Populist Movement
The Great Labor Upheaval 1877
60% wage cuts and labor strife from the east led to people walking out of the job and striking across the country, including Galveston's dock workers. There, black and white laborers united against big business interests in a general strike that evolved into a protest against police brutality. Make sure to note how it ended.
Legacy of the Populist Movement
Populist movement united races because of shared economic interests. However, their defeat 1896 defeat led to the Democratic Party welcoming back former white Populists into the party. By doing so, they reunited the White vote and used the Plessy vs Ferguson ruling to enact Jim Crow legislation, separating people by racial lines
Origins
Border issues after Treaty of Guadelupe Hidalgo, Mexican Revolution 1910, and WWI led to the realization that a Mexican American identity was neccessary (why?)
Issues
Conservative democrats' resentment toward the New Deal, civil rights, the welfare state (started by the New Deal), and communism (explain)
Knights of Labor and the Farmers' Alliance
Knights of Labor advocated for working class people while the Farmers' Alliance advocated for farmers who felt the Grange did not do enough for them, politically. Knights of Labor merged with Farmers' Alliance and the Alliance carried the 8-hour message, coops, nationalized RRs message among others.
Terrell Election Laws
Elections were often undermined by open balloting and corruption at the polls. In 1903, the Terrell Election Laws established secret balloting, limited campaigning near polling place, and required primary elections for all state, district, and county elective offices. It also allowed County officials to determine voter eligibility, leading to the disenfranchisement of African Americans in various parts of the state.
Original Focus (Mexican American Citizens)
(How?) Mexican American identity spurred by returning WWI veterans. The Immigration Act of 1924 led to the initial push for civil rights and an American identity. LULAC and other organizations established to advocate for Mexican American citizens' rights
Events
Red Scare 2: Electric Bugaloo, the 1948 & 1952 Presidential Elections, the Civil Rights Movement, the 1964 Election, the anti-war protests, and the Politicization of the Evangelical Right
James Hogg
He promises to regulate railroads and land speculation which earns him the backing of the Farmers' Alliance. He wins but subsequently goes back on his word by appointing Texas big businessmen and railroad tycoons to RR Commission. They ensure that outside interests do not threaten their monopoly of the state
The White Primary Law
The White Primary Law allowed counties to dictate who voted. In 1923, the Texas legislature passed the law to explicitly bar blacks from voting in Democratic primaries. This is in retaliation to the fear of the white vote being divided between lower/working/farmer classes and big business interests. The belief was a united Black vote would have greater influence over state and municipal politics and policies than a divided White vote
Evolution of Initial Civil Rights Movement
Push for their identity as Mexican Americans to be recognized. It was spurred by De facto segregation policies. Eisenhower's Operation Wetback’s deportation program of Mexican American citizens leads to expansion of LULAC's scope
People
The New Deal initially received support from conservatives in the early to mid 1930s. However, over time VP John Nance Garner, Senator Martin Dies, and Governor Pappy O’Daniels began to push back on the programs (why?)
The People's Party
They rally around their Omaha Platform, unite black and white voters of similar class, and push candidates in state election of 1894 and 96 and the presidential election of 1896. They lost to Charles Culberson twice and William McKinley though because of voter suppression, violence, and fraud. Their defeats effectively ended the Party
Texas Democratic Party
Democratic Party claimed a private organization status, thus allowing them to decide who they allow in their Party. This allowed the legal barring of Black voters as the Democratic Party controlled their primaries, often presumed as the general election winner because of the dominance of the Democratic Party in Texas.
WWII and the G.I. Forum
Organized in Corpus Christi as a civil-rights organization devoted to securing equal rights for Mexican Americans. The first issue the forum dealt with was the failure of the Veterans Administration to deliver earned benefits through the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944. After securing those benefits, the forum addressed other concerns, such as voting rights, jury selection, educational desegregation, and advocating for the civil rights of all Mexican Americans.
Organizations
Texas Regulators and Christian American Association
Defeat and Jim Crow Society
The People's Party's defeat highlighted the merging of the lower/working/farmer black and white classes in society. The Plessy vs Ferguson ruling spurred the Jim Crow Era in which "Separate but Equal" became the law of the south. This was also done to ensure a untied vote from the lower classes could not threaten the Democratic Party's stranglehold of power in Texas
Smith v. Allwright
This court case signaled the beginning of the modern Texas Civil Rights movement. A cool dude attempted to vote in the Democratic primary in his Harris County precinct. As an African American, he was denied a ballot under the white primary rules of the time. This led to the Supreme Court decision that overturned a previous 1934 court decision and effectively ended the White Primary Law. You must note the Supreme Court's reasoning as to why the White Primary Law was deemed unconstitutional
Successful inter-movements
MAYO, PASO, Emma Tenayaca and union strikes, La Raza Unida Party, and Viva Kennedy Clubs (elaborate)
Republican Party becomes the Party of the Conservative Democrat
Governor Allan Shivers broke away from the National Democratic Party to support and sway Texas conservatives to vote Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1952. He did this, in part, because of a controversy with then-President Harry S. Truman. John G. Tower, Richard Nixon, Bill Clements election victories also important