Mike Zepeda, 78; Sued to Desegregate Texas City’s Schools
Mike Zepeda, 78, a labor activist and civil rights leader in Texas who was among those who sued to desegregate the schools in Corpus Christi, died Sunday in that Texas city of complications from an aneurysm.
The 1968 lawsuit targeting the Corpus Christi Independent School District involved one of the first major cases in the country that identified Mexican Americans as a distinct ethnic minority that faced injustice and discrimination.
A U.S. District Court judge ruled in favor of the plaintiffs in 1970, saying the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1954 decision outlawing school segregation applied to Mexican Americans as well as blacks.
The Corpus Christi school district’s appeal of the decision to the Supreme Court failed.
A retired steelworker, Zepeda organized the city’s annual birthday celebration for United Farm Workers co-founder Cesar Chavez.
Zepeda also spearheaded the successful drive to have the Texas Legislature declare Chavez’s birthday, March 31, a state holiday.
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