Price Daniel

Daniel first became known in Liberty County by defending two of its most infamous murder suspects. In the legislature he was one of the "Immortal 56," who opposed a state sales tax. After his term as speaker he enlisted in the army as a private, became a judge advocate and served in the Pacific and Japan. As the nation's youngest state attorney general he disposed of more than 5,000 lawsuits and defended the University of Texas law school's refusal to admit Heman Marion Sweatt. As governor he saw 131 of his 151 major proposals become law.

What the plaque says

Price Daniel Texas statesman Price Daniel (1910-1988) was born in Dayton, Texas, the son of M.P. and Nannie Partlow Daniel. His career in state and national politics spanned six decades and included service in all three branches of state government. After graduating from Baylor Law School, Price Daniel established his law practice in Liberty before taking his first public office in the Texas House of Representatives in 1939. His strong record led to his election as Speaker of the Texas House in 1943. Returning to public life after service in World War II, Daniel was Attorney General of Texas from 1947 until 1953. The young Attorney General vigorously defended Texas' ownership of its tidelands against federal encroachment, an issue he took with him to the United States Senate upon his election to that body in 1952. Successful in sponsoring legislation to confirm Texas ownership of the tidelands, Daniel was elected Governor of Texas in 1956 and was reelected in 1958 and 1960. Among his many accomplishments as Governor, he championed the preservation of historic state documents and construction of the Lorenzo de Zavala State Archives and Library Building in Austin. During the next three decades, Price Daniel served as head of the Office of Emergency Preparedness under President Johnson, as an associate justice of the Texas Supreme Court and as a member of the Texas State Library and Archives Commission. At the time of his death on August 25, 1988, Daniel had held more offices of public trust than any other individual in Texas history. (2004)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Texas State Capitol — steps away
  Austin's fourth statehouse, a Renaissance Revival capitol of 1888 that stands 311 feet to its Goddess of Liberty and was restored after the 1983 fire.
• Bullock Texas State History Museum — 0.3 mi
  The state's history museum at the head of Congress Avenue, built around the hull of La Salle's ship La Belle, raised from Matagorda Bay with 1.8 million artifacts.
• Harry Ransom Center — 0.6 mi
  The University of Texas archive where a Gutenberg Bible and the earliest surviving camera photograph are always on view, free, beside the papers of Watergate and the movies.
• French Legation State Historic Site — 0.9 mi
  A raised pine house built in 1840 and 1841 for France's envoy to the Republic of Texas, who left Austin in a rage over a neighbor's pigs before it was finished.

More markers nearby

• State Bar of Texas — steps away
• Tyler Rose — steps away
• First United Methodist Church of Austin — steps away
• Confederate Texas Legislatures — steps away