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| Charles Goodnight |
Fifty-two Panhandle cattlemen decided on Dec. 29, 1885 to call the attorney general’s bluff by indicting themselves on charges of “illegal fencing” on public land.
By the 1880’s, most people in the eastern half of Texas believed beef barons in the faraway Panhandle were exploiting the public domain for their own private gain. Pressure mounted on the legislature to curtail the custom of letting the cowmen graze their herds for free on government land.
A bill was passed in 1883 that mandated competitive leasing of the public range at a minimum rate of four cents an acre. To enforce the new law, a State Land Board was created composed of the governor, attorney general, comptroller, treasurer and commissioner of the General Land Office.
But the ranchers flatly refused to bid against each other for grazing and water rights or to offer more than the minimum. The Land Board retaliated by doubling the price to eight cents an acre and branded the obstinate pioneers as trespassers subject to eviction at gunpoint.
Attorney General John Templeton demanded that the Panhandle prosecutor seek indictments against the big ranchers for “illegal enclosure,” private fencing of public pasture. Caught in the middle and fearing the worst, the district attorney reluctantly obeyed.
To his amazement, the grand jury cheerfully complied. Following the lead of Charles Goodnight, the biggest rancher of them all, the cowmen returned a total of 76 indictments against themselves and practically every beef producer in the region. The attorney general’s bluff was officially called.
Rare was the prospective juror in the sparsely settled Panhandle whose livelihood did not depend in one way or another on the cattle industry. The dozen that sat in judgment of the accused were either working cowboys or their employers, and, as expected, the short trial ended in a verdict of “not guilty.”
But the attorney general would not call it quits and immediately went after Goodnight as the ringleader of the resistance. Templeton obtained a temporary injunction in May 1886 that for all practical purposes put Goodnight out of business.
The injunction was soon overturned by a judge named Willis, the same magistrate who had presided over the controversial acquittal. Adding insult to injury, he awarded cash damages to Goodnight. Badly beaten at his own game, the humiliated attorney general was content to complete his term without going another round with the rough-and-tumble ranchers.
In a dramatic attempt to force the Land Board to honor the original four-cent lease, Goodnight and the owners of the T Anchor Ranch traveled to Austin. Loading a wheelbarrow with more than $100,000, they pushed the fortune up Congress Avenue to the office of the flustered state treasurer. Although he refused to accept the cold cash, the ranchers made their point and gave even their sharpest critics a good laugh.
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