. Reagan said something to him about getting “urban renewal up.” Hudson said, “We’ve done all we can, Henry.” Owen said to him, “It’s how far we’re gonna push the chair.” Gonzalez replied to them: “I think compromise on one, you’re sunk on all. They’re fanatical!” He told a reporter, “Everybody agreed to a compromise, but I’m not. They’re gonna have to shut me up. Hell, they don’t compromise, they’re fanatic on these bills. I think I’m going on all night and half the morning I mean till noon.” At 5:31 Lane moved the previous question. The vote was 12-12; [Lt. Gov. Ben] Ramsey broke the tie in favor of the motion. When Gonzalez sat down, debate would be over. He started talking again. Even in the thirteenth hour he was gesturing with enormous energy, and his voice was strong .. . Governor Daniel came in again. He heard Kazen and Gonzalez discussing whether an item of punctuation was “two dots or a dot and a comma.” Kazen: “Curricula, curricula . .” Gonzalez: “Not lum?” Kazen: “Senator, please don’t interrupt me.” .. . At 1:30 Gonzalez took off his shoes and walked around in his yellow socks, answering questions. He was very tired, lurching about, moving his arms and legs disjointedly, and leaning on the desks often; but he said he was fresh and ready for more. About 1:45 Lane came in unhappily. They would pass only HB 231. The call for a quorum went out, and the senators started dragging in sleepily. The voting was finished, the Senate adjourned. People gathered around Gonzalez’ desk. “I could have gone on to 8:30,” he said. But it would have been no different then, he said. “The next time,” he said, “we’ll make it more extensive.” He had held the floor 22 hours and two minutes. He and Mrs. Gonzalez, and Senator and Mrs. Kazen, went on home to bed. Later in the year, Gonzalez was filibustering again this time alone in opposition to a bill allowing local boards to close schools if they thought violence or the threat thereof could not be controlled without military troops. Gonzales talked all night long, acid when he sat down at 7 a.m., the Senate passed the bill. A total of nine segregation bills were passed in 1957. Ed. 150,000 Young Minds Feb. 21, 1958 Houston “The target today is ‘The Child’s Mind’ “` . so said Joe Worthy, a Houston-firster in education, five years ago. Since then he and the nationalist, anti-UN, pro-Citizens’ Council groups he spoke for have proved themselves as ideological marksmen. Today, with 150,000 young minds in their care, the five:to-two majority on the Houston school board are strangling social studies out of the curriculum, emphasizing Houston-area and Texas history and geography in place of international subjects, maintaining taboos against the UN, banning state-approved textbooks, and frightening teachers out of the National Education Association by the hundreds. THEY HAVE been easing conservatives into the key jobs of the system most conspicuously, G. C. Scarbrough, the acting superintendent, who is a charter member of the Citizens’ Council in Houston and with their control assured until 1960, they have launched a system-wide curriculum revision designed to sear out of the schools international values and any but a conservative approach to economics. There is evidence that some teachers who do not conform to conservative politics pay a high price for their citizenship. Jarred, as the nation was jarred, by the Sputnik symbol, the board has also stepped up its plans to restore to the curriculum the disciplined emphasis on basic skills in reading, writing, December 27, 1974 47