Agenda

• Today: Texas’s Political and Demographic Diversity

    - The Diversity of Texas People
    - Geographic Diversity
    - Political Diversity
    - Representation in Texas

• Next class: Federalism

    - Homework State (50% by class time): Chapter 02 Texas in the Federal System - Begin by January 29

Announcemnts

The Diversity of Texas People

• Texas is a large and diverse state
• Majority-minority state
• Language diversity
• Economic diversity¹
• Religious diversity²

Texas’s Diverse Population

• Texas is a large and diverse state

    - 2nd largest state in the US
    - 2nd most populous state in the US
    - 2nd most diverse state in the US

Texas’s Diverse Population

• Texas is a majority-minority state¹

    - American Indian and Alaska Native: 278,948
    - Asian: 1,585,480
    - Black or African-American: 3,552,997
    - Hispanic or Latino: 11,441,717
    - Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander: 33,611
    - White (not Hispanic or Latino): 11,584,597
    - Some other race: 3,951,366
    - Two or more races: 5,133,738

Texas’s Diverse Population

Texas population by Age

Texas’s Diverse Population

• Language Other Than English Spoken at Home in Texas: 35.4% ± 0.2%

    - Spanish 28.2%
    - Other Indo-European 2.7%
    - Asian and Pacific Island languages 3.3%
    - Other languages 1.2%

• Language Other Than English Spoken at Home in United States: 22.5% ± 0.1%

Texas’s Diverse Population

Income in Texas

Texas’s Diverse Population

Employment in Texas

Texas’s Diverse Population

Industry Employment in Texas

Texas’s Diverse Population: Religion (1)

• Christian: 77%^[https://www.pewresearch.org/religious-landscape-study/database/state/texas/

    - Evangelical Protestant: 31%
    - Mainline Protestant: 13%
    - Historically Black Protestant: 6%
    - Catholic: 23%
    - Mormon: 1%
    - Orthodox Christian: 1%
    - Jehovah's Witness: 1%
    - Other Christian: 1%

• Non-Christian Faiths: 4%

    - Jewish: 1%
    - Muslim: 1%
    - Buddhist: 1%
    - Hindu: 1%
    - Other World Religions: 1%
    - Other Faiths: 1%

Texas’s Diverse Population: Religion (2)

• Unaffiliated: 18%

    - Atheist: 2%
    - Agnostic: 3%
    - Nothing in Particular: 13%

• Don’t Know: 1%

Political Culture of Texas

• Diverse political culture has two themes that are shared across party, ethnic, and religious lines

    - Individualism
    - Traditionalism

• The Texas political mix is complex

    - Individualism and Traditionalism share common sources
    - The two are antagonistic in some ways, similar in others
    - The power of Texas and its distance from the East Coast make these even less simple

Individualism

• Grew from multiple sources
• Frontier experience of self-reliance
• Settlers looking for Economic opportunity (this continues today)
• American Revolutionary ideals

Traditionalism

• Grew from multiple sources

• Frontier experience of neighbors cooperating especially through churches

• Provincialism - distance of frontier from capital cities

• Business dominance

    - Important to note this was dominance of Texas businesses
    - East coast business interests especially banks were not well regarded

The cultures and partisan politics

• Before the 1990s, the Democratic Party appealed successfully to these cultures
• Since 1990, the Republicans social conservative wing has connected with Texan’s traditionalism
• The Republicans business oriented wing has connected with Texan’s individualism
• The national Democratic Party difficulty connecting: notable exceptions such as the Clintons and Obama

Regions of Texas

Regions of Texas map

Regions of Texas

Permian Basin map

The cultures and geography

• Traditionalism dominates

    - Interior Lowlands
    - Great Plains
    - Basin region
    - Gulf Coastal Plains - outside urban areas

• Individualism dominates

    - Urban areas in Gulf Coastal Plains

• But both strains are present in force in all areas

Things to consider in Texas political culture

• If we were going to have writing assignments, these are some questions I might ask. Why?

Things to consider in Texas political culture

• Individualism: Consider the following?

    - the specifics vary but this is a fundamental characteristic of Texas culture
    - What about variation among demographic groups? Is there any or is this a commonality?       
    - Native Texans and newly arrived Texans?

Things to consider in Texas political culture

• Traditionalism and Individualism can be in conflict

    - How does this play out in Texas politics?
    - How does this play out in Texas policy?
    - How does this play out in Texas political parties?

• Do Traditionalism and Individualism always conflict or can they reinforce each other?

    - When does traditionalism encourage self-reliance?
    - When traditionalism encourages community cooperation, does that encourage or discourage individualism compared to reliance on state or federal government?

Representation in Texas

As the share of white Texans continues to shrink, the Legislature remains mostly white and male

Representation in Texas

• 2023 State Legislature

    - 70% male
    - 54% white
    - white male: nearly half

Representation in Texas

Gender History in Texas Legislature: from Texas Tribune

Questions

• Does it seem likely that this is because people want to elect white males or because they want to elect Republicans and white males dominate the Republican primaries?

• Is this more of a long run problem for voters or for the Republican Party?

• Why are minority voters willing to vote for white male Republicans over minority Democrats?

• Is this a problem for the Democratic Party?

• Which party is this more of a problem for and why?

Representation in Texas

First Black Statewide Official

???

Representation in Texas

• Barbara Jordan
• First African- American woman elected to Texas Senate (1966)
• Member of Congress (1973-1979)
• First African American elected to Congress from Texas
• First African American woman from the South elected to Congress

Representation in Texas

First Hispanic or Latino Statewide Official

• Dan Morales
• Attorney General (1991-1999)
• Democrat
• Succeeded by: John Cornyn

Representation in Texas

¹

Representation in Texas

First Republican Hispanic or Latino Statewide Official

• Alberto Gonzales
• Texas Supreme Court Justice (1999-2001)
• Resigned to become White House Counsel (2001-2005) for George W. Bush
• US Attorney General (2005-2007)

Representation in Texas

First Female Governor: Miriam Amanda “Ma” Ferguson

• Second female Governor in the United States

• Husband James Edward Ferguson, Governor 1915-1917

    - impeached and removed from office

• Ma Ferguson Governor 1925-1927 and 1933-1935

    - "Two for the price of one"

• Democrat

Representation in Texas

Second Female Governor

• Ann Richards
• Governor 1991-1995
• Democrat
• Succeeded by George W. Bush

Representation in Texas

First Female United States Senator

• Kay Bailey Hutchison
• Republican
• 1993-2013
• Succeeded by Ted Cruz

Authorship and License

• Author: Tom Hanna

• Website: tomhanna.me

• License: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.