The Governor's Hounds: The Texas State Police, 1870–1873

Introduction

Introduction One of the most hated organizations—and one of the most misunderstood— in the history of Texas is the State Police, created under the administration of the Radical Republican Governor Edmund J. Davis. Often described as “snakes, wolves, and other undesirable things,” they were opposed from their 1870 inception by Democratic newspapers and much of the populace.1 The State Police have been maligned, excoriated, vilified, and discredited by almost everyone. Yet, no extended serious investigation of the agency or its members has ever been undertaken. This adverse characterization began in the nineteenth century and has continued into the twenty-first. Not until 1969 was the prevailing perspective about the State Police challenged. Until now, no full-scale study of the force existed. The denigration of the state constabulary follows three major themes. Two of the criticisms of the police involve its members. The first is that a majority of the personnel were desperadoes and criminals who had served terms in the state penitentiary and committed crimes of a heinous nature. The second is that due to their background, they attempted to destroy democracy by fraudulent practices, interfering in elections, costing the taxpayers exorbitant sums of money, and supporting a military dictatorship under Governor Davis. They used their official status to legally murder prisoners who attempted to escape from their custody, and oppressed Texans. The third theme is that a THE GOVERNOR’S HOUNDS 2 significant portion of the force (generally estimated at about 40 percent) was African American. (This, as we will later see, is simply untrue.)2 More than four decades ago, Ann Patton Baenziger dissented from this jaundiced view of the State Police, positing that the organization did indeed have some problems but nowhere near what previous writers had suggested. The force was created for a legitimate purpose, namely, to reduce the level of violence within the Lone Star State. And, for all the previous condemnation, they were a necessary element in Texas history. Moreover, violence was so pervasive that local areas needed assistance from a statewide directed mobile unit which could legally enter any jurisdiction. The policemen could move in and out of areas, where necessary and when needed, to reduce upheaval in local communities across the state. In short, they were created to suppress crime.3 What aroused the most opposition was the fact that many mistakenly believed the State Police were staffed with a high percentage of African Americans . (Some may have confused them with Special Policemen.) Policemen had the authority of the state behind them, but the idea that blacks could be endowed with police powers angered and simultaneously frightened many. Moreover, they carried weapons. As Matthew Gaines, one of two black state senators during Reconstruction declared, the real hostility was not in the “idea of placing such a great power in the hands of the executive,” but by the “idea of gentlemen of my color being armed and riding around after desperadoes .” African American State Policemen were often accused of “being the vanguard of a black insurrection,” and as outlaws who desired to impose a new order upon the populace through coercion.4 In the wake of Reconstruction, African Americans joined city police departments across the South. From Raleigh, North Carolina, to Galveston, Texas, black men saw service, no matter how briefly, in and among urban constabularies . And, not surprisingly, they performed adequately. It will amaze no one that these “colored” members faced daunting obstacles and a storm of censure in carrying out their responsibilities. But only in Texas was a State Police cadre envisioned. As Frederick Nolan, a noted biographer of Billy the Kid, remarked, until that time “there had never been any such force in any American state.” One historian has contended that the organization “could well have served as a model for other southern states.”5 Even after redemption black policemen continued to perform in Texas (Houston, Austin, Galveston, and Bryan) and elsewhere across the South. But in the later period, after the fervor of Reconstruction had waned, according to W. Marvin Dulaney, “racial proscriptions were placed on the police powers INTRODUCTION 3 of African Americans: black police could not arrest whites and they patrolled only areas and communities inhabited by other African Americans.” At the end of the first decade of the twentieth century, blacks had “literally disappeared ” from Southern police forces. Only five Southern cities continued to employ African American police officers: Houston, Austin...