Growing Up In Texas: A Formal Analysis

Coming of Age in Mississippi. By Anne Moody. Published by Bantam Dell in New York, New York, 1968.

Nothing quite affects someone’s life like having a criminal record. Jobs and education that were once available, could be ripped away with one negative background check. In “Coming of Age in Mississippi,” Anne Moody deals with discrimination for many more reasons than just a criminal record. However, could an African American in the segregated south really afford to add another checkmark to their list of prejudiced qualities? Anne makes it clear that she is upset with the activists who weren’t willing to go to jail for the honorable cause of fighting for civil rights for all Americans. Anne’s frustration with those activists who are unwilling to get arrested is unjustified because she never considers the possibility that some people have too much to lose by acquiring a criminal record.

From March 2, 1836 to February 19, 1846, Texas as its own independent country in North America. Those who resided in this independent country were referred to as Texians. Texas declared its independence from Mexico in 1836 during the Texas revolution which ended on April 21 of that same exact year. However, Mexico did not want to give the Republic of Texas its independence which resulted in conflicts between that of Texas and Mexico that went on into the 1840s. As a result, The United States of America recognized the Republic of Texas as an independent country in 1837 but failed to append their land. Later receiving its independence, Texas elected a Congress of fourteen senators and twenty-nine representatives in the month of September and year of 1836. However, within the Republic, citizenship was not a privileged for everybody living in Texas. Not everybody had legal rights to reside within the limits of the Republic without Congress permission. The Constitution of the Republic of Texas created differences for each and every ethnicity for each individual person. Meaning, whoever was there on the day the Republic of Texas won their independence had to be classified as a citizen of the Republic including Africans, those with African descent, and Native Americans. For Caucasian immigrants to become citizens they would have to had lived in the Republic for six months or less and take an oath. Those who were brought to Texas as a slave had to stay a

Texas, nicknamed “The Lone star State”, has always been very unique compared to any other state in the United States of America. Texas have a sense of great pride in where they come from. Texans hold their heads a just a little higher than anyone else. Texas is the second largest state in the U.S., Texans have their own pledge of allegiance to the state flag, and is the only state whose flag is permitted to fly as high as the American flag. So, why is it that Texans take so much pride in their own state? Texans take great pride in their state because at one point before Texas was a state belonging to the United States, it was its own country. This is how Texas got its name as the “Lone star” State. In nineteenth century, Texas fought many battles against Mexico and its leader Santa Anna, to gain Independence from the country. After many hostel wars and lives lost, Texas made a break through at the Battle of San Jacinto and conquered the Mexican government in the year 1836, becoming the new Republic of Texas. It then remained Independent for almost ten years. Our Independence and history of secession runs through our veins. The topic is a reoccurring one when it comes to politics. In recent years, there have been talks if Texas should secede from the United States again like they did in 1836. According to a poll in 2009, it showed that “50% Republicans, 40% Independents, and 15% Democrats believed that Texas should stand as an independent nation.” “338157 Texans have already

The History of Texas Texas history itself had its own amazing story. The small number of American settlers moved to the land of Texas had led to the dramatic war with the Mexicans. The land of Texas was used to be owned by

Texas has a reputation throughout history of differing views from the federal government in laws and politics pertaining to social, fiscal, and educational issues. On the whole, Texas operates as a largely conservative state. Because of this, policy-making is often right wing. With the institution of a Democratic, liberal president, the State’s dissent from the Federal government has only increased over certain issues. One hot topic of the 2012 Presidential election was immigration. With the major increase in immigration, it is no surprise that the issue was so emphasized. Between 2000 and 2011 there was a 30 percent

The United States of America is a country priding itself on providing equal opportunity for the right of life, liberty, and property. These unalienable rights, according to the Founding Fathers, were not to be taken away or denied by the American government. Also known as a natural right, the right to life can be classified as a citizen’s right to be protected by the government from abuse or death. Property classifies the right that a citizen has for owning materialistic items and land for which can be considered private. Finally, the right of liberty presented in the Constitution for a citizen refers to many different aspects ranging from freedom of speech and expression, right to bear arms, freedom of religion, freedom against search and

Every Texan knows the legends of Stephen F. Austin that lead him to become the “Father of Texas.” Few Texas would try to say anyone else deserves this honor even though Texas is not short of larger than life legends. Such names include Lorenzo Zavala, Thomas Rusk, Juan Seguin, William Travis, James Bowie, and Sam Houston. Even “In his eulogy for Austin, Houston called him, "The Father of Texas"” (Areas of Interest). But despite this many would argue that Houston deserves the title.

Texas has always been an individualistic state. Since the Alamo to the decision to leave the Union and stubbornly retain traditions, morals, and ideas to this day. After the Civil War, Texas went under radical reconstruction. This was a military rule in which Texas functioned under a military government that made a constitution that made the government more centralized, provided compulsory school attendance, and guaranteed a full range of rights for former slaves. By far, this constitution was a great stride forward in civil rights and made the government more efficient. However, white Southerners were extremely angered by this because of their racist attitudes and stubbornness. When reconstruction ended, white Texans quickly took back the

In my research of Austin, Texas I found out several interesting facts regarding the demographic makeup of the city. For example, the racial breakdown by race is whites 68%, blacks 8%, Hispanic are at 35% and foreign-born 18% The makeup is obviously different when you compare Austin to the US as a whole, however, it is interesting to see the “total picture”. The following is the breakdown for the US whites 72%, black 12.6%, Hispanic 17%, and foreign-born 13%.

In the long history of the United States, Texas is one of the few states that demonstrated three-way segregation including white, black, and Latinos communities. Generally, segregation influenced all dimensions of the society. In specific, former segregation in Texas has left an immeasurable impact on the state’s culture, economy, geography, and education. Despite the fact that institutional desegregation occurred decades ago, segregation of minorities still exists in modern Texas. In particular, the contemporary implementation of Texas House Bill 588 – as known as the “Top 10 Percent Rule” – indicates the state’s tenacious effort to heal the scars of racial segregation in educational perspective. Practically, the law has not only fostered multiracial public institutions, but also reshaped colleges in a statewide scale.

The current state of the Texas education policy is very complex and its roots can be traced all the way back to times were there was no equality in the public school system, we can even say it can be traced as far back to the state’s split from Mexico. This was a very problematic situation that began to be reformed heavily starting in 1954. The legislations that passed to resolve this problem have morphed the Texas Public education policy into what it is today.

The state of Texas has a government that is broken up in a way to appeal to the public. The question of trusting the government is a common thing for some people. There could be many reasons for this but that’s not important. The government is here to keep control and needs to be trusted by the people. To prevent this distrust, the government is broke up into multiple different levels. These levels are made to aid public needs and separate major powers. The Texas legislature is the main level.

There were several extremely fascinating aspects regarding the history of Texas found in Passionate Nation's pages 195-219 and Major Problems in Texas History's pages 146-150 and 162-167. One of the most salient of these was the fact that Texas was its own independent nation. This fact was fairly startling for a number of different reasons. One of these is the fact that the United States allowed another nation to be created within its borders. This is something rarely done in history, and probably never done again in the history of the United States.

Coming of Age in Mississippi by Anne Moody was published on 1968. This autobiography is memoires of Anne Moody about growing up poor and black in the rural Mississippi. The book was divided into four parts from childhood until her late 20s that described the experiences of Anne Moody in the Civil Rights Movement and her struggles against racism.