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Oral History Interview with Lupe Salinas, 1998


Interviewee: Lupe Salinas
Interviewer: José Angel Gutiérrez, Ph.D., J.D.
Transcribers: Karen McGee, José Angel Gutiérrez and Cecilia Lugo
Date of Interview: June 18, 1997

Location of Interview: Edinburg, Texas
Number of Transcript Pages: 45
Cite this interview as Oral History Interview with Lupe Salinas, 1998 , by José Angel Gutiérrez. CMAS No. 82


Lupe Salinas

Dr. Gutiérrez: All right. We are on June 18th, 1998. We are in the courthouse of the County of Hidalgo in the 332nd District Court Room with visiting Judge, Lupe Salinas and that is the person we want to interview. You have executed the deed of gift form, and so you are doing this voluntarily. I've explained the components of this interview. And you want to start chronologically. So why don't you give us some genealogy, some biography? Who are the Salinas? Your father, your mother, your grandparents on both sides; where they came from; what are their names; why did they come to the Houston area? Your own family, your own brothers and sisters, and then your own wife and children, if any and, then well get into childhood.
Judge Salinas: Well, that very interesting. That, that covers from the 1840s that I have been able to trace back. So that would take a lot more than any hour that we might have to spend, be able to spend here. But just briefly, my roots are traced back to my parents to a small town in Nuevo Leon [Mexican state]. Melchor Ocampo [city] de Nuevo Leon. Which back in the 19... or before 1925 was known as Melchor Redondo de Nuevo Leon which is a, basically a little subdivision outside of Cerralvo. And Cerralvo being one of the oldest towns in Nuevo Leon from the 1540's. And it turns out that Melchor Ocampo was founded in 1708, but I haven't been able to go back that far, but I do sincerely believe that my roots are all traced back to the early 1700s in that little town. Seeing that my, my abuelos (grandparents), my grandparents were from there. And my great-grandparents and we were able to, for example, this past June 6th, 1998 we celebrated the Centenario (Centennial), the first one hundred years of the ancestral home, there in the town that had been handed down from the Salinas from my mother's side of the families. In the oral history paper that I just sign I hesitated to put merely, Lupe Salinas Salinas. My father,

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Arnulfo Salinas Garcia, my mother Benita Salinas Lopez. And all along I thought that maybe they were related. It is a small town that along the way sometimes first cousins, many times second cousins... And many more, more times third cousins inter marry. And it turns out that perhaps there is a belief that my parent were second cousins, but not from the Salinas, Salinas side. It turns out at my abuelo (grandfather), Reyes Salinas Lopez on daddy's side is a.... and my mother's mother Vicentita Lopez Hinojosa were in fact first.... That they were the first cousins. And therefore that would make my parents second cousins. But my virtue of different.... Other than the Salinas branch. There are many Salinas! in that area of Nuevo Leon. And my family's history indicates that, that my abuelos (Grandparents) Reyes Salinas, my daddy's parents made it somehow or another to Galveston, Texas in the 1920's while there they had some children. And for some strange reason of the Galveston climas (climates) two or three kids past away after a few months of birth. And that was the early connection that Galveston, and perhaps explains why later the route from Melchor Ocampo was somewhere already paved. And, and, and it seems like my abuelos (grandparents) were the early pioneer. To date Galveston, Texas is like a sisters city. To Melchor Ocampo, Nuevo Leon where we had so many people that when they migrate, sure many go to California, some go to Chicago, Illinois, but by and large Galveston, Texas is the link. It's sort of the, the causeway that leads into the island that is one thing, but there is a bridge between Galveston, Texas and Melchor Ocampo of four hundred and fifty mile trip or so to get there. But sometimes they do it every other weekend to go back to their roots or go get a refresh, a refreshing look at life. And it was beautiful to be there June 6th, 1998, recently except that it was a hundred and ten or a hundred and twenty degrees. But thank goodness a little water came in and, and cooled it off for the party that

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we had that, that evening. The, the more recent roots, my daddy and mother met there in Melchor Ocampo. He had been in Robstown, Texas, but then 199, 1933 depression, they decided to pack up the wagons. They loaded two Conestoga-type wagons up, got the horses hitched on, and my daddy took one because he was the oldest of the boys. In 1933 he was only twelve years old. But he and his brother Roberto, my tio (uncle) Beto drove one of the wagons and abuelito (grandfather) Reyes took the other wagon loaded up with the rest of the family. Daddy had all the, the tools that they used in sharecropping. They were sharecropping in Bloomington, Victoria area. And there they would, of course, work many deals as far as working the land and sometimes tried to perhaps maybe go get a car and sometimes in order to do that they had to work it off somehow, but I, I what I gather is that abuelito had one car one time and it broke down on him and instead of keeping it, he decided to get more shares of, of in the share cropping business. And that was a tradeoff The farmer gave the tools and in return he got the car and got it to run somehow. And, so they got more opportunities to work the land. There was a time that I understand that they made trip. Because I was wondering well, ever since you were born in Robstown 1921, I mean, was Mexico out of the picture all those twelve years? He said no. In 1926 or so I was about five or six, he tells me, we made the trip. And Nicador Aguilar from Victoria, Tejas lent a car to my abuelo. And he made the trip and he stopped in McAllen and he left the car over at tio Primitivo's (uncle Primitivo's) house and left it there while they crossed the river and got to Melchor Ocampo in some fashion. But then when they came back it turns out a couple of weeks later, they came back, to get back to work and dad tells me that they had to cross the river in the middle of the night. I said, "Wait a minute. I thought you were born in Robstown. You are a U. S. citizen." He said, "Yes,

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but your abuelito Reyes was not." And so, in 1926, 1927 they were worried about los rinches ( Texas Rangers ) working the river, los rinches being the Texas Rangers. And maybe anybody who is law enforcement was regarded as being los rinches because of the history of the community and it could have been the Border Patrol, it could have been any law enforcement agents, but to them they were all los rinches. And, and they made it back across, got back to Bloomington area and didn't return until 1933 in a trip that took them roughly twelve days to get from Bloomington, Texas to Roma, Texas, crossed over into what was then called San Pedro Del Roma, now Miguel Aleman. And waited there another four days for the, for the oxen to make the trip. Because the terrain was just too rough for the horses and by that point, of course, all horses were about to give up. And they went back, made it to El Campo and remained there. Daddy married, Dad and Mom married in 1940. And Dad started the migration back to the United States in 1944 when he landed, when he personally landed in Reynosa and then brought the family later. Reynosa being right across here the area where I am now working here in Edinburg, Texas in Hidalgo County. He then crossed over in 1945 and set up a home here in, in McAllen. And three years later, in 1948, 1 was born here in McAllen, Texas. In fact, the little barrio here in Southside called La Paloma, a very prominent neighborhood, prominent for those of us who, who loved the neighborhood and notorious in the... in the eyes of some who regard it as a, as a sort of a troublesome neighborhood. But, of course, I only saw the good side. I never saw the bad. It's still an area that I visit, that I drop by. And see the old little school house, Sam Houston Elementary where I went, must have been my kinder, kindergarten year. At the most, it could have been, been the first year, but I do remember attending there and years later in doing research on education and segregation, I

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discovered that I had attended a Mexican school. A segregated Mexican school. And McAllen was one of those communities that operated specifically designated schools for Mexican children. But nevertheless from there eventually, about five years later, the Transportation Department for the state decided that they wanted to build a highway. And they decided right to build it right over my house, my, right over our land on Quebec Street here in La Paloma. And, so we had to make a choice. Either relocate in, in the Valley or go to Galveston, Texas where my dad had been commuting to go work. And, so there comes Galveston all over again, twenty, thirty years later, after my grandparents first made some early trips to the island. Dad had already been going and commuting to go work there. And, so it was only natural that perhaps we move there. And, and, and relocate there and that's what had happened. I attended grade schools there, public schools in Galveston, Texas. I graduated in 1966 from Galveston Ball High School. Graduated with honors. I went on to the University of Houston where I studied political science and got my degree in that with an interest of going to law school. And I immediately went to law school in 1969 before getting my, my political science degree when perhaps the Viet Nam War, that was the primary explanation opened up slots since so many men were away at war. And there was room at the law school, so I got in before I finished my degree plan and was able to basically complete my undergraduate degree plan in four, in the four year program in three years. And then, was able to complete the law in, in another three years. So I was able to get out at the age of twenty three and began my legal career, being one of the younger ones in the state of Texas at that time. So I began my career with the Mexican American Legal Defense Fund in San Antonio, Texas back in 1972. And that was, shortly after, of course, much activity in the area of, of Chicano; civil rights, the creation, of

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course, of La Raza Unida Party was very prominent in those days. In fact, I think it was 1972 when I campaigned for a candidate for governor of the La Raza Unida Party, Ramsey Muniz, and other candidates that were running. And then, I went to San Antonio and began my civil rights career as an education lawyer. And there were issues galore in the area of segregation, the area of bilingual education. And here we are, what twenty six years later, we are still battling the issues of education of Latino children. And, but after awhile I had to get back to the Houston area for personal reasons. My little sister was, was ill with cancer and, and I needed to be home. So I gave up my, my civil rights career directly. And indirectly, of course, I was already of course planning to, to, you know, to get back to the area, find a job where I could become a better lawyer, and I joined the district attorney's office because they are always in trial. And, and I did join the Harris County District Attorney. I later then, after three and a half years there, went and joined the United States Attorney and worked under one of the first Mexican American federal prosecutors, Jose Antonio Canales. Tony Canales from Corpus Christi and led the prosecution of several prominent civil rights cases. One of those being the prosecution of Houston police officers who participated in the killing and the cover-up of the killing of Randy Webster. And that gave me the opportunity and the in, sort of paved the way to Washington, D. C. where Tony Canales recommended me to work as special assistant to the United States Attorney General, Benjamin Sivoleriz. And becoming the first Mexican American, the first Latino period, to, to basically have an office on the fifth floor at the Department of Justice in Washington, D. C. And it was a sad commentary that it took so many years in our nation's history. That here it was in late 1979 for them to have the first Latino to work in that area. However, I was happy to see that when I showed up for my

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first day of, at work that another Latino walks in and it turns out that Benjamin Sivoleriz, to his credit, hired the first, not the first Latino, but the first two Latinos ever. Jose Rangel came in at that point and was I proud.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Where was he from?
Judge Salinas: He was, New Mexico, or I believe it was New Mexico or Colorado, somewhere in the, in the northwestern part. And, but he had lived so many other parts of, of the states, so he was like a universal from, from all over the nation. And, in fact, shortly after that he got a job assignment in Indiana and he was with corporations. But nevertheless it was beautiful to see that. Before the 1980 was up, the, we were there under the Carter administration. And it was very clear that the Carter administration was not going to get a second term. So I returned to Houston and became head of the civil rights division for the federal prosecution for the U. S. Attorney and during that, in that leadership role was able to authorize some very key prosecutions. One of those being of a crooked sheriff in, in San Jacinito County who was basically taking over the highway. Highway 59. And stopping people that he considered to be, to be undesirables, hippies, Blacks, anybody without a state license plate, they were prime targets for, for planting drugs on them. And so, we got into an another area of planting matters or planting evidence. The Webster case had been notorious and prominent in my legal history and career because I had discovered one of the first throw down guns in the history of this nation. We knew they had been going on. But nobody had ever been able to prove it up and luckily I was able to show it. They made a movie out it entitled the Killing of Randy Webster. It was produced by CBS. And so, there was a lot of prominence there and that's like I say, what helped me get to Washington, D. C. But back over here, Sheriff Humphrey Parker was doing his wrongful deeds. And he was

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eventually caught after I authorized the investigation. The FBI moved in and, and cleaned up the place and Humphrey Parker had to do time in federal prison for his wrongs. But it was about that time that the governor of the state of Texas was looking for good candidates to appoint to state judgeships. Three new courts had been created in Houston and, of course, my friends in political circles made the recommendations. I was able to receive the attention of Governor Mark White. And Governor White appointed me September 1st, 1983 to head the 339th Criminal District Court of Harris County Texas. And after serving a year and a half in that post and running for election in the November of 1984 elections, I along with every other Democrat and roughly forty or forty-five were swept out of office in the Reagan landslide of 1984. And it was sad to see. We knew that the president was popular, but we also all realized at the local level that individuals, politics of that level should not impact upon the local courthouses. But in Houston, Harris County Texas you had the situation not only of so many contested elections. You had so many people or roughly one point two million in those years that were registered voters and you have everybody running at large trying to grab all that vote. And obviously many of us did not have the money or the, you know, just basically the general publicity to be able to mount that kind of campaign. And, and the partisan politics began to take over and now judging is based on Republican Party partisanship in, in that county. But after 1984, that election I was blessed to be able to participate full time in something I've always desired and enjoyed and that's teaching. I went to become a visiting professor at the University of Houston Law School. I taught evidence and criminal procedure. And later, after six months, so even though I enjoyed it, also missed the courtroom and I returned to downtown courthouse circles becoming chief of federal trials for the Harris County Attorney, Mike Driscoll at

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that time and served in that capacity from 1985 through 1988. But my desire to return to the bench remained. I lodged a campaign in 1988 against one of the Republican incumbents who had been swept in even though he had tried to get out of running, he tried to withdraw from the ballot, but he was two days too late and, therefore he remained. And he won anyway. And so, I took him on four years later and was able to become in the 1988 George Bush election where he was victorious. I was the only Democrat to defeat a, as a challenger, to knock out an incumbent. And I was written up at the time that after forty-five years, that was the first time in forty five years they had remembered anyone ever being able to do that. Obviously the opponent that I ran against helped a lot. He had a very, very sorry record to put it in plain English and he was out real quickly. But I served in that capacity until 1996. And in 1996 elections we saw another Republican landslide. And, of course, there was something that aggravated matters, not only the landslide, but also the fact in 1994 the district attorney of Harris County began to conduct an investigation right when I was up for federal judge. The, the politics of the time basically the, the concerns perhaps that, well more so, I'll put it plainly in my opinion, is the concerns that the district attorney had knowing that I was a very independent type thinker, I had ruled against him on occasions, they didn't like it. They took me up on matters of that had to do with my court rulings. And, in fact, at the time that the investigation against me began, the first words uttered by the district attorney was that I had... And I don't know if I can use the vernacular here, the... Basically, it's in public print, you know, his words were that I, I, his exact words were: He pissed us off. He shot the finger at us. He threatened to hold one of my prosecutors in contempt. And, of course, that's referring to me and my decision to rule on a case in court where they are parties. I was eventually ruled,

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ruled against by the high court in Austin, Texas, but that should have been the end of it. Instead it became into a retaliatory investigation where, where I end up getting accused and with all the negative publicity that that entails, that obviously assured the, the loss in the 1996 elections. As a result,. I am now a visiting judge for the state of Texas. All the accusations washed out. I am completely cleared. But when a public official is charged like that, we all know that the matter of fact is that they are always going to have to carry a, basically a taint of some sort. Where everybody is going to wonder because the front page had all the "beautiful" accusations. And I say beautiful in quotation marks, of course, all these nasty allegations hit the front page. But all the, my acquittals, my, my being cleared are nowhere to be seen on the front page. And, in fact, some of the most recent ones haven't even been publicized period. No where. But you know, I know, we know that we've done right. We know what the picture is all about where individuals in those positions seek to sort of limit certain individuals that they see as threats to the political process. And, and, and in a way I was honored, so to speak, that they thought of me so highly that they would target me in that fashion. But nevertheless it's bad government. It is dangerous. It is inhibiting of the person's ability to be free and independent especially when they are serving as judges. But I will continue in my role and serving as a judge, as a visiting judge here in Hidalgo County, Galveston County, wherever I sit to rule according to the law and the evidence. The, during the overall years I have served also as a visiting professor in the area of civil rights, teaching at the University of Houston primarily. And continue to do research in different areas, speaking at different groups on Latino politics, on civil rights issues, things of that nature. The, another area of, you know, we've talked about the, the family and

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the, the chronology. At this point I’ll open it up, so to speak, since I've talked for quite a period of time now.
Dr. Gutiérrez: There, there are some tidbits here.
Judge Salinas: Yes.
Dr. Gutiérrez: What's your father and mother's name?
Judge Salinas: Arnulfo Salinas Garcia is my father. My mother is Benita Salinas Lopez.
Dr. Gutiérrez: OK.
Judge Salinas: As a result I become Guadalupe Salinas Salinas. Professionally, I use the name Lupe Salinas. And I have, over the years, also used Lupe S. Salinas.
Dr. Gutiérrez: What brought your grandparents over to Galveston in the Twenties?
Judge Salinas: Work, of course. They were looking for, you know, different areas. They mostly worked in Bloomington area. Now what specifically got them to the island, I have been unclear about. My dad was only a, my dad was only a kid. But there in my writings I have seen, you know, the names of the three little ones who passed away on the island. I have them recorded in my personal research into my family. Andrea was one of them. And, but it's just so basically shocking to, to think of, you know, in those years, number one that they were even in that area that far away. Secondly, that, that for some strange reason of all the, what was it, twelve or thirteen kids that abuelita (grandma) had that, you know, three who died all died there on the island and may have been just pure coincidence.
Dr. Gutiérrez: The Mexican Revolution played no part of that migration?
Judge Salinas: No, these migrations were in 19..; in the early 1920s. It was the tail end of the, of the second Mexican Revolution. That was not the motive. The, the northern part of the, the country did not get that much, Mexico did not get that much of the impact of the war and the revolution. It was primarily, primarily appears to be economically

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oriented. And, and, you know, it's why we always believe that we should have these communications, these, these this research while the grandparents are still quite healthy. To, to be able to get that information, to find out why of all places or for whatever reasons, wherever they went, wherever they migrated. There is one thing we definitely, definitely know. Mexican people have migrated all over this country, all over the world and back.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Any, any other brothers and sisters?
Judge Salinas: Yes. I am one of six in the family. The oldest is Maria Luisa Salinas Del Bosque, she lives in Galveston, Texas, a teacher aide. My brother Reynol Salinas. Those two were born in Melchor Ocampo Nuevo Leon. They, he lives in Houston, Texas. He's a barber. My sister Maria Gloria Estela Salinas de Rodriguez is a restaurant owner in Houston. Her husband Rodrig, Gregorio Rodriguez came over years ago as an undocumented worker, worked in restaurants, helped those industries build up and eventually saved enough money to invest in Los Reyes of Houston. And I was happy to be a lawyer at that time where I could help him with the lease papers. And, so I take a little credit in that little operation there. In fact, we worked on all the different names, anything that would, you know, be popular and I consider Los Reyes to be a very catchy and attractive name. And thank goodness he's been in operation, they've been in operation since 1986 and still doing quite well. Then my sister Graciela Salinas lives in Galveston, Texas, works with the UTNB System, the medical branch as a clerk over there. And then, my late sister, Rosa Maria, was a college student, but she married. At the time she got married about a few months later, during her twenty first year she was discovered with a very severe case of colon cancer. And it was way too late. And by the end of the year she passed away. And that, that was the motive in my leaving San Antonio and going back to the Houston area to be close to

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the family. But those are the, the families. Now in my, in my personal case, in 1968, thirty years ago this, this August, I married Oralia of Galveston, Texas. And she and I were... have known each other since 1962 at a time when I was... knew her cousin better. And then, I meet her through her cousin. And then, before I know it, I'm, I'm more interested in, in Oralia than I am in, in her cousin. And, but that's really not anything negative to say about her prima de Oralia. (Oralia's cousin.) Oralia and I started seeing each other, and then, and like I say, while we were still in college, we were, we did something very bold. We got married at a very young age. And, and you know, we continued our educations. She, you know, promoted me and encouraged me. And I did the same to her and she became a school teacher and after fifteen years of a very lucrative career in education as an elementary school teacher, she decided to go to law school. And, and if I recall correctly, she went with a very prominent man named Jose Angel Gutierrez, same student, about the same time that the University of Houston Law Center. And I also graduated from the University of Houston Law School in 1972 so we are both from the same institution. Ori [nickname] and I had three kids. The oldest Javier Guadalupe is a third year law student at the University of Houston Law Center with an interest in international commercial law. He is currently interning for the United States Tax Court under the first Latino, Mexican American tax court justice in the nation, the Honorable Juan Vasquez of San Antonio, Texas. And he is interning there until the, for a little bit and then, for the rest of the summer of 1998 he will be interning with the International Court of Arbitration in Paris, France. On his second tour of duty in Paris, where he's also working, of course, on his French. He's quite fluent in French, but, of course, everybody always needs more and more practice. So he'll be going back for another round, and then, returns in August of

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September 1998 to finish his last year where he will simultaneously obtain his Masters of Business Administration from the University of Houston. And my second child, Aaron Benjamin, is a, is now twentythree. He's a student at St. Thomas University where he's studying the psychology. He is a full time worker with the Harris County Probation Department and hopefully will soon go full time and try, you know, to get college finished because he also has interest in law school. My youngest is, and only other child, is Lorie Rene. She is a sophomore student at Trinity University, San Antonio, Texas where she is currently in a pre-med program. But, you know, there's, she's still at the early stages of her career in college. That might change, but she has expressed quite a bit of interest in medicine. We do not know definitely that it will not be law based upon on what she has seen her mother go through, her father go through, and her brother and, and then, obviously what her other brother works into. It's law related all the way, so she wants a break from the law field and, and we don't, but we are not going to quarrel with that.
Dr. Gutiérrez: When were you born?
Judge Salinas: I was born July 29th, 1948 here in McAllen, in McAllen, Texas here in Hidalgo County. I, I consider my mother one of the early feminists. She decided to deliver me at home. And, in fact, all of her children with the exception of one. Well, I take it back. They were all born at home if I understand it correctly. No, there was one born in the hospital, but the four were born with parteras, with midwifes. And, and the, and the fifth was born at home also, but a doctor decided to, I guess she decided to call the doctor in here in McAllen, but she was one of the early feminists in my book.
Dr. Gutiérrez: When did you graduate from high school?
Judge Salinas: Class of 1966, Galveston Ball.
Dr. Gutiérrez: When did you graduate from U of H?

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Judge Salinas: Undergraduate, August 1970, Political Science degree, graduated with honors, cum laude graduate.
Dr. Gutiérrez: What prompted you to go to college or who instilled that or when did you first think that you wanted to go to college?
Judge Salinas: I was in the, my eighth grade and we were in American History class and Miss Macmillan was asking questions about, you know, where do you plan to go to college or where do you plan to go? And everybody was standing up when they, when they come their turn. And I was very uncomfortable sitting there because I knew, since we lived in a housing project, by definition that's for individuals of very limited means, and to me college meant money. It costs a lot. And it does. And I never saw the realistic side of going to college. I was not necessarily then, I didn't realize that I had potential, but that question made me uncomfortable. Because I didn't know what to tell her when it came my turn. And, you know, basically I said, "I didn't know. I didn't know what to do because my parents could not afford it." That was my response. And she said , "Well, I'll talk to you later. There are all sorts of programs that can help." And that was the eighth grade. In the ninth grade there were some teachers, Mr. Posalo, Charles Posalo and Miss Francis Shoop. They took me to the side and they said, "Lupe, we are going to nominate you for the National Junior Honor's Society." And right there, that act of confidence from those two teachers did something to me. I mean, after that people basically, they had to get out of my way because I was going to succeed. Once I knew that these two individuals had, you know, that confidence in me. And that's been like 1963. It's thirty-five years. And recently, thirtyfive years after that happened, I saw a man in a restaurant and he was so happy to see me. He said, "Do you remember me? I'm Charles Posalo." I was so blessed. I had my wife and my three kids with me. Excuse me. Because, you know, this was the man that had, had

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basically shown that confidence that I could do it. He and Miss Shoop. And I proudly stood up and I said, "Mr. Posalo," and after giving him the good Mexican abrazo (hug) I said, "I want you to meet my kids." And I told the kids, "This is the man that opened the doors, that opportunity, that, that confidence that we all need to succeed in life." And so, he was very, of course, happy to, to see us. We got his number. We will be, you know, getting in touch. The problem is that I am always out of the area. I'm always traveling to go to work and that makes a normal lifestyle very, very difficult to maintain.
Dr. Gutiérrez: What prompted you, and when did that happen, to go to law school?
Judge Salinas: I started out my freshman year, September 1966 at the University of Houston. I arrived with a class that included my college group, soon to be college roommate, Jorge Rangel who is now a very prominent lawyer, former State District Judge, and soon, and hopefully in the near future Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge. He's under nomination and consideration by the United States Senate. But Jorge was... Knew already he wanted to go to law school. I was a math major at that time. I wanted to work at NASA, the space industry, the, was all very, very prominent at that time as it is, of course, more so, now. But after my first semester of calculus where I made an A and I didn't understand how I made the A, I became, I, I got worried. That summer I went to Alvin Junior College and took government classes so I wouldn't have to take United States Government in the huge auditorium at the University of Houston with three or five hundred students. I wanted to have a little bit more hands on approach. And I was in a class with thirty or thirty-five students at Alvin Junior College. And all the matters they were discussing I was one of the ones in class that could answer, respond, especially when they discussed constitutional law classes or cases rather. And it was at that time that Marilyn Miller, a friend of mine from Galveston Ball

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High suggested to me strongly that I should consider a career in law? Because she, in her opinion, saw that, that I was, had that ability, that, that ability to interpret the cases and, and, and understand what the law was all about. And I appreciated that. And that summer I, I wrote to Jorge, my, at his home in, in Alice, Texas, and in Alice told Jorge that I had made up my mind that I was going to change my major, that I was going to political science. Jorge tells me he still has that letter in his possession. And, and that's where I began the, the efforts and changed to political science. And, and that's where, of course, before I even got my degree the University of Houston put out a notice, the law center did, the law school, that they had openings for individuals that had more than ninety hours of school work. And luckily I was in that category and in February of 1969 I entered in the Spring semester of that term and began my, my law school.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Was the law school, at that time, in the basement of the Cullen Building?
Judge Salinas: Yes. The, when I first began the Spring semester of 1969 was the last semester that the law school was in basement at the M.D. Anderson Library and that's where, where it was housed. Obviously years ago, the law school was in some barracks, army barracks when they first began in 1947. But by that point, 1969, they, they had a little better quarters, but it was in the basement and it was very, you know, very small. But at that time the new building, the, what they call now the Bates Building, Teaching Unit #1 in it's current location at the University of Houston Law Center, that was under construction. And that September of 1969, we moved to that new building. And I began my second semester there.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Were there any women in law school when you entered?
Judge Salinas: There were, there were very, very few. There were, I'd say of the, the class, I would put it at about five percent or less.

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Dr. Gutiérrez: Were there any Blacks?
Judge Salinas: There were about three in the total group and they were, as far as Mexican Americans, we only had about six in the whole law school.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Do you remember who they were?
Judge Salinas: I can rattle off a few names. Juan Manuel Ramirez, who is here in Edinburg, Texas, as a Master in the court system. Handles family matters. Gene, Genaro Gene Garcia of Corpus Christi, excuse me, Kingsville, later practiced law in, in Corpus Christi. We had Fortunato, Pete Benavides who was here from the Valley who later, is now currently on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Those were four. We had a, a Mexican res... native, Humberto Coon, who came from Mexico City, but you know, he was not, you know, he was basically in the foreign student type program and a very, very well to do young man and he came in. I don't know if he ever finished. Those were four that come to mind. There was another, about the next semester we had, I'm trying to remember if it was the summer of, if it was September of 1969, no it was 1970. June 1970 when we had another flock of, of really a good number of, of Latino students compared to what we had before. And that's when we got Ramon Garcia came in. Ramon Garcia who's a very prominent attorney here in, in Edinburg, Texas here in the Valley. Was at that time a, a student who had come in under the CLEO program. Ramon Garcia scored such a low score on his admissions test, very similar to mine. I had scored a little bit higher, but I was able, luckily, to get in apparently with my 3.3 GPA in, in political science. And nevertheless Ramon could barely qualify so he had to qualify under what's called the Continuing Legal Education Opportunity program. CLEO program. And that program allowed certain students to compete during the summers and if they could make it in that summer The CLEO program, then, they, the law school would admit them. Ramon

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did that. He competed in the program, made very good grades. He then got accepted to law school. And two and a half years later he's out as a member of the, the Order of the Coif, the Honor Society, for the law school because of his high grades. And, and basically that's just an example. Of course, it's one, but there's so many success stories like that of individuals who just given the opportunity can compete. Just because they had perhaps inadequate education along the way should not be the barrier to keep them when they show independence and signs of progress or, or of success. And Ramon definitely did. And, of course, he's been one of the most prominent lawyers in civil cases in this area.
Dr. Gutiérrez: When did you learn that you were a Mexican?
Judge Salinas: From the very beginning. My first recollections of childhood in La Paloma, McAllen, Texas, everything was pretty much in Spanish. In fact, I don't independent recall. I know I got in trouble in my first days at school and I was being kept after school. I can't, of course, state that it was definitely because I got chastised for speaking Spanish. But I know that my sisters often complained about that. They were older and they could remember better and at that school, Sam Houston Elementary, the No Spanish rule was in full effect. Punishment was somewhat rampant as far as the teachers and the administrators. And so, I remember that I had to, to stay, well, they threatened to hold me after school. And I remember crying and crying and crying because to me in my limited abilities in the English language, to me that sounded like I was going to be locked up over night in the, in the school. And so, of course, I think they probably regretted threatening me like that after as much crying as I probably did. But everything from the very beginning we were always going to Mexico. The grandparents still lived there, on both sides of the family so the 1950s, I spent most of my summers in Mexico. Cutting the corn in the fields, getting the

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blisters that were customary for those of us who were not accustomed to doing field work. Working there alongside my abuelo Reyes and my tio Ramiro going to the goat to, with, with the shepherd, El Pastor to, to tend to the goats, and then, at the end of the day to try to milk the goats and things of that nature. Or working, you know, different, different things that they had to do in the ranch communities and the, the farm communities as those towns are in Mexico.
Dr. Gutiérrez: When did you learn that being Mexican was bad according to some?
Judge Salinas: I, I don't think I ever, I knew that there was negative treatment as to Mexicanos. I always asked the question in my mind. And many times wondering out loud with my parents, porque, porque, porque (why, why, why)? Why is it? Like in 1955 when we went to Bryan, Texas to pick cotton. And we were not regular migrants. My daddy had done it. He didn't want it for us. He had seen what it did to a lot of families, as far as, school disruptions and he was concerned about it. Many migrants are able to go to the fields, and then, come in, oftentimes, late after school starts in September and are able to catch up and cope. Dad was just afraid that that would affect us or he did not want to do that. But one summer he did take us to the cotton fields in Bryan, Texas primarily I think to teach us that it was best to get an education as opposed to having to live the life that he led and his brothers had led and many of his family still leads of having to go out to the crops wherever they might be, wherever the work might be, whether it's Oregon or Bakersfield, California or going up north or whatever the case. And so, we went that summer and what I saw is what began to infect me. Why is it that all the cotton pickers were Blacks or Mexicans? Where were the whites? And eventually, of course, we saw the whites, but they were in positions where they were collecting money, and or paying out the little bit of money that you would get for filling up a big sack of algodon(cotton), of cotton.

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And, and that was the beginning of the why's. Why is it that our society is such that there is so much segregation, there's so much discrimination, there's so much lack of opportunity? We see it at, you know, the early days at the University of Houston, ten years after that. When hanging around there going to school there and you see all the workers taking care of the plants on the campus and beautiful work that they did. All Mexicanos, all of Mexican descent. And then, you go into the cafeteria and they are all African American. And you go into the halls of administration and they are all Anglo American. And, and you have all these separations and it's not right. But obviously when we look at the history, we understand the why's now that we are a little bit more educated. But the why's as a kid, the innocent why's perhaps are a little bit more, oh perhaps, meaningful in the sense that that's the perspective of innocence. We know a lot more now, of course.
Dr. Gutiérrez: In junior or high school did you have any leadership role?
Judge Salinas: Yes. Earlier when you asked the question about when did you, you know, did you ever feel or when did you feel that it was bad to be Mexican. I started turning things around in my mind after I saw all those experiences in Bryan. And saw other things like waiting in the bread lines, so to speak, go getting the welfare assistance in the late Fifties, early Sixties in well, in fact it was the late Fifties because I remember vividly it was the last years of the Eisenhower administration. And we had to go to the Department of Agriculture and get the, the cheese and the tanned horse meat, the powdered milk, the powdered eggs, and it was very distasteful, but nevertheless it was something. We were hungry, we had to eat. And that was another time that I saw differences, you know. The why's of why is it only minorities primarily that are there? And it's surely not because we don't work because we work our butts off. So that's not the reason.

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They can throw that out all they want, but that's not the reason. Sure, there are some that want to be freeloaders. But for them, don't punish all the other innocent people. It's not right. It's not fair. But the, when I got to junior high, when I got that surge of sort of confidence built into me by my teachers I did get a few little awards there when I left the ninth grade and went onto the tenth grade at the, at the high school. When I got to the high school, I guess I was in the end of my junior year, we... And some seniors came to me and wanted me to run for president of the student council. The seniors were individuals that might be known in these, in these oral histories or at least in the area of civil rights. One of them was a good friend of mine named Inez Hernandez. Inez Hernandez later became a professor of English. She's currently teaching in California State University of Fresno. And the other individual was Al Kauffman who is currently regional counsel for the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund. And Al and Inez came to me and urged me to run for president of the student council. And up to that point I had no interest at all in being a candidate for anything much less president. So I, after I saw how serious they were, that they wanted to leave the school with what they considered to be in good hands and I made a deal with them. That I would run, not for president, but at least for vice president, and so, we compromised. And I let two other guys fight it out for president. And as it turned out the fellow that won the presidency was way too smart to have any common sense. And way too smart to be interested in the mundane matters of running student government and ended up pretty much absenting himself from leadership. And as a result, the vice president, in the absence of the president takes over. So I became the de facto president of the student council at Galveston Ball High from 1965 - 1966. All at the urging of those two good friends who pushed me into, to that. But when I ran for student

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council president, vice president rather, I campaigned on a slogan that I would promise to bring more bailes (dances) is the way I put it to. And, mind you, the Mexican American population or student body numbers were only around fifteen percent. We had just started the first efforts at freedom of choice in 1965 so we had about twenty African Americans from Central High School who had come over to Galveston Ball High on the freedom of choice. So their numbers were quite, quite small. Latinos, Mexicanos, primarily, were fairly noticeable, but it was only about fifteen, twenty percent at the most. But still I threw that out that we would have, if I get elected president we will have more bailes (dances) in the school cafeteria. That's where we would have our dances. And furthermore that I would, everybody loved the enchiladas that they made on Fridays, that I would urge the school administration to serve enchiladas more regularly. And, so, while it was swell, I, of course, was running a serious campaign at the same time thought I would show that there's room for a little humor in the entire process. And somehow or another 1 was able to win the election against two other opponents, two Anglos who ran against me or ran in the same race. And I was able to win without a runoff. I attribute that in great part to the leadership efforts of Al Kauffman and Inez Hernandez who no doubt urged their seniors to vote for me on their way out. And it was, it was accomplished. But those, you know, we began to see a, a lot of that. In 19, a couple of years later, well it was in those years that Cesar Chavez began the, the grape boycott. And he was featured on Time magazine I believe it was, front page coverage of the "Grapes of Wrath" and the, the stories of the, the, the farm workers. And I began to get independent, perhaps corroboration as to the, the things that had been bothering me. And it was at that time that I decided I am going to start learning more about my people, about Raza, about Chicanos,

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about Mexican Americans, about all issues dealing with Latinos and somewhere, '67 or '68 I began to cut newspaper articles out. And you know, sometimes I get chastised for leaving things all around the house, but nevertheless that was of a collection. People don't understand that sometimes that effort can, can really build some good information, some good knowledge, and good sources of topics and of, of... Anytime you want to correct somebody over the history of some incident or event, you've got the proof right there going back to the 19.., late Sixties, when I began this effort. And those are the same kind of things that helped me along the way when I got to the law school. Those issues like school desegregation are what really opened the doors of opportunity for me. Because I was able to compete for the Law Review. I did not have the grades directly to get onto the law review by invitation, but I challenged them to give me an opportunity to write and I wrote, they accepted my article on school desegregation of Mexican Americans. In, in 1970 I began it and in 1971 it was published. And with that I became an associate editor on the Houston Law Review.
Dr. Gutiérrez: What is leadership?
Judge Salinas: Leadership, it's obviously very difficult to comprehend. But there's one thing that I can say. I felt all along, perhaps after I got thrown into the student council situation, I didn't want it. I had never expected to be doing anything like that, but nevertheless I've always been in a situation where I've offered my services. That is one way to look at leadership. I've done different things to help out in communities. Two years before that, you know, when they needed somebody to go to the hospital to help with kids that, in one specific example, a kid had lost both, both arms. A kid from Guatemala, he had no family here. He spoke only Spanish. So they asked for volunteers and I said, "Sure, I'll go." And I ended up being the, the

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kid's interpreter and his hands. Because he couldn't move the, the chess pieces. So, I've always wanted to help and I've done other things in that arena. But then, of course, it gets into a different level when you then make the commitment like student council., And then, later, of course, when we were at the University of Houston undergraduate in 1970, I was active in the then called League of Mexican American Students, known by the acronym LOMAS. LOMAS later, a few of us in 1970, I think it was May of 1970, decided that we were going to change the name of the organization. The organization LOMAS had a somewhat of a reputation of being more social than political. More party than action. And we, many of us began to see that we needed to do more in our communities. And, so we converted and changed the name to MAYO. The Mexican American Youth Organization in, in around 1970. I was also active at that time with the, what was called in Houston, the Barrio MAYO located in the north side where a group that was a lot more militant than any of us college students ever dreamed we would ever be. But it was two different, perhaps, approaches. One at the educational institutional level, the other more at the grossest level, the Barrio MAYO. But I basically worked in both. And, and then, of course after that there was, there was a comment on the question about leadership. One thing that I've always seen as I've gone through my life and done different things and worked in groups like, not only MAYO, but IMAGE, the Incorporated Mexican American Government Employees group that was seeking to get more people in, in government work. Our, the Mexican American Bar Association of which I was one of the founders in 1972. One of the very first things I did as a lawyer, two weeks later in fact, was to sign on and charter the Mexican American Bar in Houston, the first such organization in Texas. And, but all those situations were things in me that said I have

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been blessed by the Lord to have the ability to be educated, to know, to be able to articulate to some extent. And to hopefully be able to speak on behalf of individuals that were either afraid or felt powerless based upon their job situation. And needed somebody to get out there to do the either the dirty work or the, the fighting or the speaking on their behalf, whatever the case may be. That's why we created Mexican American Bar known as MABA and that's why I've been active in other groups. But, I basically say if a person has those abilities and does not exercise them in a leadership role. And the ability to either, by definition, lead others or to speak for others or to stand in the place of others, to be sure that they are heard fully then they are basically cheating themselves and cheating the rest of society.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Who is the most effective Mexican American leader today?
Judge Salinas: Today? Well, it's a tough one to answer here in 1998. You could have asked me that a few years ago and I would've said that Henry Cisneros was the most effective in the sense of begin able to rally people by talking, by explaining things, by sending a message that people will basically say yes, yes, yes. And do whatever might be required and maybe inspire them through that process to get more involved in the political process. You know, today it's a, it's hard for me because I'm, I'm sort of involved in the process where I was, in my book, taken down. I was affected. I was hurt. Henry, because of whatever may have happened, Henry Cisneros, he's been affected. And he's obviously facing a very serious accusation in federal court. And that will be going to trial sometime in the near future. Houston City Councilman, many of whom individuals that I respected as leaders and I, to a great extent, still do are caught up in an accusation of bribery. The, and in that process of course, there's so many people that are just basically many of us, many people are afraid because of all the things that are happening in recently in regards to government and

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investigations and accusations. And I'm afraid that's going to hurt, you know, leadership, basically individuals wanting to be out there as leaders. Sure they are going to step forward, but will be getting the best, perhaps, candidates that can best articulate on behalf of the, the Latino community? I don't know.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Which, which is the most effective Mexican American organization today?
Judge Salinas: The most effective in my book is the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund. They were created in 1968 and since then they have been consistently fighting for that perspective, that goal of equal justice under the law. Fairness and have always been there no matter what the battle was to try to right the wrongs. On another hand, there's also a very effective organization, the Legal United Latin American Citizens. LULAC has been in existence since the 1920s. They have been very effective, you know. I, I've never been a member of LULAC. I primarily want to do my leadership activities through the Mexican American Bar and through MALDEF. And there were times that the bickering, infighting, whatever the case may be, sometimes just bothered me. And while I fully support the actions and the, the, the activities and the goals of LULAC, I've just not been active because I wanted to do my work through the legal arena.
Dr. Gutiérrez: So I take it you don't belong to Mexican American civil rights groups and organizations?
Judge Salinas: I have been, I'm a member of the, formerly the Mexican American Democrats of Texas, now known as, and primarily as Tejano Democrats. I've been active with that group since around the 1980s. I can't remember exactly if that's about when they started, but my recollections is from the very inception. And there's, I mean, there's leaders that I admire. I hope my hesitance earlier does not suggest that, that surely I can't think of any one that's not it. There are people

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that I admire that are good such as Senator Gonzalo Barrientos. And there are other individuals who are quite capable, that have always been out there fighting on behalf of our, our communities. And I guess because of the proximity, the question in the proximity, there is so many negative things that have been going on and headlines in the Houston Chronicle. For example, about three or four weeks ago talking about the great number of, the large number of Hispanics in Houston, Texas and yet where are the Hispanic leaders? Those kind of things hurt and they are very disconcerting, but nevertheless I do believe that with time that will heal. We will get back on our focus and we do need, what we do need individuals that can carry the ball because you know, all communities need that type of leadership to be able to carry them along. Individuals just acting alone, while they can all go out to vote, that's fine, but there's sometimes before a vote that a lot of dangerous things can occur as are occurring in California with these initiatives that the people get all worked up about and go out to vote on. And basically have very, very harmful long term effects.
Dr. Gutiérrez: What is the most pressing issue facing Mexican Americans today?
Judge Salinas: Education has al, has been and regretfully continues to be, in my book, the most pressing matter from all levels. There are still those individuals that even in programs that have bilingual education the quick reaction to, to the problems so to speak is, you know, get rid of it. It doesn't work. Well, the problem is that in many of those programs they are not doing it as they are supposed to accomplish it. And the resources have to be applied. There are kids from, they come from all sorts of different backgrounds and you cannot take each kid and say well, you're of Mexican descent. And you speak Spanish, therefore this is the way we are going to do it because that's not the way it works. A kid may have come from a ranch community and his father may have been coming over here for years and years working in

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the fields or working in factories, working wherever. And has built up citizenship or, or residency rather, and is able to bring them over finally. But they have come over from this ranch where the education was very, very weak due to economic or other circumstances. And so, those kids don't have the, the, the foundation necessarily to come in and start learning; whereas a child that comes in from a more urban community such as Monterrey, Mexico or Reynosa or other towns where the education may be a little bit better. And more organized, may already have their foundation, their cognitive skills, may be able to better go from reading in Spanish to reading in English. And at that process, we have found that those over the years I have seen that those types of students are able to bridge from Spanish to English a lot quicker than the child that needs to get the fundamentals even in Spanish. But these opponents don't understand that and they think we are trying to teach the kids Spanish to make us a Quebec Province from the southern part of the United States. And they are afraid of, of the matters that occur in Canada where the French-Canadians want to or allegedly want to rebel and, and split from, from the rest of Canada. That's not going to happen here, at least not any time in the next fifty years that I can foresee. But all these concerns that people have.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Did you ever go to the military?
Judge Salinas: I did not go to the military.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Reservist, National Guard?
Judge Salinas: No military at all.
Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. This is a compound question. What are the underpinnings of tension between Chicanos and a) Blacks, b) Mexicanos from Mexico, c) other Latinos, Cubans, Puerto Ricans, Central Americans?
Judge Salinas: That's a tough one. The, much of it has to do with the way, the way I see it. First of all, we are in this situation with very poor opportunities overall in getting good education. Yes, we all go through and we go

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through the school system and we get educated to some extent. Not everybody gets the same degree of education obviously. We all have to deal with that and then go from there. But once we then get into the competitive arena such as either, well mostly college, then we start cutting and dealing with limited resources. That's where most of the sort of battle begin. And, and I'm talking right now specifically the native Mexican American citizen and the African American citizen. The, and then, of course, the Anglo American. We have the battle of Affirmative Action where limited resources are being looked at and who is going to get to participate in those slots or those admissions, whatever the case may be. And that's where much of the hostility arises. There are obviously some schools will make room for minorities through one method or another whether they call it affirmative action or they call it diversity or they say, you know, they are going to look at different factors to decide who they want as students. And eventually the, the numbers are going to be such that everybody is going to have friction. And we have seen that already. When more Mexican Americans get admitted because of some factors that, that Blacks don't have, then they become angry that we Mexican Americans are taking their spots. And Anglos become angry when minorities take, get certain acceptances, they think, they argue that they are, that those slots are their slots. And obviously we're always going to have this, this battle, this problem, this friction because there will never be slots for everybody to go around. Never, never as far as I can see. It's just like there will probably never be one hundred percent full employment in this nation. We always are, you know, we may be at the best we are now and in the history of this nation at three point nine or four percent employment, but it's, no one's ever recognized that there will ever be full, full employment. The, as far as, as the friction entre latinos (within Latins), with Mexican American

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citizens and others versus recent immigrants, historically that's always been there. There's always the, the concern with some individuals who are established, that, that are doing well that the continuing migration of nationals of Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, y (and) Nicaragua are always going to perpetuate the discriminatory attitudes of the dominant population. The Anglo American population. That's been there and that's been the case, but that in turn causes even conservative Mexican Americans to berate, to use the term wetbacks, to use the term mo... esos mojados, things of that nature derogatorily against individuals that have risked their lives coming to this nation to seek a better world whether escaping economic hardship or military problems, uprisings, things of that nature. But the, the, the frictions there, it's going to continue. Another part that creates a lot of the friction and I see it in my work that we see so much individuals that cross over and are in engaged in large scale criminal activity. Years ago, they used to make that argument, but the evidence was not there that in let's say, the period of the 1950s and the 1960s. There were the, the Anglo critics of Mexican migration would always talk about all the crime that that brought. And by and large, the statistics indicated that those people that would migrate, that would come over to work, were working people, hard working people. Yes, they had their share of driving while intoxicated, cases just like Anglos did, just like anybody else did. But when you looked at whether or not they were engaged in large scale organized crime or drug trafficking or things of that nature, you could pretty much say not anything other than anybody else might. And hardly was it noticeable. However now, working different, I'd say since 19, perhaps the late Eighties, early Nineties, that we have seen more and more of it. People that are getting into this country illegally. Many of those individuals are engaging in narcotics traffic, prostitution, kidnappings, all sorts of ugly

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things. And there is no question that's going to naturally create friction between Mexicanos, Mexican American citizens, and, and Blacks and Anglos also against those individuals that appear to be bringing in all this additional crime. And that unfortunately will create sort of a targeting or a stereotyping that all migrants, all immigrants, especially the undocumented are individuals that are just bringing this country more and more problems.
Dr. Gutiérrez: When you were appointed judge, district judge, can you tell me about the appointment process? Did you go interview; who interviewed you; what did they ask; how did that work out?
Judge Salinas: Yes, in, I immediately, as soon as I heard that there were court openings, new courts created by the legislature, I went and visited with Marc Campos, special assistant to Governor Mark White. I also visited with State Representative, I am saying state rep, he may have already been on the city council, Ben Reyes who had been state representative and knew the governor quite well. And those were the two primary individuals that I, along with State Representative Al Luna, to seek the support and they extended the support on my behalf. And as a result of that Governor White nominated me, appointed me rather to that court. But they were invaluable at the time.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Did somebody interview you? Did somebody from the governor's office talk to you or it was just Marc Campos?
Judge Salinas: It was, there was no direct agent that would say, you know, IND appointments person for the, for the governor. Although Marc Campos was the point person. And I, of course, excuse me, I of course, provided all my, my resume, my, any other papers that they might need. Marc already knew me so he knew my background, but obviously he had to, you know, sell me along the way. Ben Reyes knew other people that knew the governor, Walter Mischer, a very prominent businessman in, in Houston. While I do not know what

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exactly happened there, I was informed that Mr. Reyes had informed Mr. Mischer that, that I was a candidate that the leadership of Houston was behind. And I gave Mr. Mischer a call, a courtesy call, thanked him for any support. Of course, assuming that he had in fact supported me. And Mr. Mischer informed me that he had just talked to the governor to try to shift to Mr. Mischner's accent, that he had just talked to Governor White day before and not, for me not to worry, that I was in like a burglar. And, and...
Dr. Gutiérrez: Bad choice of words.
Judge Salinas: Exactly. I told him that, Mr. Mischer, I’m a little concerned with that terminology since this is a criminal court appointment. And, but we got a good laugh out of that and but he, the way he put it, you know, it was, it was a done deal. And that made me feel better and sure enough, within two to three weeks, I get the formal word that the governor was appointing me.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Compare and contrast that with the federal judgeship that almost happened.
Judge Salinas: The federal judgeship goes through a process of, of really, you go to the, either the senator in charge. And since we did not have a senator, the Democratic party at the time, when Senator Lloyd Bentsen became treasury secretary dropped out from that position therefore we lost a key person in the appointment process, so we had to then figure out who is the next person in line. And it was stated that. ..There was confusion at the beginning whether not it would be the senior Democrat in the House of Representatives who was Congressman Jack Brooks with forty years of tenure or whether it would be a combination between the senior congressman and the governor who happened to be a Democratic.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Well wasn't Krueger in already? Wasn't he appointed already?
Judge Salinas: Krueger had been,

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Dr. Gutiérrez: He was appointed right away.
Judge Salinas: was in but before, at that time, he had made some decisions that did not include me. I was allegedly in with Krueger. But then this is where all the friction comes in between ethnic groups. The word was that Blacks had pretty much threatened to go fishing on June 5th, 1993, a date that you probably remember quite well for obvious reasons. And, and sure enough everybody went fishing that day. I think the turnout for the vote was something like three to five percent of the total vote for the state of Texas and Krueger did make it. Kay Bailey Hutchinson, I believe, got into a runoff or somebody did. Whatever the case was, the Blacks threatened that if, and they used their political clout as they should, something we need to learn to do. And or had begun to learn to do, and basically I was in one minute, I was the front runner in the screening committee, I along with Alice Oliver Parret and we were the top two for the two slots. And then, low and behold, when it came down to the date of the announcement in Austin, Texas I never received a call to go there. Instead I did get a call from Krueger saying Lupe, I'm calling you from, I'm flying over Texas, and, on the campaign and he said I just wanted to let you know that you were way up there, but you know, it didn't happen this time. You know, hang in there for the next time. And I told him yes, you know, Senator. I understand, I understand what you had to do. And of course, deep down inside I didn't. I rated the top, you know, in that committee, but nevertheless, you know, things worked out the way they did and that was that process.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Who got appointed?
Judge Salinas: Vanessa Gilmore. She was a member of the committee that had interviewed me and apparently because the African Americans that had interviewed were not sufficiently regarded by the committee, apparently the committee asked Vanessa Gilmore to apply and

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interviewed before the committee. And Vanessa Gilmore received the, the, the appointment or nomination by the senator. But then my process later came up for another opening and that's when Congressman Jack Brooks became involved and he fully supported me and went to bat and that's when the district attorney jumped me in the middle of the. The FBI had just about finished the investigation and then that's when they came in on me and started raising election code questions regarding the raising or the expenditure funds.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, when was the first consideration; what year?
Judge Salinas: That was 1993.
Dr. Gutiérrez: And the second one?
Judge Salinas: 1994.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Back to back?
Judge Salinas: Yes.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, you want to talk about how you were taken down?
Judge Salinas: I pretty much have already stated that. I don't think, you know, I don't want indigestion to set in anymore. It's, as I've said, it was all basically, I think as the, as the objective record will show, it was retaliatory. It was an effort to, to basically get even with the judge who ruled independently. And, yes, they, they went and dug through all my campaign records, they went and dug through all my political bank accounts, my personal account, my wife's lawyer account. Had no business going in there. But they were just hoping to find some evidence because they had to justify the lengthy investigation they conducted. They went ahead and indicted me. And on charges alleging misstatements in my election code reports, alleging failure to keep records. I was acquitted of the records. And the judge threw out the misstatement accusations as being unfounded and not even based on law under the election code. So all that was thrown out. All that's been cleared but once again, the damage was done.

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Dr. Gutiérrez: Who was your lawyer?
Judge Salinas: I started off with George Parnham, a good friend of mine.
Dr. Gutiérrez: How do you spell that?
Judge Salinas: P-A-R-N-H-AM. George Parnham of Houston and later because George Parnham was in, in the potential position to be a lawyer for my defense, not a lawyer, a witness for my defense. I needed to keep him available for that and I then hired Dick Deguerin to take over and handle the trial. And, once again, we were ready to call George in case we needed him, but after they put on the ninety minute show. For two and a half years of digging up paper, paper, paper, in ninety minutes they presented their case and my lawyer didn't even bother to turn to me and say you know, and ask, you know, whatever we might do or to discuss the matter with me. He immediately stood up, since the state had put on nothing that would be incriminating under the law, and rested. And the judge quickly acquitted me of the accusations. But once again, it was a done deal. It was all the damage was done. I had lost the election and I, you know, now in this new role of visiting judge.
Dr. Gutiérrez: How much money did that cost you to defend yourself?
Judge Salinas: It was a total of, it's in the neighborhood of fifty some odd thousand over these, you know, misdemeanor allegations that arised over the alleged mis, misspending of a hundred and ninety three dollars, I believe it was.
Dr. Gutiérrez: So, is it fair to say that...
Judge Salinas: In political funds.
Dr. Gutiérrez: ...this fifty thousand dollar legal bill pretty much ruined you financially?
Judge Salinas: Luckily we were able to use political funds for defense of those kind of matters. But what it did, it took money that should have been going for political purposes and had to be used for defense purposes. And

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obviously limited my abilities in the 1996 election. And those lawyers that worked so hard on my behalf, George Parnham, Dick DeGuerin, also who handled my appeal because the state kept appealing everything even if they lost lawsuits, they would take me to the Court of Appeals. If they lost there, they would go to the Court of Criminal Appeals in Austin, so all that cost money and those lawyers still are owed a lot, but obviously I'm not financially able. And I'm not, I don't have a political fund now that I can afford it and I've got, with three kids in college, you obviously do not have the, I don't have the ability. I need to educate my kids. I don't, you know, regardless of their age, I am still morally obligated because that's what my wife and I believe in is the education of our children so that they can be independent. Obviously, I got educated and I was independent, but not enough. Obviously. because the powerful district attorney of Harris County can take down anyone he wants if, if and when he decides that he is ready to move on them.
Dr. Gutiérrez: This is Wendall Odom?
Judge Salinas: Odom. 0-D, O-D-O-M.
Dr. Gutiérrez: OK.
Judge Salinas: His dad was a former justice on the Court of Criminal Appeals.
Dr. Gutiérrez: So, what was the estimate of how much money you still owed the lawyers?
Judge Salinas: The, I would put it at about, about ten thousand or total of, total of thirty five thousand is still owed. And, hopefully they'll either be patient or that they will, with all the great publicity they got in defending me and representing me, maybe they picked up so much more business that they've forgotten about my bills.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Do you think Hispanic political figures and, and prominent figures are being targeted?

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Judge Salinas: I am concerned that that is, there is a pattern that when we start moving up and become individuals that challenge the status quo, that challenge the, getting the piece of the pie that's left. That there's all this inactivity to start criticizing, to start cutting down individuals that are, we regard as leaders. And all of a sudden, we are held and we've always been held to a much higher standard of, of duty, of, of conduct, of character. And, and now though it's, we've seen so many of those types of situations where all of a sudden we are being criticized for this or for that. And obviously it starts hurting our own internal community when we start seeing these things and people begin to believe that with the mere accusation alone, well maybe he did it. Maybe he is on the take. Maybe all these things that start disenchanting our community and start basically turning them off to the political process.
Dr. Gutiérrez: I've got three questions remaining. Let's go back to a happy time. The election you won for district judge, how much money did you raise; how did you campaign; how many volunteers did you have; how did you win? How did you manage to pull that off and knock out an incumbent?
Judge Salinas: The 1988 election, I raised roughly fifty thousand dollars political funds. That's for Harris County race, believe it or not, it's not that much. It is about half the amount. In 1984 for example, I raised eighty eight thousand dollars and spent it all and got, got whipped with the Reagan landslide. 1988 I said I am going to try a different approach. I hate to say it, but the people in at large elections sometimes do not know exactly what they are doing when they go vote so oftentimes they take the easy approach and vote either Democrat or vote Republican. Lately, unfortunately, it's been Republican. And what I did, I said I have to reach a few of those independent voters. What will I do? And I basically took out an ad

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for that election. And as I said earlier, my campaign, my opponent basically paved the road for me. He had ruled in a few cases dealing with child molesters. And in those child molester cases, he had given probation to the first eight, ten men that had come before him who had admittedly, many of whom had admittedly had sex with their own little girls, their daughters. And so, I basically put out an open letter to the citizens of the community; do you want a judge who is soft on child molesters? Simple question. And it caught their attention. They read it and it was all documented. I quoted quotes from the opponent that he didn't think that they were, should be sent to prison, that they were ill and they needed to go to a hospital. And my position was they should go to prison. They know what they are doing and they can get their treatment either in prison or later. When they get out when they do their time. And so, I won comfortably and served eight years until the 1996 election. But volunteers, we had a good number of volunteers. We had individuals that were law students. My wife was still in law school at the time. Many of her classmates would go over to the, to Tina Vidaurri's house and make yard signs there with her husband, John. He was the coordinator of the sign brigade. And I had other friends like Carlo Rodriguez who led the efforts to spread them out all over the county. I mean we, and I worked in there too. I do not believe that the candidate should not be out there, you know, hitting, getting hit with the hammers as we put yard signs out in the middle of the night. We had, you know, people all over. People that would work polls. Although I believe in a city like Houston, working polls, you know, some people believe that it works, but in a large city like Houston, I, I think people go there, they already know what they are going to do, much of it through the media. And that's where the cost come into play in a large urban election.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Did you have TV?

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Judge Salinas: I could not afford TV. No, .I did not have TV. I had the Houston Chronicle. That was expensive enough.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Newspaper ads?
Judge Salinas: Yes.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, let's switch then to, to being a judge. What's the best thing you like about it and what's the worst thing you hate about it?
Judge Salinas: The best thing I love about being a judge is always learning, the continuous learning of new situations, new legal principals, new evidentiary challenges. The worst part of, obviously there is some times that you hear the same thing over and over and over again and after. I've got eleven years or so on the bench now, I'm in my twenty sixth year of law, and, and but, as far as, the judging, sometimes you hear the same thing. And, secondly sometimes hear cases that are very, very, basically unpleasant. The case that I am hearing now, for example, of a twelve year old girl who was molested by a neighbor. More than molested. She was sexually assaulted by a neighbor according to the allegations. Assuming all of that is true, these things are very, very troubling. There is no reason not to believe, based upon the evidence. Obviously a jury is going to decide. This is not, it's not going to be for me, but things are leaning against the defendant. The question is whether it be justice, who knows? But these things... And many times we see cases where the child, there's hardly any way that the child is not telling the truth and the jury gets either confused or has trouble relying on the testimony of a five year old, six year old girl and ends up acquitting the defendant. And obviously there's no justice in a situation like that. But that's our system and we have to swallow and accept those kind of things. That, those are the things that really sort of work at me and get at me, but once again, I knew what I was getting into when I took this job.

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Dr. Gutiérrez: Now, now does it work to become a visiting judge? Here, the irony is here you, you, you, you're in, you're out. You, you win, you lose. Yet, you are here. You are their sitting judge. No election and, and...
Judge Salinas: Exactly.
Dr. Gutiérrez: ...here you are.
Judge Salinas: And then, it's, there's one of the beauties of being a visiting judge that you don't have an election. However, the, the negative side of being a visiting judge is that you sometimes may not find a community that needs work. And, if you don't work you don't get paid, period. We are on a day to day basis as a visiting judge. You become a visiting judge in this fashion. Under Texas law a jurist who has served four years, forty-eight calendar months, is eligible to sign up with the offices in Austin or in his regional district, administrative district and sign on to become a visiting judge or a former judge. Once you become that you are able to receive an assignment. If somebody wants you, I live in Houston, if somebody wants me down here in the Valley they, the requesting courts sends it to the administrative region in Brownsville for the Fifth Administrative region. They then ask my region, the Second Administrative region in Conroe, Texas which covers the Houston area. And they ask Judge Underwood and, and the Fifty, rather the Second Administrative region to allow me to be sent, to be assigned.
Dr. Gutiérrez: They can request you by name?
Judge Salinas: Oh, they request by name. And they request to, me to be appointed to serve in the 370th District Court Auxiliary Court. Which is the court that I'm presiding over now. And this Auxiliary Court was created with a federal grant to assist this community, the Valley, Hidalgo County, with it's jail population and with the high number of cases involving violence. And it's a case of court that primarily deals with aggravated assaults, sexual assaults, murders, capital murders. The

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non death penalty variety. So this, in a year and a half, it's been continuous. But for this court, I'd have to be waiting in line, waiting at home, waiting for a phone call to see if somebody needed me in Corpus Christi or in Brownsville, Texas or in Galveston or elsewhere. One thing is certain, Houston, not one single judge in Houston has had the, the guts or the audacity to anger the district attorney and requested me to go visit in Harris County, Texas. We know that much since January of 1997 and here we are in June of 1998.
Dr. Gutiérrez: I suppose you'd rather be a judge than practice law? You practice law this other way?
Judge Salinas: The, as a visiting, as a visiting judge we are not allowed to do any practice of law in the courtroom. We can have an office practice. We can do wills. We can do other matters dealing with the law which are not in court related. In other words, we cannot appear in court....
Dr. Gutiérrez: No, no. I wasn't, I wasn't asking all that.
Judge Salinas: Oh, I'm sorry.
Dr. Gutiérrez: I am saying you wanted to be a judge, you want to be a lawyer again?
Judge Salinas: Well, I am a judge now. I am enjoying it. That doesn't mean that if something comes along that I find enticing whether it's teaching full time in law school or in the, or in an undergraduate setting or, or litigating with some firm, I would definitely consider those options. I am not married to the judiciary. I enjoy it, but I definitely always loved to take on new challenges. And I'm, I'm open if you have any ideas. Let me know.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, the last question is just if you could give me a thumbnail sketch of, of who do you think runs the,. the politics of Hispanics in Houston and Harris County? Or if you have not been involved that long over there, your opinions about this environment here since you've been here about a year, year and a half?

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Judge Salinas: Well, I don't, I don't, in the Houston area, and fm able to look at it now from a distance even though I still live there, but I come over here and, and I go back on weekends, I'm able, it's, I know what shows up on TV. And it's Senator Mario Gallegos and Frumencio Reyes, a very active political leader, active in the Tejano Democrats of Harris County, and they get into different things and you know, they are popular. They are well known in their communities. But many times a lot of people don't agree with some of the things they are doing. They don't necessarily agree with some of the people they are promoting as the good candidates or, or for different positions. And that creates a lot of division. And so, right now I see things in Houston as sort of, I don't know, it's at a standstill. Yes, we definitely look to Senator Gallegos as our senior elected official. However, at the... And over here there are many people who are popular. We have a congressman in the area, Congressman Ruben Hinojosa who's, very, very well known, very popular, has always been involved in the community. He's still, of course, has a little bit way to go to really show what he's going to do, what his, what his basic mark is going to be in the congress and for the Valley. He's taken over for Kika de la Garza, a very well known in this community leader, congressman who is highly respected by many, but also, of course, very criticized by others. The, but, you know, Hinojosa will begin a new, a new era, a new career in that area. At the local level, we have many individuals who are basically new relatively speaking. You have outstanding jurists in this community from Judge Fernando Mancillas, Noe Gonzales, Juan Partida, Leticia Hinojosa, one of the first women on the bench here. Now we have Rose Guerra Pena who. will be taking over in January for the, to another district court. So we, we have, excuse me, a lot of good leadership at this level. Then the Court of Appeals has all Mexican Americans here that are assigned here in the,

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in the Valley area. Federico Hinojosa, Judge, there's a danger of quoting names here, you know. We draw a blank. Melchor Chavez. And, and I'm going to get in trouble here. The only woman on our Court of Appeals... You can help me out can't you?
Dr. Gutiérrez: Reyna.
Judge Salinas: Yes. Justice Reyna, who I just saw this morning as I was coming in the court and waved at her. The, the, but the, the here, you know, the politics are different where we have such a large number, the Mexican American populate, population is large. So there is a lot of coalitions that have cut across different lines and you get a lot of the Mexican American community here, the business community primarily, who many times side with the other side. That is with the more conservative Republican forces. And that probably has been the explanation for much of the, the number of years that it took to elect the first Mexican American mayor of McAllen, Texas, for example. Where many of the Mexican American community wouldn't even go with the Mexican American leadership for fear that, that the, that they were going to lose out perhaps in their business concerns.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Maybe I misunderstood. We'll just clean it up. You get paid by day. Did you literally mean that or, or do you get, the county pays you? Who pays you?
Judge Salinas: My, the visiting judge salary comes through the state of Texas.
Dr. Gutiérrez: It's prorated on an annual basis?
Judge Salinas: And it is, it is prorated. Yes. So, obviously if I work five days a week, I get five days pay. If I work, if I, if it turns out that something happens and let's say I have to leave, an emergency, I leave, let's say I work through Wednesday and I leave Thursday and Friday on emergency, I get three days pay. If I get sick, it's my, my, that's my problem.
Dr. Gutiérrez: No fringe benefits?

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Judge Salinas: I can't get sick.
Dr. Gutiérrez: There are no holidays and no sick leave?
Judge Salinas: Holidays, if you are working and the holiday hits, they pay.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Do you get any retirement accrual?
Judge Salinas: The retirement, thank God, is accrual. As we speak, as we speak.
Dr. Gutiérrez: We can assume that you're, you're paid the annual rate for any district judge with at least four years experience?
Judge Salinas: You can, can assume that.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, what, what do you get paid?
Judge Salinas: OK. The, the past, the recent legislature, 1997 was it, increased salaries for state district judges to ninety eight thousand or so, somewhere in that arena. In that area, rather. But there was a provision that former judges, such as myself, would stay at eighty five thousand dollars. And there is a question some, other former judges are going to, are looking into the question. I...Is there any rational basis for distinguishing between the, the judge, the state district judge who's been elected versus the former judge who is working pretty much as, as much as the elected district judges, doing the same work for twenty thousand dollars, roughly, or eighteen thousand dollars less a year. Now, that'll be a question and hopefully I've had enough business in court that I'm hoping that the other members of this former judges' association take that battle on. I'll definitely join in a class action on that one.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Do you get travel?
Judge Salinas: Yes, we have reimbursement for travel. The county pays the travel component, the per diem, part of the per diem and your travel expenses. Then they pay a supplement that's apparently part of state law. The county is obligated to pay a supplement of roughly, what is it, twenty some odd dollars, twenty-seven dollars a day or something.

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Dr. Gutiérrez: Then you have coffee money? Judge, I don't have any other specific questions. I want to tidy up just some of the things that we kind of left hanging. Do you want to talk about an area that I didn't ask you about or, or cut you off on an answer or...
Judge Salinas: No, not at all.
Dr. Gutiérrez: ... on a subject?
Judge Salinas: No, no. I want to thank you and, and, and...
Dr. Gutiérrez: You want to get over with?
Judge Salinas: Well, you know, it's, I'm getting dry, you know, and...
Dr. Gutiérrez: Me too.
Judge Salinas: ...the, and, and no we... I think you covered everything and I, maybe some matters I didn't fully respond to and I'm sorry if I didn't. But, I really appreciate your, your doing this and very valuable matters that are important to the, to the future generations of all Texans and all Americans.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Are you ever going to run again?
Judge Salinas: You know, I had, I, I, I think my sentiments have been felt and seen in this interview. The experience of being treated like that by a very, oh, a person with very little scruples in public office, a district attorney that violated principals of justice, principles of law, they indicted, for example, one of my good friends, Arnold Gobella.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Gobella?
Judge Salinas: Gobella. G-O-B-E-L-L-A. But he's of Portuguese-Mexican descent and apparent, apparently in Portuguese the LL is the L sound and he prefers to go by Gobella. Arnold was the head of the Mexican American Bar Political Action Committee and because I gave him some cash money out of my political fund, they called that a crime. There was no crime. They indicted him anyway. He had to suffer the, the humiliation of being booked, like I did, over matters that were not criminal conduct. And/or if they were, they were more, they could

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have been ethically dealt with by the Texas Ethics Commission, but that wasn't going to get me in trouble with the public therefore they took their approach. And it was a real sad deal. And that experience has definitely, oh, it's like the kid that once went and touched, reaching for something at the stove and touches the stove, the comal, the grill and burns himself. He'll never do that again. And I'm not saying, as they say, never say never, but right now I am not at all.
Dr. Gutiérrez: You've ..... already...
Judge Salinas: Not at all. I am not at all interested, at this moment in my life, to disrupt it. We, my wife and I talked recently, December in fact, 1997, and we had to make a decision whether or not on January 2nd, 1998, I would file for office and I wanted to run statewide.
Dr. Gutiérrez: What did you want to run for?
Judge Salinas: I wanted to run for the Te... Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. And, however, you know, she pretty much, it, it's very important to talk to your, your partner in life and, and sometimes to face the reality, you know, why do you want to do that to yourself at this time in your life? And I asked myself the same question and I answered it. There is no good reason at this time in my life to disrupt my kids' lives, my wife's life, my life, and, obviously in a situation where the income situation was very, very, very risky. Where we have a lovely daughter primarily that we have to make sure she gets through those years at Trinity and we have to get her educated. It's our obligation. We are going to do it one way or the other. And obviously a run for a statewide office would be, looking back on it, would be the most foolish thing I could have ever done. May have won this coming November, but I, would it be worth all the, the, the potential dangers at this time in my life? And the answer was no. It is not worth it and I'm, I'm a much happier man for it, at this time.
Dr. Gutiérrez: Judge, thank you very, very much.

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Judge Salinas: Thank you Jose Angel.
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