Little Rock Nine

Little Rock Nine

Was little rock nine more of a failure than a success for the civil rights?
One could argue that the little rock nine was a complete failure for the civil rights because, although the federal law about education had been legally changed, the reality was that the state governments were finding ways to get around the integration of the black children. Mostly the southern states found ways to rig the system to prevent as little integration as possible. They made it compulsory for the black children to have criteria like character and health for them to get into the school. This got rid of about 75to25 applicants. Then they tried to convince the rest of the remaining applicants not to continue with the application. Even if the children decided to go through with their application they risked abuse and being victimised everyday they went. By 1964 only 123 black students out of 7000 attended integrated schools in little rock. The fact there was no widespread integration at that time suggested that the civil right had yet more work to do in their goal to achieve equality.
Tension between the federal government and state government also contributed to the failure of little rock nine. Segregated schools were illegal according to federal law but authorities like governor Faubus did all in their power to stop integration. In opposition to the civil rights Faubus has sent in national guards to stop the little rock nine from entering central high. He also spread rumours that the black teenagers were buying weapons, and he appeared on local television predicting there would be a lot of violence if integration continued. By doing all of this faubus was trying to get in favour of the white voters who were deeply opposed integration anyway. The fact that the white people were still quite racist towards the blacks indicates no change in the attitudes and emphasised the scale of the obstacles the civil rights were still to face.
However the little rock nine was not a...

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