Brown vs. Board
In 1954 Linda Brown's father charged a school with violating Linda's rights because she was denied entry into school. The court ruled in favor of Brown saying that segregated schooling violated the 14th Amendment. The court said all schools must desegregate. On September 4th, 1957 the Little Rock Nine attended their first day of school. There was a white mob in front of the school and the Arkansas Governor deployed their National Guard to prevent the nine students from entering. After having to bring in NAACP lawyers at the federal district court, the NAACP won. On September 23, the nine students and police entered the school from a side door. Once the other students realized the nine students were in the school violence escalated. Soon after arriving they were sent back home. Violence hardly stopped, Daisy Bates writes about what the nine students experienced. At the end of the year, Ernest Green was the first African American to ever graduate Central High School. Martin Luther King Jr. attended his graduation ceremony. The governor still putting up a fight closed his schools, but the supreme court said they had to reopen the schools for desegregation. The school was awarded a medal of honor and helped mark the path for the coming years. There is now a Little Rock Nine Foundation set up to promote justice and Equality.
IMPACT: Learning about the Little Rock Nine impacted me greatly. Now schools are open to everyone, but there is still civil rights issues. The impact of this case now is that every school is desegregated and there is now a law saying the supreme court overalls the state courts. Please read the interview below!!! Interview from Elizabeth Eckford The above information is used from the secondary sources. (link below). http://mlk-kpp01.stanford.edu/index.php/encyclopedia/encyclopedia/enc_little_rock_school_desegregation_1957/ Google Images: "Little Rock Nine Case" |