Civil rights movement

===Little Rock Nine, 1957===
{{Main|Little Rock Nine}}

[[File:Little Rock integration protest.jpg|thumb|left|White parents rally against integrating Little Rock's schools in August 1959.]]

The Little Rock Nine were a group of nine students who attended segregated black high schools in [[Little Rock, Arkansas|Little Rock]], the capital of the state of Arkansas.  They each volunteered when the NAACP and the national civil rights movement obtained federal court orders to integrate the prestigious [[Little Rock Central High School]] in September, 1957. The Nine faced intense harassment and threats of  violence from white parents and students, as well as organized white supremacy groups.  The enraged opposition emphasized miscegenation as the threat to white society. [[Governor of Arkansas|Arkansas Governor]], [[Orval Faubus]], claiming his only goal was to preserve the peace, deployed the Arkansas National Guard to prevent the black students from entering the school. Faubus defied federal court orders, whereupon President Dwight D. Eisenhower intervened. He federalized the Arkansas National Guard and sent them home. Then he sent in an elite Army unit to escort the students to school and protect them between classes  during the 1957–58 school year. In class, however, the Nine were teased and ridiculed every day. In the city compromise efforts all failed and political tensions continued to fester. A year later in September 1958 the Supreme Court ruled that all the city's high schools had to be integrated immediately. Governor Faubus and the legislature responded by immediately shutting down all the public high schools in the city for the entire 1958–1959 school year, despite the harm it did to all the students. The decision to integrate the school was a landmark event in the civil rights movement, and the students' bravery and determination in the face of violent opposition is remembered as a key moment in American history. The city and state were entangled in very expensive legal disputes for decades, while suffering a reputation for hatred and obstruction.<ref>Karen Anderson, "The Little Rock school desegregation crisis: Moderation and social conflict." ''Journal of Southern History'' 70.3 (2004): 603–636 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/27648479 online].</ref><ref>Elizabeth Jacoway, ''Turn away thy son: Little Rock, the crisis that shocked the nation'' (Simon and Schuster, 2007).{{ISBN?}}{{page needed|date=August 2023}}</ref>