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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 Smith 2 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.”