Pioneer Attorney William Burges Tackled Unpopular Issues
By Merica Lindstrom, Ashley Martinez, and Chris Hancock
At the turn of the 20th century, El Paso was a city fraught
with controversy. Gambling,
prostitution
, immigration laws, local elections and a growing population were issues to be
reckoned with. While some sought answers in politics, William H. Burges
initiated reform in his own way.
The Burges family was dedicated to the law. A member of the Texas Bar
Association, William H. Burges Sr. settled in Seguin, Texas, with his wife,
Bettie Rust. The couple had several children, with three of the boys becoming
lawyers, like their father. William Jr. entered the world on November 12, 1867.
With little formal early education,
William Jr
. still learned enough of the basics to attend the University of Texas. His was
the first law class to graduate from the university in June 1889.
An asthmatic, he sought a healthier climate in El Paso and set up his law
practice in 1889. His prominent uncle,
Dr. W. M. Yandell, an El Paso health
officer, announced his arrival, practically guaranteeing employment.
In one of his first cases, Burges defended the publishers that distributed the
St. Louis Republic in a libel case brought by Robert F. "Poker Bob"
Campbell. An 1891 article accused Campbell of trying to drive out F. P. Clark as
collector of customs, a post that Campbell had wanted. Much was made of the fact
that Campbell owned a gambling house and had been indicted for illegal gambling
several times.
Despite state laws against gambling, El Paso derived a great deal of money from
said activities with “fines” on each gambling establishment serving as
licenses. William Burges believed this case could be his chance to influence
the rampant gambling problem in El Paso.
By 1895 when the case went to trial, Campbell had been elected mayor of the
town. Not only did Burges lose the case but also his job as city attorney. This
did not discourage Burges because he had the support of the
Law and Order League
that included Dr. Yandell, his brother Richard and other like-minded individuals
who publicly spoke out against gambling and attendant ills in the city.
Nevertheless, he served as legal counsel to
Tillie Howard
, one of the best known madams in El Paso. Burges saw Howard as a human being.
He believed that prostitution needed to be restricted to a “reservation” in the
city since it could not be eradicated.
In his book,
Texas Lawyer: Life of William
Burges
, J. F. Hulse wrote that prior to the Campbell case, Burges and the League had
supported Mayor Robert Johnson when he issued a proclamation on August 4, 1894,
banning open gambling. But after two months, the economy of the city was
suffering, and open gambling returned to town. Burges continued to try to clean
up El Paso despite threats and attempts on his life.
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In 1896, William Burges formed a brief partnership with his brother
Richard
who also had come to El Paso to practice law. According to Hulse, Richard
struck out on his own after a year, and William found a satisfactory partner in
William Ward Turney
, a lawyer-legislator-rancher from Marshall, Texas. Their law firm, Turney &
Burges, was established on April 1, 1897, and lasted 41 years.
By 1903, Burges was a leading public figure, speaking out vehemently against
corruption. It was also an election year, one in which former sheriff and
reform party member, James H. White, ran for mayor against
C. R. Morehead
, president of the State National Bank and member of the traditional Democratic
faction, known as "
the Ring
," which allowed gambling and prostitution to flourish.
In his biography of Burges, Hulse wrote that "the White-Morehead election was
long remembered as one of the hottest El Paso, or any town, had ever seen. The
spark plug of the White campaign was W. H. Burges. … The election heat and
hatred centered on him.” Almost daily, William Burges’ wife, the former
Anna Pollard, received anonymous threatening letters or phone calls.
During the spring of 1903, the two factions of Democrats held several rallies
for their candidates, often resulting in physical fights between the supporters
of Morehead and White. During one rally for Morehead at the
Myar Opera House
, young lawyer Zach Cobb fired up the crowd when he said he would "roast" Will
Burges for some previous insults, real or imagined. According to Hulse, Cobb
said, "I don't intend to do it, for there is not enough meat on Mr. Burges to
roast. He's a half-fry. He's better known as the junior partner of Senator
Turney."
Soon after, the Young Men's White Club organized a rally for White at the same
venue, affording Burges the opportunity to reply. Threats all over town and at
his home let it be known that if Burges made one derogatory comment about
Morehead, he would be shot dead on the stage.
That night about 800 people from both sides filled the opera house, including
Zach Cobb. Burges told the crowd that he appreciated the young attorney, but he
refused to argue with him. Referring to the man’s name, Burges then said,
“Besides, I've no time to shuck a nubbin,” a nubbin referring to a stunted or
deformed cob of corn.
Switching to the real subject of the evening, Burges declared that Morehead
would be an ineffectual mayor, as he had been in Leavenworth, Kan. Burges
stated, "He doesn’t want the city to advance; a little village is easier to boss
than a big busy city. … He has fought me, and I have fought him, and I'm going
to give him some more."
The crowd waited anxiously for a gunshot, as hired gunmen were supposedly in
town. Owen P. White was at that rally, and in his book
Out of the Desert
he wrote, "No shot ... rang out from the gallery; no young attorney lay
sweltering in his own blood on the stage of the opera house, and those of the
audience who, filled with gory anticipation and hoping to see a tragedy, had
attended the meeting, went home disappointed and sore." Morehead won this
election, but Burges and the reformers would regain power later. Burges escaped
death several times, including once at his residence, where he was able to talk
the gunman out of the idea.
Burges had a keen sense of justice. Hulse wrote that when the large
Chinese population in El Paso
began to suffer the effects of the Chinese Exclusion Act, Burges
enthusiastically took up their cause. The law, introduced in 1882 and renewed in
1892, was an effort to reduce immigration and prevent Chinese immigrants from
becoming citizens. Over a span of about 20 years, Burges traveled regularly to
San Antonio where such cases were tried.
Among his most notable cases was his defense of
Phelps Dodge Copper Company
and hundreds of Bisbee, Ariz., residents involved in the deportation of almost
1,200 striking miners to the New Mexico desert near Columbus in the summer of
1917. Two miners died before they were rescued. The I.W.W. (Industrial Workers
of the World) had called strikes throughout the Arizona copper mining country
just as America had joined World War I. The
I.W.W. or “Wobblies
,” as they were popularly known, imported union agitators, and picketers
harassed scab workers.
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When the town felt threatened by the dispute, Bisbee’s sheriff deputized over
1,000 residents, and they rounded up the striking miners, loaded them into empty
freight cars and sent them east. Kidnapping charges were brought against some
400 residents, along with civil suits for damages in the millions of dollars.
Burges, who had accepted a partnership in Chicago in 1917, took the case for the
defendants. He was ready to return to the Southwest for his health.
By 1921, the Bisbee I.W.W. Deportation Case had been tried in Tombstone, Ariz.,
and the civil suits were settled for about $100,000. Burges had used a defense
called “the law of necessity,” allowing a community to protect and preserve
itself when endangered. He had won a huge victory.
In addition to maintaining his law practice, Burges was also a civic leader. He
was a charter sponsor of the El Paso Symphony Orchestra, founder of the Toltec
Club, president of the Texas and El Paso Bar Associations and a regent of the
University of Texas. Knowledgeable about literature and music, he acquired an
extensive library of some 17,000 volumes.
In his 70s and nearly deaf, Burges still sat in on trials, eagerly watching the
magic of the courtroom. On May 11, 1946, he died after suffering a heart
attack. According to his obituary in the
El Paso Times, he requested
friends to direct money towards a library fund rather than send flowers. His
personal library was sold to the University of Texas at Houston.
U. S. Senator
Ralph Yarborough
of Texas nominated him to the El Paso County Historical Society’s Hall of
Honor. An eastside street, a high school and Burges Hall at UTEP further honor
the man who boldly confronted unpopular issues and worked to make a wide open
frontier town a more law abiding modern city.
Related sources:
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Cite: Lindstrom, Merica, Ashley Martinez, and
Chris Hancock . "Pioneer Attorney William Burges Tackled Unpopular Issues."
Borderlands
24(2005-2005): 4.
Borderlands. EPCC Libraries.
<http://www.epcc.edu/nwlibrary/borderlands>
Page last updated:
El Paso lawyer and reformer William Henry Burges, Jr. worked to clean up the
city.