Dear Commons Community,
Politics Daily reports that former President Bill Clinton honored the Little Rock Nine yesterday at a ceremony opening a new permanent exhibit in his presidential library featuring the Congressional Gold Medal they were awarded. For those who are too young to remember this event, it was September 1957 when Governor Orval Faubus issued an order ordering the Arkansas National Guard to prevent nine black students from attending the racially segregated Little Rock Central High School. In response, President Dwight D. Eisenhower ordered the U.S. Army’s 101st Airborne to federalize the Arkansas National Guard and to escort these nine students to school which they did amid angry mobs for the entire school year. Without any doubt, it was one of most important events of the entire Civil Rights Movement in this country.
Thank you President Clinton for remembering these nine brave individuals.
Tony
