Ezequiel D. Salinas

Who was Ezequiel D. Salinas?

Ezequiel David Salinas, Sr., was a Mexican American Democratic state court judge from Laredo, the seat of Webb County in south Texas, known for his advocacy of civil rights for the Hispanic community. In the late 1940s, Salinas was defeated in a race for the Texas House of Representatives but was elected to the 111th District Court in 1950. He served in that position until 1974.

Salinas was born to Ezequiel Salinas and the former Luisa Gonzalez of Laredo. He attended public schools and graduated from the former Laredo High School, thereafter Martin High School before he headed for the University of Texas to study law. He was awarded an E.D. Farmer International Scholarship in international law at the National Autonomous University of Mexico in Mexico City.

He wrote numerous articles on civil rights during the early years of his law practice. In 1939, Salinas became the eleventh president, and the first Laredoan, of the national interest group, the League of United Latin American Citizens. In 1955, another prominent Laredoan, Oscar M. Laurel, assumed the LULAC presidency for a single one-year term. During the 1940s and 1950s, Salinas worked to establish LULAC chapters in parts of Texas where none had previously existed. He was instrumental in persuading contemporaries in Austin to rid Texas of the poll tax, which was finally ended nationally through the 24th Amendment to the United States Constitution coupled with the Harper v. Virginia U.S. Supreme Court decision of 1966.