President Eisenhower's Speech Summary

684 Words2 Pages

President Eisenhower wrote a speech in response to the events that were taking place in Little Rock, Arkansas. The intended audience for this speech is the citizens of the United States, the people in Little Rock, Arkansas but most important the powers of the world, waiting to see how the United States would handle the situation. The events in Arkansas would have a very huge impact on future Supreme Court Decisions and the Executive powers of the President. Governor Orville Faubus used his executive powers as Governor of Arkansas to call out in the National Guard to stop the Supreme Court decision of allowing nine African American from integrating Central High School in Little Rock. President Eisenhower at this time had the entire world waiting to see what he would do in order to Board of Education case of Topeka, Kansas in 1954 was a unanimous Supreme Court decision that overturned the Plessy vs. Ferguson case of 1896. The decision stated that separate but equal rule violated a person equal protection rights as stated in the 14th amendment. This case proved to be a model case of future civil rights lawsuits. The Little Rock, Arkansas incident was under the watchful eyes of people worldwide. The white citizens of Little Rock were very defiant and would not let the black students enter the all- white Central High School. The disturbance at Central High School went on for several weeks. The African American students tried to enter the school on several different occasions but each time they were greeted by an angry mob that blocked the entrance to the school. After several weeks President Eisenhower addressed the citizens of the United States and the citizens of Little Rock explaining to them that he had no choice now but to use his executive power in order to uphold the Supreme Court decision allowing African American to attend any school of their choice. He stated, “No one, not even a mob could override the decision of the Supreme

Open Document