Hispanic American History: American GI Forum

The Felix Longoria Affair

After the body of Felix Longoria was returned to the states for burial in 1948, the small town in Texas refused to accept him in the funeral home, because he was Mexican American. He served in the U.S. Army and was a casualty in the Pacific during the last year of World War II. Then Senator Lyndon B. Johnson spoke out on this injustice and led the national outrage at this bias against a fallen American soldier.