Download Smith Sally Smith Miss Hughes/Mrs. VanGorder ____ Hour English

Sally Smith
Miss Hughes/Mrs. VanGorder
____ Hour English 2/____ Hour Social Studies
16 October 2013
Domestic Tranquility in the United States: The Little Rock Nine
Within the United States Constitution, the Preamble outlines the five
responsibilities of a republican government. The founding fathers believed that it
was essential for the federal government to protect and provide for its citizens
"in order to form a more perfect union." One of the necessary functions of the
United States government mentioned in the Preamble is to "insure domestic
tranquility." The Constitution has afforded the government certain powers to
make sure that its citizens are guarded from war, internal conflict, insurrections,
and other situations that threaten personal safety.
In Article IV, Section 4, the Constitution states, "The United States shall
guarantee to every State in this Union a republican form of government, and
shall protect each of them against invasion; and on application of the
legislature, or of the executive (when the legislature cannot be convened)
against domestic violence." The Constitution promises that states in the union
and its citizens are protected against potential threats.
Although Constitutional amendments ended slavery and provided voting
rights for African American male citizens of the United States, Jim Crow laws
created segregation and racial discrimination in some Southern States. In the
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1950’s, the United States was in the midst of the Civil Rights Movement. Many
black citizens began to boycott, protest, and advocate for equal protection
under the ultimate rule of law – the United States Constitution. African Americans
demanded equal voting rights, school integration, and other basic rights of life,
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
In 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that segregating schools was
unconstitutional in the landmark case, Brown v. Board of Education. Despite the
ruling, some states did not agree with the decision and still prohibited equal
rights to black citizens. In 1957, nine African American students enrolled at the
previously all-white Little Rock Central High School. The governor of the state of
Arkansas, Orval Faubus, supported segregation and sent the Arkansas National
Guard to keep the black students from entering the high school.
Knowing that the governor was acting against the Constitution’s
responsibility to insure domestic tranquility, President Eisenhower sent the 101st
Airborne Division of the U.S. Army and federalized the Arkansas National Guard
to protect the students entering Little Rock Central High School. Governor
Faubus had presented a clear threat to the safety and security of United States
citizens. As the executor of the law of the land, it was the President’s duty to
“insure domestic tranquility” wherever that peace was threatened.
As evidenced by Article IV, Section 4 of the United States Constitution and
by the Little Rock Nine historic event, it is the U.S. government’s responsibility to
insure domestic tranquility “in order to form a more perfect union.”