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Lesson Plan

“Great things happen in small places...”: Government Authority and Civil Rights Activism in Arkansas, 1954-1959

Little Rock Central High School National Historic Site

Members of the Little Rock Nine arrive at Central High under federal troop escort, October 1957.

NPS Photo

Grade Level:

High School: Ninth Grade through Twelfth Grade

Subject:

Social Studies

Lesson Duration:

90 Minutes

State Standards:

Ties to the Arkansas History Frameworks: (grades 9-12) TCC1.1, TCC1.2, TCC1.3, TCC1.4, TCC2.2., TCC2.3, PPE1.1, PPE1.2, PAG4.1, PAG4.2, PAG4.3, PAG4.4, SSPS1.1, SSPS1.2, SSPS1.3, SSPS1.4, SSPS1.5, SSPS1.6.

Additional Standards:

Ties to the Social Studies Frameworks (U.S.): (grades 9-12) TCC1.1, TCC1.2, TCC1.3, TCC1.5, TCC1.6, TCC2.1, TCC2.2, TCC2.4, PPE1.1, PPE1.5, PPE1.7, PPE1.8, PPE2.7, PAG1.1, PAG1.2, PAG1.3, PAG1.4, PAG1.5, PAG1.6, PAG2.1, PAG2.2, PAG2.3, SSPS1.1, SSPS1.2, S

Thinking Skills:

Remembering: Recalling or recognizing information ideas, and principles. Understanding: Understand the main idea of material heard, viewed, or read. Interpret or summarize the ideas in own words. Applying: Apply an abstract idea in a concrete situation to solve a problem or relate it to a prior experience. Analyzing: Break down a concept or idea into parts and show the relationships among the parts. Creating: Bring together parts (elements, compounds) of knowledge to form a whole and build relationships for NEW situations. Evaluating: Make informed judgements about the value of ideas or materials. Use standards and criteria to support opinions and views.

Essential Question

What happened during the desegregation crisis at Little Rock Central High School in 1957-58 and how did activists, both for and against school integration, shape the history of the civil rights movement?

Objective

As a result of this lesson plan, students will comprehend the desegregation crisis at Little Rock Central High School in 1957; identify the Arkansas State Legislature, its role in the crisis at Little Rock Central High School, and the attributes of effective leadership; comprehend the way legal appeals through the federal court systems, combined with grassroots organizations (church communities, neighborhoods) and individual activism, caused change at Little Rock Central High School.

Background

In 1954, the Supreme Court of the United States unanimously declared in a landmark court case, Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, that it was unconstitutional to create separate schools for children on the basis of race. The Brown ruling ranks as one of the most important U.S. Supreme Court decisions of the 20th century. At the time of the decision, 17 southern states and the District of Columbia required that all public schools be racially segregated. A few northern and western states, including Kansas, left the issue of segregation up to individual school districts. In 1957, the Brown decision affected the citizens of Little Rock, Arkansas, when nine African-American students chose to attend the previously all-white Little Rock Central High School. For months, the attention of the state, nation, and world were turned to Arkansas and the heroic efforts of nine teenage students and local civil rights leaders as they fought for equality in central Arkansas’ educational system. The desegregation, which officially occurred under federal troop protection on September 25, 1957, set a precedent for many other communities and states to follow.


Grassroots Activism in Arkansas

Grass roots activism in the United States took the form of organizations like the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), who directly challenged segregation and disfranchisement while becoming involved in high profile lawsuits and criminal cases in support of African-American civil rights. Founders of the Little Rock chapter of the NAACP included a who’s who of African-American elite in the city: A.E. and C.E. Bush (sons of John Bush who founded the African American organization, Mosaic Templars of America, in Little Rock in 1882), G.W. Ish, a physician, Joseph A. Booker, president of Arkansas Baptist College, Dr. James M. Robinson, physician, and Issac Gilliam, a politician. In 1928, they sought to challenge the white primary system in Arkansas, but the New York office of the NAACP would not provide funding because it was involved in cases in other southern states and did not want to spread its resources too thin.

Two organizations that were founded in Arkansas and worked to bring civil rights to African Americans included the Arkansas National Democratic Association (ANDA), founded by Dr. James M. Robinson, and the Committee on Negro Organizations (CNO). Harold Flowers, an attorney from Pine Bluff, founded the CNO because of his frustration with the ANDA’s lack of success. He wanted to bring together African-American political organizations to challenge the voter registration system in Arkansas.

The Little Rock Classroom Teachers Association (CTA) was the African- American affiliate to the Arkansas Teachers Association (ATA). In 1942, the group requested that the Little Rock School Board equalize salaries between African- American and white faculty and administrators. The ATA refused to assist the CTA, causing the NAACP to bring a lawsuit against the Little Rock School Board. The U.S. District Court ruled against the CTA and several persons involved in the suit were fired from their jobs with the Little Rock School District. The ruling was overturned in 1945.

Working from the inside, dean of the University of Arkansas law school, Robert Leflar, convinced the university board of trustees that African-Americans should be admitted to the school. In 1948, the first African-American law student, Silas Hunt, entered the University of Arkansas. A year later, the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences admitted Edith Irby without incident and with the support of African-American activists.

Another grass roots organization, the interracial Arkansas Council on Human Relations (ACHR) organized in 1954 to help promote understanding between the races. Ministerial alliances, so important to the Civil Rights Movement in other southern states, were organized in Arkansas to encourage the church men and women to mediate racial disputes.The ACHR was loosely associated with a ministerial alliance in Atlanta, Georgia, and received some of is funding from that source. Harry Ashmore - a journalist who would play a significant role in covering the crisis at Little Rock Central High School - was one of its organizers. In the year before the crisis at Little Rock Central High, the ACHR held a meeting at Camp Aldersgate to begin discussions on ensuring peaceful integration at the school. Their actions were watched by the Arkansas State Police, who also recorded their license plate numbers. The group planned a “Brotherhood Week” at which local ministers (both African-American and white) spoke.

In 1954, Charleston (Franklin County), Arkansas, desegregated its schools, followed by Fayetteville (Washington County). School administrators, church officials, University of Arkansas employees, and the public worked together to integrate that city’s high school. It was successful and took place without many incidents of racial unrest. Following this, other districts worked to integrate their 
schools and public facilities, such as Hoxie (Lawrence County), which integrated its schools in 1955. Despite protest from segregationists, these three schools integrated in 1955 largely because it was simply too expensive to maintain separate facilities.

Daisy and L.C. Bates were actively involved in desegregating Little Rock’s schools. Bates used his newspaper, the Arkansas State Press, as a forum for grassroots activism in Arkansas and his wife was the state president of the NAACP in Arkansas in 1952. Parents of students wishing to attend Little Rock Central High School filed a lawsuit against the Little Rock public schools and the 
Bates supported their cause. As a result, the Bates witnessed their share of violent reaction: burning crosses, bombs, verbal abuse, and the bankruptcy of their newspaper due to economic sanctions placed on them by local segregationists in an advertising boycott of the paper.

While adults worked outside the schools for integration, some children fought inside the schools for better race relations. In Fayetteville (Washington County), the high school had been quietly integrated since 1954. Incidents of racial violence were the exception rather than the rule.One student remembered that they often handled the tension themselves without involving a teacher or administrator. However, at Little Rock Central High School, racial tensions were high among students perhaps because of all the attention. Elizabeth Huckaby, English instructor and vice principle for girls, kept a folder outlining incidents that included name-calling, vandalism, shoving, and fighting against the nine African-American students during the 1957-1958 school year. Perseverance in the midst of crisis led Ernest Green to be the first African- American student to graduate from Little Rock Central High School in 1958. He and many others blazed a path for the many African American students who came later - proving that even young people can create change for the better.

In the 1960s, the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) came to Arkansas to fight for African-American voting rights. SNCC identified Arkansas as a state that needed special attention and launched the “Arkansas Project” in 1963 at Philander Smith College and the AM&N College in Pine Bluff (now known as the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff). They paid attention to many Delta towns where the African-American population was high and voter registration low. They first turned their attention to integrating public facilities, such as Woolworths,whose segregated lunch counters were the target of sit-ins by students. In the Delta, SNCC set up “freedom centers” where African-Americans could meet to discuss their problems. They were also schooled in voter registration. SNCC members were met with resistance by local law enforcement officials and were often harassed, beaten, and arrested. Despite these setbacks, SNCC continued to work hard during the summer of 1963 to register African-Americans to vote. High school students from Pine Bluff worked alongside SNCC volunteers and encouraged people to pay their poll taxes and vote. SNCC sent members into the African-American community on Friday and Saturday nights, and churches on Sunday mornings. By November 1963, they had registered over 2,000 African-American voters.

Activism = Communism?

It was a widely held belief by segregationists throughout the South that those who attempted to create social change were associated with the Communist Party (a radical viewed as subversive or revolutionary; a supporter of the Marxist-Leninist parties). Therefore, the integrationist threat became associated with the communist threat that was prevalent in America in the 1950s (see Red Scare). Activists were seen as so subversive that the Arkansas State Legislature held a committee hearing in 1958 to interview witnesses who divulged information on possible “communists” that included Daisy Bates, Harry Ashmore, and members of the NAACP. The witness reports included innuendo, circumstantial evidence, and accusations. They maintained that Arkansas’s African Americans were happy with their segregated status until activists began to introduce revolutionary ideas. In 1958, the Arkansas State Legislature passed Act 10 that required state employees to report all memberships to organizations over the previous five years. It was introduced as an anticommunist bill but it was designed specifically to identify NAACP members. In defiance, four faculty
members of the University of Arkansas refused - on grounds of academic freedom - to report their memberships and were subsequently fired. Governor Orval Faubus played into the hands of the segregationists and lent a legitimacy to the pro-segregation activists by battling integration at Little Rock Central High School. He supported Act 10 and publicly associated integration with communism (despite the fact that he himself had attended a college associated with the communist party, Commonwealth College, in 1935). In the days leading up to his election as governor, Faubus denied attending the labor school. Governor Francis Cherry used the information to try and discredit Faubus in his unsuccessful reelection bid in 1955.

Dissenting Opinions

Several organizations formed in Little Rock and Arkansas to oppose desegregation and the Civil Rights Movement in general. Throughout the South, all-white Citizens Councils formed along side the Ku Klux Klan, whose memberships consisted of prominent members various communities. Their strategies were to delay integration in all forms (school, transportation, public facilities, voting rights) and intimidate African Americans.

The Capital Citizens Council was formed in Little Rock in 1955 to combat desegregation. They joined with other segregation organizations (including the Mother’s League of Central High School) during the 1950s to oppose the integration of Little Rock Central High School. A front for the Capital Citizens Council, the Mother’s League sought injunctions against school integration from the Chancery Court in Arkansas. Both groups worked to try and prevent integration in the 1950s with the support of the governor of Arkansas.

Another dissenting organization was CROSS (Committee to Retain Our Segregated Schools), who used the religious imagery of their acronym in their unsuccessful appeal to Little Rock voters to keep segregationists on the Little Rock School Board in 1959.

Executive Authority: Federal vs. State
“You can clear a room almost any place by talking about federalism.”
--Senator Charles S. Robb, 1986

From a constitutional standpoint, events at Little Rock Central High School reached crisis proportions between the federal government and the state of Arkansas. Governor Orval Faubus seemed intent on confrontation with the federal government after the U.S. District Court ordered the Little Rock School District to desegregate Central High School. Bowing to constituents, Faubus took the view of segregationists and tried to block the desegregation process at the high school. Who had the most power, the State of Arkansas or the government of the United States?

By 1956, Governor Faubus faced reelection. His opponent, Jim Johnson, courted the segregationists in the state. Johnson felt that the 1954 Brown decision was unconstitutional and his way of speaking enthralled audiences. He called Faubus a “traitor” to the southern way of life. At this point, Governor Faubus began to strike back against Johnson, integration, and the U.S. Supreme Court. He appointed people to study the NAACP integration lawsuits and called his actions “a model of restraint” against desegregation. Governor Faubus’ plans included allowing students to opt out of integrated schools and interposition (the process by which the governor could step in and insert the state’s sovereign power between its citizens and the federal government, and prevent implementation of the Brown decision). He opposed Little Rock Superintendent Virgil Blossom’s plan for gradual integration of Little Rock schools. In 1957, the governor supported segregationists by signing four segregation bills passed by the Arkansas State Legislature. He also supported the actions of the Mother’s League of Central High School as they filed a temporary injunction against school integration (granted by a Pulaski County Chancellor but later nullified by the federal courts). In September 1957, Governor Faubus publicly supported segregation in a speech to the citizens of the state before calling out the Arkansas National Guard to keep the nine African-American students from entering Little Rock Central High School on September 3, 1957. He said that the State of Arkansas did not have to abide by the federal government or Supreme Court rulings on desegregation. While the federal government watched what went on in Arkansas, President Dwight D. Eisenhower assured Governor Faubus that he would uphold the U.S. Constitution “by every legal means at my command.” By late September, President Eisenhower overrode Governor Faubus by sending in the United States Army’s 101st Airborne Division from Fort Campbell, Kentucky and federalized the Arkansas National Guard. Both were now under the orders of the president. The soldiers escorted the nine African-American students into the high school on September 25, 1957. In response, Governor Faubus told Arkansans that they were living in “an occupied territory” with “unsheathed bayonets at the backs of schoolgirls.”

The school year proceeded, but the Arkansas State Legislature and Governor Faubus endorsed a school closing bill. It was approved and announced that the schools in Little Rock would be closed for the 1958-1959 school year pending a public vote on immediate integration. The U.S. Justice Department called the closings a “sham” and a federal judge, weary of the fighting, commented that “this type of litigation can’t go on and on.” Meanwhile, Governor Faubus was reelected for a third term. He proposed a constitutional amendment to remove the state’s obligation to provide money for public schools in Arkansas while the segregationist members of the Little Rock School Board worked to purge Central High School of any pro-integration administrators. Faubus also supported the Arkansas State Legislature as they approved a bill to prohibit any public employee from becoming a member of the NAACP.

Three U.S. district court judges ruled the school closings illegal and ordered the Little Rock schools to reopen and integrate in the fall of 1959. Students returned to school on August 12, 1959. Governor Faubus, at a rally of segregationists on the state capitol lawn, told them that it was a “dark” day, but not to give up the fight. On a national level, the newspapers applauded the peaceful reopening of Little Rock’s schools (even though the Little Rock Fire Department had to threaten to hose down some of the protestors). Despite the reopening, the fight between federal and state government continued over integration. The NAACP continued to fight for speedy integration while the federal government and court system focused on school consolidation and busing issues.

Quotations from the Crisis
 

• “Our objective is to secure the prompt and orderly end of segregation in the public schools. We want all children, regardless of race, to have the opportunity to go to the public schools nearest their homes.” (J.C. Crenchaw, President, LR Chapter of the NAACP, February 8, 1956)
• “The Negroes have ample and fine schools here and there is no need for this problem except to satisfy the aims of a few white and Negro revolutionaries in the local Urban league and the [NAACP].” (Robert E. Brown, President, Capital Citizens Council, July 1957)
• “We are confident that the citizens of Little Rock will demonstrate on Tuesday for the world to see that we are a law abiding people (Arkansas Gazette editorial, September 1, 1957)
• “Blood will run in the streets...” (Governor Orval Faubus, September 2, 1957)
• “I tried to see a friendly face somewhere in the mob - someone who maybe would help. I looked into the face of an old woman and it seemed a kind face, but when I looked at her again, she spat on me.” (Elizabeth Eckford, one of the Little Rock Nine, Southern School News, Summer 1979)
• “Just then a white man sat down beside me and patted my shoulder. He raised my chin and said ‘Don’t let them see you cry.’” (Elizabeth Eckford, Southern School News, Summer 1979)
• “We won’t stand for our schools being integrated. If we let them in, next thing they’ll be marrying our daughters.” (mob comments, 1957)
• “The only assurance I can give you is that the federal constitution will be upheld by me by every legal means at my command (President Dwight D. Eisenhower in a telegram to Governor Orval Faubus, September 7, 1957)
• “As we started the words, ‘I pledge allegiance to the flag...’ I heard clapping, and I looked from the flag to the mob, there they stood, applauding as if they were at a parade. The irony overcame me, and I choked out the words, ‘indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.’” (Elizabeth Huckaby, Vice Principal of Girls, LRCHS, 1957)
• “I had long dreamed of entering Central High. I could not have imagined what that privilege could cost me.” (Melba Pattillo Beals) one of the Little Rock Nine, Warriors Don’t Cry)
• “I don’t intend to quit. We’ll try again. It’s still my school, and I’m entitled to it.” (Ernest Green, one of the Little Rock Nine, upon being denied entrance to LRCHS, 1957)
• “You have nothing to fear from my soldiers, and no one will interfere with your coming, going, or your peaceful pursuit of your studies.” (Major General Edwin A. Walker to LRCHS student body, 1957)
• “After three full days in Central, I know that integration is a much bigger word than I thought.” (Melba Pattillo Beals, one of the Little Rock Nine, 1957)
• “They were invited (three of the nine) to sit with the white girls [at lunch]. About 75 kids left [the cafeteria]. Remaining pupils varied from friendliness to coldness toward them.” (Elizabeth Huckaby, Vice Principal for Girls, LRCHS, 1957)
• “We believe that what is happening in Little Rock transcends the question of segregation versus integration. It is a question of right against wrong, a question of respect against defiance of laws, a question of democracy against tyranny.” (Daisy Bates, Arkansas State Press, 1957)
• “As I scrambled to my feet, I looked back to see the brigade of attacking mothers within striking distance, shouting about how they weren’t going to have me in school with their kids.” (Melba Pattillo Beals, Warriors Don’t Cry)
• “We were studying genetics in biology class. And this little old fellow, he wanted to be a redneck, or he was one of those that didn’t like the idea [integration] too much, so every chance he got, he’d come out with some racial slurs...My brother-in-law was one of those who didn’t take that. So whenever he did go through a day of that, he’d catch him after school or down there where they played at the game room. He’d...box his head. So we didn’t ever go to the principal.” (R.L. Morgan, one of first African American students at Fayetteville High School, oral interview, Civil Disobedience, 1990s)
• “With all the kids that jumped out the window the day that the nine black students went into the school, why did they single me out? I wasn’t the only girl that jumped out of the window. I just happened to be the only girl that jumped from the second floor.” (Sammie Dean Walker, student who jumped out of window at LRCHS to protest the Nine’s entrance into the school, 1957)
• “Any time it takes 11,000 soldiers to assure nine Negro children their constitutional rights in a democratic society, I can’t be happy.” (Daisy Bates, mentor to the Little Rock Nine, 1957)
• “That was the first time I’d ever gone to school with a Negro and it didn’t hurt a bit.” (Student at LRCHS, 1957)
• “I just can’t take everything they throw at me without fighting back...I didn’t realize how deep the term [white trash] affects white people.” (Minnijean Brown, 1958)
• “One down...eight to go.” (Chant by students after Minnijean Brown was suspended in 1958)
• “It’s been an interesting year. I’ve had a course in human relations first hand.” (Ernest Green, one of the LR Nine, 1958)
• “I will not force my people to integrate against their will. I will fight to preserve the rights guaranteed to the people, and that includes control of the school.” (Governor Orval Faubus, 1958)
• “We are calling together a group of women who are concerned about the matter of race relations to see if we can organize an agency through which our kind of people can express themselves...it is high time for the moderates to be heard from.” (Adolphine Fletcher Terry, Women’s Emergency Committee, 1958)
• “[The students] will be on their best conduct and avoid any violence.” (Daisy Bates request to students who staged a sit-in at Woolworths in Little Rock, 1960)
• “The eyes of the world have been and will be on Central High School.” (Lloyd Myers, first African-American student body president at LRCHS, 1977)
• “I guess it never dawned on me that it was a big deal [integration]. Of course, I was born and raised here...I just never had thought about it, I guess.” (Student at Fayetteville High School, on integration, oral interview, Civil Disobedience, 1990s)
• “Two, four, six, eight...We ain’t gonna integrate.” (Mob students chant outside LRCHS, 1957)

 

Preparation

• Writing instrument for each student
• Paper

Materials

Procedure

• Teacher’s note: Begin by reading aloud background information for teacher.

Vocabulary

AM&N College (now University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff):  Historically Black College founded in 1873; Originally named Branch Normal College.  Branch Normal College merged with the Agriculture and Mechanical Normal College and became the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff in 1972 when it merged with the University of Arkansas System.

Act 10:  One of the segregationist bills passed by the Arkansas State Legislature and signed into law by Governor Orval Faubus in 1958 that required state employees and others to report all organizations to which they belonged.  Its purpose was to identify those who supported integration (ex: NAACP members).

Arkansas Baptist College:  Founded in Hot Springs at the Colored Baptists of the State of Arkansas’ Annual Convention in 1884, this historically black college was originally labeled a “Minister’s Institute” and was opened in November 1884 at Mount Zion Baptist Church in Little Rock with the title, “The Baptist Institute.” The primary objective was to raise the educational level of the African-American ministry. The secondary objective was to aid Arkansas in preparing young African-American men and women with a post-secondary education.

Arkansas Council on Human Relations (ACHR):  The ACHR was an interracial organization founded by Harry Ashmore of the Arkansas Gazette that began in 1954 to work for a peaceful solution to the integration crisis in Arkansas.  They organized to promote racial harmony and often looked to community churches and social organizations to help mediate during the conflict.

Arkansas Gazette: Arkansas’s oldest newspaper (1819) –now known as the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette; Covered the crisis at Little Rock Central High School in 1957; Won both the Pulitzer Prize and the Freedom Award for its news reporting of the events.

Arkansas National Democratic Association (ANDA): Organization founded by Dr. James M. Robinson to eliminate the “white primary” in a state that was heavily Democratic.  The primaries often determined the outcome of the elections.

Arkansas National Guard: State militia called up by Governor Orval Faubus to keep the nine African-American students from attending Little Rock Central High School in September of 1957; Later used to protect the nine students under federal orders.

Arkansas State Legislature:  Law making body for the State of Arkansas.

Arkansas State Press:  Weekly newspaper printed for the African-American community by L.C. and Daisy Bates.  First appeared on May 9, 1941 and became the largest and most influential African-American paper in the state.  It criticized racism, attacked police brutality, segregation, and the inequities of the criminal justice system.  The paper closed in 1959 after the Bates were involved with the Little Rock Central High School crisis.  L.C. Bates died in 1980 and Daisy Bates reopened the newspaper in 1984 and served as an advisor after she sold the paper in 1987.

Harry Ashmore:  Pulitzer prize-winning Arkansas Gazette editorialist who covered the 1957 crisis at Little Rock Central High School; Founding member of the Arkansas Council on Human Relations.

Daisy Gatson Bates: (born Huttig, Union County, Arkansas in 1914 and died in 1999;  married L. C. Bates (1901-1980) and settled in Little Rock);  Bates and her husband published the Arkansas State Press.  Bates also served as a member of the NAACP and served as president of the Arkansas State Conference of NAACP branches. It was in this capacity that Daisy Bates became an advisor to the Little Rock Nine and their parents.  In 1960, Bates moved to New York City and spent two years writing her memoirs of the Central High crisis. The Long Shadow of Little Rock was published in 1962 with an introduction by Eleanor Roosevelt. After completion of the book, Bates moved to Washington, D. C. where she worked for the Democratic National Committee and for the Johnson administration’s antipoverty programs. After suffering a stroke in 1965, she returned to Little Rock.

Lucius Christopher (L.C.) Bates: (born in 1901 and died in 1980) Civil rights activist, and original owner of the Arkansas State Press; Husband of Daisy L. Gatson Bates.

Virgil Blossom:  Superintendent of the Little Rock schools in 1957; Devised the plan for desegregation which  was named for him - the Blossom Plan; Superintendent of Fayetteville schools during their desegregation.

Oliver L. Brown et al. v. Board of Education of Topeka:  Landmark 1954 court case in which the Supreme Court of the United States unanimously declared that it was unconstitutional to create separate schools for children on the basis of race. The Brown ruling ranks as one of the most important Supreme Court decisions of the 20th century. At the time of the decision, 17 southern states and the District of Columbia required that all public schools be racially segregated. A few northern and western states, including Kansas, left the issue of segregation up to individual school districts. While most schools in Kansas were integrated in 1954, the elementary schools in Topeka were not.

Capitol Citizens Council:  Group founded in 1955 to combat desegregation, the Little Rock Capitol Citizens Council was one of many “councils” that promoted segregation throughout the South; Originally formed in 1954 as a response to the Brown v. Board of Education decision, these groups had a sole purpose to maintain a segregated society.  The first one was founded in Mississippi and similar groups organized throughout the South.

Committee on Negro Organizations (CNO): The CNO was founded by Pine Bluff attorney Harold Flowers because he felt that the Arkansas National Democratic Association  was not doing enough to help African-Americans in Arkansas.  The CNO also worked to challenge the white primary system.

Committee to Retain Our Segregated Schools (CROSS): Counter group to STOP (Stop This Outrageous Purge) that supported the segregationist members of the Little Rock School Board.

Commonwealth College:  Socialist institution located in rural Polk County, Arkansas in 1924.  The school specifically aimed to educate the future leadership of what they designated as a new social class, the industrial worker.  A court action forced the College to close in September 1940. Commonwealth’s most famous student was Orval Faubus, who said in an interview just before his death that he had “never been with a group of equal numbers that had as many highly intelligent and smart people as there were at Commonwealth College.”

Dwight D. Eisenhower:  (born in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania in 1890 and died in 1969) American military leader and 34th President of the United States (1953-1961).

Orval Faubus: (born Combs (Madison County), Arkansas, 1910 and died in 1994)  Governor of Arkansas (1955–67) and schoolteacher.  After serving in World War II, Faubus became a state highway commissioner. Elected governor in 1955, Faubus initially pursued a liberal course in office but to combat his political opponents who were staunch segregationists, he adopted a hard-line civil rights position. In 1957, Faubus gained national attention when he called out the Arkansas National Guard to “prevent violence” during the integration of Central High School in Little Rock, but he was eventually forced to withdraw the Guard. After rioting broke out, President Dwight D. Eisenhower sent U.S. troops to Little Rock and put the National Guard under federal command in order to ensure the integration of the school. Faubus’ political expediency resulted in his repeated reelection as governor but also prevented him from moving into the national political arena. In 1970, 1974, and 1986 he sought reelection as governor of Arkansas but was unsuccessful in each attempt at a political comeback, the last time losing to Bill Clinton.

Federalism: system of government in which power is divided between a central authority and constituent political units.

Integrationist:  Person who supports the bringing together of people of different racial or ethnic groups into unrestricted and equal association, as in society or an organization.

Mosaic Templars of America:  Founded in 1882 as a fraternal organization by John E. Bush and Chester W. Keatts, the Mosaic Templars of America became one of the largest African-American-owned business enterprises in the world by providing burial and life insurance to members; operating a building and loan association, a newspaper, a nursing school, a hospital; and offering other social programs to the community. During the 1920’s, the Mosaic Templars’ membership numbered in the tens of thousands, with chapters in 26 states and several foreign countries. The Mosaic Templars reinvested their wealth in the African-American community to create social and economic benefit. They began construction of their landmark three-story national headquarters building in 1911 in downtown Little Rock. The 10,000 square foot structure housed independently operated professional and retail businesses; membership services offices; and a 3rd floor auditorium, which hosted theatrical and musical performances as well as symposia. The Mosaic Templars’ National Headquarters Building still stands at the southwest corner of Ninth and Broadway in downtown Little Rock.  The Headquarters Building was the largest of three buildings constructed by the Mosaic Templars on Broadway, which housed other black-owned businesses and profes-sional offices (definition taken from the Mosaic Templars Building Preservation Society).

Mother’s League of Central High School: Organization consisting of Little Rock women from local churches that opposed desegregation.  They obtained the support of Governor Orval Faubus and attempted to block desegregation by filing a request for an injunction in circuit court.

National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP): Organization founded in 1909 in New York City for the purpose of improving the conditions under which African-Americans lived at that time.  Although these conditions have improved enormously, many differences still exist in the exercise of rights of U.S. citizens solely because of race or ethnic origin. The NAACP continues to seek a single class of citizenship for every American.

Philander Smith College:  Founded in 1877, this Historically Black College was set up to educate ex- slaves after the Civil War.  The school became a four- year college in 1884 and maintains itself as a “college of service and distinction” in the heart of Little Rock, Arkansas.

Segregationist:  A person who believes in the act of segregating or forced separation from others.

Stop This Outrageous Purge (STOP): Grass-roots campaign organized to recall segregationist members of the Little Rock School Board in 1959.

Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC): Formed in 1960, SNCC (composed of both African-Americans and whites) student activists conducted “sit-ins” and used other methods to obtain civil rights for African-Americans. Their first attempt to organize in Arkansas occurred in 1963 and enlisted students from Philander Smith College and the Agricultural, Mechanical, and Normal (AM&N) College from Pine Bluff to hold a sit-in at public facilities (e.g., Little Rock Woolworths) and register African-American voters in Delta towns.

United States Supreme Court:  Highest court in the United States and the chief authority in the judicial branch, one of the three branches of the United States federal government.  The Supreme Court hears appeals from decisions of lower federal courts and state supreme courts, and it resolves issues of constitutional and federal law.  It stands as the ultimate authority in constitutional interpretation, and its decisions can be changed only by a constitutional amendment.

Unconstitutional: Not constitutional; not according to, or consistent with, the terms of a constitution of government; contrary to the constitution.

U.S. Army’s 101st Airborne Division:  Federal troops sent from Fort Campbell, Kentucky to ensure the safety of the nine African-American students at Little Rock Central High School and to keep peace in the city of Little Rock in the event of protest or violence.

U.S. Justice Department: executive department of the United States federal government, created by Congress in 1870 to assume the functions performed until then by the Office of the Attorney General. The department is headed by the attorney general, who is appointed by the president of the United States with the approval of the Senate, and who is a member of the Cabinet.  The functions of the department include providing means for the enforcement of federal laws and investigating violations thereof; supervising the federal penal institutions; furnishing legal counsel in cases involving the federal government and conducting all suits brought before the U.S. Supreme Court in which the federal government is concerned; interpreting laws relating to the activities of the other federal departments; and rendering legal advice, upon request, to the president and to Cabinet members; Responsible for enforcing civil rights laws enacted by the U.S. government within its Civil Rights Division.

Women’s Emergency Committee to Open Our Schools (WEC):  Founded after Governor Orval Faubus closed the schools, pending a public vote on immediate integration, the WEC consisted of women from Little Rock who worked behind the scenes to reopen the schools by canvassing voters in the city and enlisted
prominent businessmen and others to place pressure on the Little Rock School Board and voters to reopen the schools under the existing desegregation plan.

Assessment Materials

Activism in the Central High Crisis

Select a group whose activism contributed to change during or after the Central High Crisis and discuss ways their involvement positively or negatively affected the progress of civil rights.

Activism During the Central High School Crisis

The Central High School Crisis marked a pivotal moment in the American civil rights movement, where grassroots activism and federal enforcement clashed with state resistance to desegregation. Following the Supreme Court’s 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education, which declared racial segregation in public schools unconstitutional, the Little Rock Nine—nine Black students—attempted to integrate Central High School in September 1957.

Their courageous effort was met with violent opposition. Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus deployed the Arkansas National Guard to block their entry, defying federal law. In response, civil rights activists mobilized locally and nationally.

Possible Activists to Consider:

• NAACP and other Grass Roots Organizers
• Community Networks
• Educational Organizations
• Legal and Policy Groups
• Youth-Led Action
• The Media 
• Federal Response
• State Response

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