Barefoot Sanders Stepping Down
By Vince Leibowitz on Jul 8, 2006 in Texas Democrats
Senior Federal District Judge—and Texas legal and political legend—Harold ‘Barefoot’ Sanders has announced he will retire. He is 81.
Though Sanders is most famously known for presiding over the desegregation of Dallas ISD schools, he has a distinguished record as a judge and public official. I was, in fact, stunned that Wikipedia doesn’t have an article on Barefoot Sanders (I’ll be writing one, though).
Sanders served four terms in the Texas Legislature from 1952 to 1958. During his tenure in the Legislature, he sponsored a number of bills including Texas Securities Act, the Texas Probate Code, the Texas Mental Health Code,
In addition, President Kennedy appointed Sandars as U.S. Attorney for the Nothern District of Texas, a position he held from 1961 until 1965. In 1965, he was named Assistant Deputy Attorney General, rising to Assistant Attorney General in 1966 and serving out the remainder of the Johnson years as Legislative Counsel to the President from 1967 until 1969.
In 1972, Sanders sought and won the Democratic nomination for United States Senate from Texas after a bloody battle and runoff against former U. S. Senator Ralph Yarborough. He went on to oppose Senator John Tower in a hotly-contested general election battle.
President Jimmy Carter named Sanders to the Federal bench in 1979.
Public radio station KERA 90.1 FM (Dallas-Fort Worth-Denton, TX) will broadcast excerpts of Sam Baker’s recent interview with Judge Sanders on Monday, July 31 and Tuesday, August 1, 2006 at 6:40am and 8:40am CDT. Click here to listen to the complete unedited interview.
Sorry, the HTML didn’t come out on that link. Here’s a URL that will get you close:
http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/kera/.jukebox?action=programs