"This Rotten Mess"

For more than 40 years Beaumont, Texas, was known as a wide-open oil town where booze, bookmaking and bordellos flourished. But no longer: last week, in the wake of a sweeping investigation by the Texas legislature, crap games and horse parlors were closed down. The madams and their girls had checked out of their "hotels" and departed for brighter lights. And 43 people were under indictment on vice charges, including several top officials of Beaumont, neighboring Port Arthur and surrounding Jefferson County.

In the not-so-old days, nobody in Jefferson County (pop. 245,659) had to look hard for diversion. Downtown clubs and suburban roadhouses sported open bars in defiance of Texas' liquor laws. Bookmakers' tote boards were visible through many a plate-glass window; odds were available on everything from Florida horse races to Beaumont high school football games. Madams of the 20 brothels offered special matinee rates for teenagers. The law looked on amiably (though there was a police order ruling the brothels off limits to 14-year-olds and under). Only one gambling arrest was recorded in Beaumont in 35 years.

For years, Jefferson County grand juries were routinely called; just as routinely they discovered no evidence of sin.

Then in 1960, one jury panel included an angry Beaumont sandpit operator, James C. Barry. Barry and two fellow jurors toured the county, found teen-agers guzzling whisky, taking dope, stopping off at Rita Ainsworth's, the foremost brothel in Beaumont. When the jurors could rouse no reaction from county officials, they traveled to Austin and brought back Texas Rangers and investigators for a state legislative committee. The Rangers raided dice games and bars, took their prisoners to jail in Ranger cars when local cops declined to provide paddy wagons.

Little White Envelopes. During three days of televised hearings before the legislative committee, Jefferson County Sheriff Charles Meyer admitted "campaign contributions" of $85,581 over a five-year period; he campaigned only once in the five years and was unopposed. The contributions, he said, came in little white envelopes. Port Arthur Police Chief Garland B. Douglas got "campaign contributions" of $65,000; his was an appointive office. On a monthly salary of $735, Beaumont's Chief of Police J. H. Mulligan had tucked away $40,000 in the bank and owned property worth $73,000. "I got a lot of money at different times from my sister for years and years," said he. District Attorney Ramie Griffin explained that a $6,000 extra-income figure on his tax returns represented gin-rummy winnings.

By last week Mulligan had been fired, Griffin was due to appear in court to answer charges, and the other two were under indictment. More indictments were being urged by a 13,000-member reform group--United Citizens for Law Enforcement--which also watchdogged horse parlors and brothels to make certain they stayed shut. Preliminary audits showed Beaumont's municipal government alone, through years of avarice and disinterest, had been thrown $1,475,000 in the red. Said one weary reformer: "We've really only started. We still don't know yet how deep this rotten mess goes."

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