Hector P. Garcia - The American G.I. Forum and American Politics

The American G.I. Forum and American Politics

The American G.I. Forum became a recognized voice for Mexican Americans in the post-World War II era. Besides providing veterans a social and political network, the forum also raised funds to pay the poll taxes of the indigent and campaigned against the Bracero Program, infamous for exploiting migrant laborers. Dr. García testified before the National Advisory Committee on Farm Labor, asserting that "The migrant problem is not only a national emergency, it has become a national shame on the American conscience." This work brought him into contact with such figures as Hubert Humphrey, Arthur Goldberg and George McGovern. The organization, and the attention it drew to poverty and discrimination in Texas, also got the attention of Look magazine, which published an article on the diphtheria, infant diarrhea, and tuberculosis affecting the neglected community.

In 1953, the G.I. Forum published its own study, "What Price Wetbacks", on farm labor in South Texas, as well as having Lyndon Johnson speak at their statewide convention. In 1954, attorneys funded by the G.I. Forum and LULAC argued and won Hernandez v. Texas in the Supreme Court of the United States. The decision, one of the Warren court's first, threw out the plaintiff's murder conviction on the grounds that he had not had a jury of his peers. Court records showed that there had been nobody with a Spanish surname had served on a jury in the county for twenty five years. The desegregating decision in Brown v. the Board of Education was handed down the next year, with its extension to integregated education for Mexican American citizens being pursued by LULAC and the G.I. Forum in the Texas Supreme Court cases against the Driscoll, Carrizo Springs, and Kingsville independent school districts.

In 1960, García became national coordinator of the Viva Kennedy clubs organized to elect John Fitzgerald Kennedy president. He is credited with delivering 85% of the Hispanic vote to the Democratic party in that close election. The civil rights agenda of the Forum, however, was not at the forefront of the Kennedy administration's platform, and García and his supporters were forced to content themselves with his perfunctory appointment as representative of the United States in mutual defense treaty talks with the Federation of West Indies Islands in 1962. The talks were successful, and the appointment was notable as the first instance that a Mexican American had represented an American president. After Kennedy's assassination, his successor Lyndon Johnson appointed García Presidential Representative with the rank of Special Ambassador to the presidential inauguration ceremonies of Dr. Raúl Leoni in Venezuela.

In 1966, through the efforts of the Forum and other groups, the Texas poll tax was repealed. The forum also undertook a march on the Texas state capital to protest the low wages of Mexican agricultural laborers. In 1967, President Johnson appointed García alternate ambassador to the United Nations. He was tasked with the improvement of relations with Latin American nations. He made history when, on October 26, he became the first United States representative to speak before the U.N. in a language other than English. Starting in 1968, Dr. García and the other members of the G.I. Forum began accompanying families of fallen soldiers to the airport to collect the bodies when they returned from Vietnam. He would often eulogize the soldier, and never refused a request to speak at any funeral.

In the same year, President Johnson appointed him to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. In 1972, García was arrested at a sit-in protest of the de facto segregation in Corpus Christi school district. He consulted with President Carter several times during the 1970s. In 1987, he became involved in the struggle against the campaign to name English the official language of the United States. His final project was to improve the standard of living in the colonias in the Rio Grande Valley along the United States–Mexico border.