History
The beginnings of Texas Southern University can be traced to the March 7, 1927 resolution by the Houston Independent School District school board to establish junior colleges for each race. The resolution created Houston Junior College (now the University of Houston) and Houston Colored Junior College. The Houston Colored Junior College first held classes at Jack Yates High School during the evenings. It later changed its name to Houston College for Negroes. In February 1946, Heman Marion Sweatt, an African American man, applied to the University of Texas School of Law. He was denied admission because of race, and subsequently filed suit. (See Sweatt v. Painter (1950).) The state had no law school for African Americans. Instead of granting Sweatt a writ of mandamus to attend the University of Texas, the trial court granted a continuance for six months to allow the state time to create a law school for blacks.
As a result, the state founded Texas Southern University under Senate Bill 140 by the Fiftieth Texas Legislature on March 3, 1947 as a state university to be located in Houston. Originally named Texas State University for Negroes, the school was established to serve African Americans in Texas and offer them fields of study comparable to those available to white Texans. The state took over the Houston Independent School District (HISD)-run Houston College for Negroes as a basis for the new university. At the time, Houston College just moved to the present site (adjacent to the University of Houston) donated by Hugh Roy Cullen and had one permanent building and an existing faculty and students. The new university was charged with teaching "pharmacy, dentistry, arts and sciences, journalism education, literature, law, medicine and other professional courses." The legislature stipulated that "these courses shall be equivalent to those offered at other institutions of this type supported by the State of Texas."
Given the differences in facilities and intangibles such as the distance of the new school from Austin and other law students, the Supreme Court ruled it did not satisfy "separate but equal" provisions, and that African Americans must also be admitted to the University of Texas Law School at Austin.
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