JAMES COMMITTEE INVESTIGATED VICE IN JEFFERSON COUNTY
By Judith Linsley
On January 4, 1961, the General Investigating Committee of the Texas House of Representatives (better known as the James Committee), led by Representative Tom James, began three days of hearings for the purpose of exposing organized crime and vice in Jefferson County. Its ultimate goal was to eradicate vice across Texas.
Beaumont had been an "open" city at least since the 1800s, with the law turning a blind eye to illegal activities such as gambling and prostitution. In 1898, a group of male Beaumonters called for removal of "houses of ill repute"-but not complete removal, only from the busy shopping area along Forsythe Street, where women shopped with their children. Their petition, acknowledging reality, requested that if the brothels "must exist in our beloved city, please force them to occupy some retired corner."
In the early Twentieth Century restrictions finally came about; by the 1930s, Beaumont's "red light" district occupied an area of a few blocks, known as "Deep Crockett." While most of these brothels closed during World War II at the request of commanders at nearby army bases, they reopened after 1945, many of them outside the Deep Crockett boundaries. Gambling operated freely as well.
Ultimately the open vice attracted the notice of the James Committee, which was concerned that local crime, left unchecked, might be taken over by national crime organizations. In late 1960 state lawmen, including Texas Rangers, gathered evidence, and by January the committee was ready. The hearings were broadcast over live television-unusual in that time-to a huge local audience. A Beaumont Journal reporter testified about widespread criminal activity and the indifference, even hostility, of local law enforcement to being told.
Witnesses were called, and many said nothing, invoking their Fifth Amendment rights. Enough talked, however, to give the committee all the information it needed for its report, which read in part: "Committee personnel found flourishing in Jefferson County the oldest, largest, and best-organized vice operation in Texas," including "gambling, book-making, prostitution, liquor law violations, and narcotics traffic." The committee included grim predictions for Beaumont's future if the city weren't cleaned up.
Beaumonters, most of whom had at least a general awareness of the criminal world that existed parallel with the orderly world, couldn't ignore the truth any longer. There was a rash of firings, resignations, and removal suits, new elections were held, and the United Citizens for Law Enforcement was formed to act as a watchdog in the county.
The hearings spotlighted Rita Ainsworth, proprietress of the Dixie Hotel. The Dixie was considered the finest brothel between Houston and New Orleans, and was even nationally renowned. After they ended, Miss Rita, who had risen from humble beginnings to financial success and whose philanthropy benefited many local charities, had to shut down the Dixie.
The hearings were a watershed event in Jefferson County history and are still referred to as the "vice probes" by longtime Beaumonters. Years later, the Dixie was renovated and became the Dixie Dance Hall, part of an entertainment complex that occupies what was once known as "Deep Crockett."
The Dixie Hotel, third building from the right, as it looked ca. 1590