by Charles and Pauline Sullivan
Co-Founders and Co-Directors of CURE
CURE in effect, began at 6 AM on Sunday, January 2, 1972, in San Antonio, Texas, when five buses filled with families of prisoners began the all day journey to the visiting rooms of the prisons in East Texas. On the buses were family members, many of whom had not seen their loved ones in over ten years.
This was primarily because of the expense. But, some could not make the trip because they were disabled.Others were afraid to travel because when they arrived at the prison gates, they would not have the "proper"identification or could not speak English.
From this initial successful trip, monthly and then weekly bus visits were organized. Also, bus services for families were started in other cities in Texas. For example, in the summer of 1973, a 1,600 mile roundtrip was undertaken from El Paso.
On this bus trip, there was a mother who had not seen her son in 17 years.When she arrived at the prison, she discovered that he had been transferred to another unit. This prison was near and she was able to take a taxi to visit her son for an half-hour. Normally, she would have received a four hour visit.
We were very angry about this incident and confronted the prison system. The Director responded by allowing visiting on Saturday as well as Sunday. Also, he knew that visiting rooms were more crowded because of the buses. An extra day would benefit every one.
Although the prison system made mistakes like this not properly communicating with families before visits, they were very supportive of these bus services.
However, they gradually dampened their enthusiasm when we began to question even more their policies especially those that involved violence.
For example, on these all-day trips, the families talked about the brutal "building-tenders". These were prisoners selected by the warden to be in charge of a cell-block. These BTs enforced the rule through killing prisoners, if necessary. Although they did not have guns like inmate guards had in many other Southern prisons, they did have access to baseball bats and other enforcement instruments.
In the 1973 Legislative Session inAustin, ninety miles away, we decided to introduce a bill to ban prisoners from having disciplinary, administrative and supervisory authority over other prisoners.The prison system fortunately took a neutral position on our bill because incredibly they said that the building tenders did not have any power. They were simply like janitors and kept the cell-block clean, or kept count of the prisoners, etc.
Our bill was written by a legendary "jail-house lawyer" who had just been released. On the day of the hearing, he not only testified for the legislation, but also a large contingent of families of prisoners were present. We had used the buses to bring the families to lobby!
Miraculously, the bill passed the House and Senate and the Governor signed it. It was scheduled to take effect in 90 days.Back then, we were naive. We actually thought this would happen that summer of 1973.
On the contrary, the implementation of our bill took ten years, and a federal court order. The order required the hiring of 2,500 guards to take the place of the building tenders. But, the order stated that our legislation was the reason behind this fundamental change in the Texad Department of Corrections.
In the summer of 1974, we decided to leave San Antonio. Some of the family members from the buses had emerged as leaders.Also, we wanted to try and organize statewide. But, we were not sure where to settle.
Should our statewide headquarters be located in Huntsville the area where most of the prisons were located back then (now, there are all over the state!) or should we move to Austin where the Governor and the Legislature was? If Huntsville, services like the bus trips would still be our emphasis. We had also thought about hospitality houses.
If Austin, we would focus on advocacy and our only services would be informational e.g. answering prisoner and family letters, communicating with the criminal justice agencies, public education through newsletters and speaking, etc.
We decided to move to Austin, and as we look back, it was definitely the right decision. In fact, we feel strongly that good advocacy and good services cannot exist in the SAME organization. The success especially the finances of services depend on the very same criminal justice agencies that you may have to criticize as advocates. And, we believe the old saying is true. We are very reluctant to "bite the hand that feeds us".
In 1975, we had a constitutional convention to write a CURE constitution and our first statewide meeting. Over the next ten years, we "cut our teeth" in the Texas Legislature on a multitude of prison reform issues including the death penalty. And, although we lost on the death penalty, we did have success on a moratorium on prison construction and community corrections. Also, we aided in the passage of such bills as the ex-felon vote, removing felony restrictions on jobs, and overall about 25 pieces of legislation.
When we say "we", we are talking about a statewide network of families and concerned citizens. Most of all, the prisoners especially the long-termers were the back-bone of our prison reform movement. Although they could not be present for our annual convention or our legislative day at the Capitol, they were there through their loved ones who travelled from all over the state and through their most supportive letters.
Also, through out our time in Austin, the most comprehensive prison reform lawsuit in the history of the country was being prepared and was heard. The court order in 1981 that was issued from this litigation basically "blessed" everything we had been saying about the Texas Department of Corrections.
At that time, we made a conscious decision to change our strategy. Instead of criticizing the prison system, we devoted fulltime to encouraging the Governor and the Legislature to follow the court order and not appeal it. We went from an "outsider" to an "insider"!
This resulted in helping to settle the building tender issue which we mentioned earlier. We also played a role in the prisoner medical care part of the order that the Texas Attorney General accepted. When we started the bus trips, there was only one full-time doctor for the entire prison system. Now, there were fifty budgeted.
Finally, we were very busy with the passage of legislation that was in response to the court order. At one point, legislation that we had been working on for years sailed through the Legislature so fast that we had a hard time getting to sleep at night. The excitement was overwhelming!
The last issue of overcrowding in the court order was settled in May, 1985. By this time, we had decided to try and expand CURE to a national organization and move to Washington. There were many fine national organizations, but there was not one organization based on the families of prisoners and prisoners. Also, we felt we were pretty seasoned. If you can SURVIVE prison reform in Texas, you can survive it anywhere! Thus, onAugust 3, 1985, we packed a U-haul and left Texas.
Financially, Texas CURE members had put together a fundraiser in Austin that netted $10,000. Washington was a lot more expensive than Texas and, of course, we did not have the contacts for membership that we had in Austin.
For the first seven years, our national office was in our apartment which was 15 blocks from the Capitol. Our rent was high , but slightly reduced because we took care of our apartment building and another one next door that our landlord owned. In 1992, St. Aloysius Church which is located only six blocks from the Capitol offered CURE an office above the sanctuary which we immediately accepted. We are still there today.
In October, 1986,the first of many "nuts & bolts" seminars on how to organize CURE chapters was held in Washington. The leaders of Ohio and Pennsylvania, our first two chapters besides Texas, participated in the weekend.
In June, 1987, CURE had its first of seven national conventions which also have all been in Washington. All of these conventions have averaged about 250 participants from about thirty states.
The format of the conventions have been to have self-introductions on the opening Saturday night. Networking and "making prison reformers especially families and former prisoners feel at home" is a result of this evening.
Panels on various aspects of prison reform are conducted on Sunday and Monday. On Tuesday, participants visit the congressional offices of their members of Congress. Appointments are made well in advance and, over the years, members many times visit with our people attending the convention from that state. A specific prison reform agenda is given to the Senator or Representative or left at the office for him or her.
These items on this agenda are decided at the annual board of directors meeting. Each chapter has a representative on the board. This includes over forty state chapters as well as issue chapters.
An issue chapter is a specific reform whose membership is through out the country. There are nine issue chapters that seek to organize (1) federal prisoners and their loved ones, (2) lifers and their loved ones (3)death row prisoners and their loved ones (4) foreign prisoners and their loved onesand ( 5) prisoners in control units and their loved ones. Or, these chapters work for such reforms as treatment and help (6) for the sex offender (7) the mentally ill prisoner (8) the incarcerated veteran and (9) removing post-release restrictions on ex-prisoners in regard to jobs, voting, etc.
This past October (2001) , CURE sponsored an international conference in New York City. The format was similar to the national conventions. Self-introductions were made and panels opened the first two days. Instead of visiting Congress as we traditionally do at our conventions, we brought a report card to the United Nations office of each country represented at the Conference. This Report Card graded the particular country on its ratification of the UN's six major human rights documentand and also comment on their implementation of prison reforms contained in these documents.
We will close that the greatest benefit of this work over the last thirty years has been the inspiring prison reformers we have met. It seems like daily we encounter someone whose story is so uplifting that "it keeps you going" in this most difficult and up-hill struggle. And anyone that has been in this world knows that IT IS A STRUGGLE! The prisoners in Texas knew this when they challenged the building system thirty years ago. They were denied parole, threaten, brutalized and even killed! However, they would end their letters to us and we would like to end this CURE history with their closing words, "The struggle is its own reward!"