Biography
The following interview on October 15, 2002, is with James Barton who lives at 3201LakePine drive Tyler, Texas. It will become part of the oral history project of the department of History at The University of Texas at Tyler, in Tyler, Texas. The interviewer is Kelly C. Clay.
KCC is Kelly C. Clay
JB is James Barton
Transcript
KCC: Mr. Barton, will you give me a brief back ground of your education.
JB: I graduated high school in Henderson, Texas, graduated from Business College in Henderson, Texas, and attended the FBI National Academy in numerous schools over the country.
KCC: How long did you work with the District Court?
JB: I worked with the U. S. Marshall's office, who worked with the district court for 25 years.
KCC: Can you describe the work you did with the Court?
JB: The U. S. Marshall's service provides all of the security for the Federal Courts and serves all the paper work out of the Federal Courts. Of course, they handle all federal prisoners who go in and out of the Federal Courts. Whether some other agency arrest them or not, or the U. S. Marshall's arrest them, or some other agency arrest them, the U.S. Marshall service had to produce them in and out of the Federal Courts. If they are convicted or sentenced.
KCC: While you were working with the Federal Courts, how did the people perceive the Courts?
JB: The way people perceive the Federal Courts or the way the people working in the courts themselves saw their jobs changing over the years, Federal Courts have always been known to be very strict and very disciplined and over the years I have seen it get more lax and lax. I have seen Federal Courts, in the years gone by, everybody that came into the Federal Court had to wear a coat and tie. Everybody that served on a jury had to wear a coat and tie. Everybody that came into the court had to wear a coat. When I worked over there, we had two Federal judges in the Eastern District of Texas, one in Tyler and one in Beaumont, and the one in Beaumont wouldn't even let ladies wear pantsuits, they had to wear dresses. They had to change that over the years, on that they got more lax on what they would allow. That has a lot to do with the individual judges, I guess. Its quite different now than what it was then. I went to work for the marshal service in 1962, and between 1962 to 2002, it is quite a bit of difference.
KCC: I'll bet so. Are there any particular cases that you saw, that sort of defined the court or changed the court or the way they thought about things?
JB: No, I don't know that I find they have changed too much. Over the years, they sort of, back when I went to work a lot of the cases were moonshining cases or a lot of them were automobile thief cases, which is seeing a vehicle drive across a state line. There used to be a lot of those in the years gone by when I started, but those are basically, they don't do very much of those anymore. Most of the moonshining cases were out of the Federal Court in Marshall, Texas. Back when l started to work that division was at Jefferson, Texas and they moved that court division from Jefferson to Marshall, in about 1965. The marshal in Texarkana were where most of the moonshine cases were and like I said they use to have a lot of automobile cases and they don't do that anymore. Most of it has gone to drugs and alcoholic fines, the majority of it.
KCC: I guess the moonshining cases were pretty interesting sometime.
JB: They have been over the years Kelly, they have been. We even had a case one time, where we had a county commissioner out of another state, who was tried in our court and that commissioner even built a road up to this guys still in this state. Needless to say he got in trouble doing that.
KCC: I bet so. Were there any particular judges that you thought were noteworthy or that you worked with or thought highly of?
JB: I thought highly of all of them, but they all had their different ideas. I guess you could say they went from ultra conservative to ultra liberal and then everything in between. I started to work in the marshal services, there were only two judges in the Eastern District of Texas and today in the Eastern District, today there is about, I guess about nine, I would have to count them up, about nine federal judges in the Eastern District ofTexas. There is one in Sherman, one in Texarkana, one at Marshall and Beaumont and Tyler. When I went to work there was only one in Tyler and one in Beaumont, and that's how that they have changed over the years. In the Eastern District of Texas, there are the divisions of old courts in Sherman, Texarkana, Marshall, Tyler, Lufkin and Beaumont. Now, Paris has always been a division, but I don't think, even if it is still a division I don't think they don't hold court up there anymore. They have changed and do away with all that, the office. So, the judges did a lot of travelling back then.
KCC: In your view, which cases do you think were the most influential that the court handled during your time there?
JB: Well, I have seen them handle some big cases. Well, I have seen them handle like the Rex Cauble case, which was out of Denton, Texas, which was a huge, huge case. There was a book written about that group of people that was called the "Cowboy Ma?a". I noticed here awhile back they had the author down at Barnes and Nobles signing these books. That was a big thing, that was a big thing, and I think there were about 20 something convictions in that particular case. That was one of the big ones, and we have had a lot of big ones over the years.
KCC: Out of your time there, what would you say was one of your most memorable moments and that would interest people in oral history project?
JB: Well, I'm not sure that what I would call interesting, would be interest to anybody else. The changes in the courts had a lot to do with the changes in federal buildings, the modernization of them, the buildings and the add ons in the courts. One of the things that have changed now, and changed after I left is that the federal courts now have gone back to giving the death penalty. When I was working the federal courts there was no death penalty in the federal courts, but have since passed the law of giving the death penalty. Will, there was back then, but its primarily been passed today for the drug cases of the big kingpins that get the death penalty, but its like I say its been sort of changed over the over the years over the type of cases, but a lot of that has to do with the U. S. Attorney in the district. They are primarily responsible for the filing of cases in the district and of course, they file cases according to what they think the judges will accept. So it has been quite a change. I've seen it change, like I said, when I went to work in the Eastern District of Texas, there were two judges, at that time they called it a U. S. Commissioner and since, after that they went from U. S. Commissioner to Magistrate, and now the commissioner is no longer a bankruptcy judge, and there is about two, three bankruptcy judges in the district now. The magistrates held the preliminary work like justices of the peace do in the county. They go before them for the setting of the bond, reading of their rights, and they do try cases. There is a big change in that and the U. S. Attorneys office has come from about, I would say, about four to there must be 30 something and there are assistants, and they have in the courts a chief probation officer and about 4 probation officers, and today l am sure they have 20 something, 30 something probation officers and there has been quite a change. The Eastern District of Texas when I started out was 42 counties, there are 43 counties now. They added another county a few years ago down in, I believe, it was Livingston was the county that was added. So, its been quite an interest. We have gone from the civil rights, been a lot of that in the last few years in the federal courts and like I said we have had judges who were liberal to conservative and all of those in between. I have worked a lot of cases, but right off my head I can't think, in the Eastern District other than the Cowboy Mafia case was a big one. We also, had a big case up in Dallas, out of Denton, Texas, that we seized a huge horse breeding farm. They had about 250 horses that were worth about a million dollars a piece and the mares were worth about $250,000.00 to $500,000.00 a piece. We seized two big homes with swimming pools, a huge ranch house and all kinds of modem hams, about 9 big hams. They had a veterinary office on this place and they had all kinds of veterinary equipment in it and the doctor could operate and it was fancy and we took that and all the cattle and tractors and equipment. We seized a couple trucks and we seized Mercedes Benz and in the back of that Mercedes Benz, there must have been about a million dollars of jewelry.
KCC: You said something about modernization a moment ago, did you see people who tried to resist changes to modernize or did they just accept it and went along with the flow?
JB: Oh, we had I guess one judge that sort of liked things sort of status quo. He was a fine fellow, and he died here about a year or so ago and was one of the nicest fellows in this whole world. He liked, we started the federal courts security officer, which is funded through the office of the courts and the marshal service handles it and provides federal courts with security officers. He did not want any in his courtroom, he still wanted deputy marshals, but over the years we got that changed. That has been one of the big changes in the federal courts is the security. To go up to the federal court building now you have to go through the monitors, the screening and all that where you didn't have any of those years ago, everything was open. Now when you go up to the court building you have to go through the monitors, the x-ray and they are going to check you out real well. That's in all the buildings now, you can't go in any one of the buildings without being monitored. That's been a big change, and I can't remember what year it came out, but it was in the 80's when that started.
KCC: Did you ever have any involvement in some of the other federal courts. Where you could compare the Eastern District with some of the others?
JB: Not really, that much comparison. We had a lot of different federal judges come into this district. They handled cases in this district and they did a lot of things different, we way we worked and I worked in the federal courts in Mississippi and Louisiana and worked on some of the cases out of there. I worked on the case in Mississippi, where the 3 civil rights workers were killed and buried in the dam. I worked over there and worked in all of that and some of the guys were finally convicted and sent to the penitentiary . I worked in Mississippi while that was going on and that was an excited time. I worked out of the court system with integration orders in Louisiana, when they had the big school cases there and in Mississippi. I provided security to a witness also out of Mississippi, when a member of the Ku Klux Klan was involved in the killing of people and we kept them in secret locations for 3 or 4 years. That was out of the courts out of Mississippi, and he plead guilty to being a part of the murders he received either three life sentences and two ninety-nines or three ninety nines and two life sentences. I worked the courts in Mississippi, while that was going on. I also, worked in a case out of the federal courts where a protective witness out of Louisiana worked down there that help put Jimmy Hoffa in the penitentiary. We stayed with him for several years too as a protective witness and moving him from place to place and hiding him out. That is one of the big things in working with the courts is protecting the witnesses. I remember particular cases where we changed their names or the families names. Changed all of their paperwork, hanged identities and moved them clear across the county and give them a brand new life. All of this through the federal courts, I remember protective witness here, when I have gone to the schools to enroll the kids in the schools and tell them what information we had, and I went to get them and I never had any problems with the schools in this area. We changed all the kid's names, birth certificates, social security numbers and everything.
KCC: I guess that makes tedious work for awhile.
JB: Yeah, it does. The guy with the Ku Klux Klan and the guy that put Jimmy Hoffa in the penitentiary, is the high profile cases that I was involved with. It's been pretty interesting.
KCC: I only have one more question for you. In your time with the court, do you think that the court was perceived in a positive view by the people, or do you think they were sort of neutral, they saw it being a court or did they see it as doing positive things?
JB: I think it was positive, I think the federal courts, it's always sort of been viewed more of a professional and more dignity and more positive than some of the local courts, but I'm not taking away from local courts. I've been involved with all of them and I have seen that there is more dignity and its more positive in the federal courts. I think most people as a whole are really more impressed with the federal courts, than they are the local court, the county courts.
KCC: Is there a higher level of professionalism?
JB: Yes, there is. There is just more dignity there, the main thing that I hear against federal courts, everybody to their own opinion, is that most people do not think Federal Judges should be appointed for life, but they are. I only know, in all of the years, I have known judges is two that have been put out of office. The U.S. Senate had to confirm them. The only difference with the U. S. Attorney, U. S. Marshall is the judges are appointed for a lifetime and the attorney and marshal are not, but they .have to go through the same process to be appointed.
This concluded the interview with James Barton. It will become part of the Oral History Project of the Department of History at the University of Texas at Tyler, in Tyler, Texas. The interviewer was Kelly C. Clay.