Orval Faubus
Encyclopedia
Orval Eugene Faubus was the 36th Governor of Arkansas, serving from 1955 to 1967. He is best known for his 1957 stand against the desegregation
of Little Rock
public schools during the Little Rock Crisis, in which he defied a unanimous decision of the United States Supreme Court
by ordering the Arkansas National Guard
to stop African American
students from attending Little Rock Central High School.
Despite his initial staunch segregationist stances, Faubus moderated his positions later in life.
, the seat of Madison County
in northwestern Arkansas
. He was born prematurely and weighed only four pounds at birth. According to his father, "Little Orval was different from most boys. Kids liked to get into mischief, but all he ever did was read books. He never done anything if he couldn't do it perfectly. You'd never find a weed in his row of corn."
, a race in which he finished second. He was urged to challenge the result but declined, which earned him the gratitude of the Democratic Party
. As a result, he was elected circuit clerk and recorder and recorder of Madison County, a post he held for two-terms.
When the United States entered World War II
, Faubus joined the United States Army
and served as an intelligence officer with the Third Army of General George Patton. He rose to the rank of major and was in combat several times. His book, This Faraway Land, documents the military period of his life. He was active in veterans' causes for the remainder of his life.
When Faubus returned from the war, he cultivated ties with leaders of Arkansas' Democratic Party, particularly with progressive reform Governor Sid McMath
, leader of the post-war "GI Revolt" against corruption, under whom he served as director of the state's highway commission. Meanwhile, conservative Francis Cherry
defeated McMath's bid for a third term in the 1952 Democratic primary. Cherry became unpopular with voters, and Faubus challenged him in the 1954 primary.
Faubus rejected his father's radicalism for the more mainline New Deal, a pragmatic move. He was elected governor as a liberal Democrat. A 'moderate' on racial issues, his political realism resurfaced as he adopted racial policies that were palatable to influential white voters in the Delta
region as part of a strategy to effect key social reforms and economic growth in Arkansas.
in Mena
, as well as his early political upbringing. Commonwealth College had been formed by leftist academic and social activists, some of whom later were revealed to have had close ties with the Communist Party of the United States of America
. Most of those who attended and taught there were idealistic young people who sought an education or, in the case of the faculty, a job which came with room and board. During the runoff, Cherry and his surrogates accused Faubus of having attended a "communist" school and implied that his sympathies remained leftist. Faubus at first denied attending, and then admitted enrolling "for only a few weeks". Later, it was shown that he had remained at the school for more than a year, earned good grades, and was elected student body president. Faubus led a group of students who testified on behalf of the college's accreditation before the state legislature. Nevertheless, efforts to paint the candidate as a communist sympathizer backfired in a climate of growing resentment against such allegations. Faubus hence narrowly defeated Cherry to win the Democratic gubernatorial nomination. Relations were cool between the two men for years, but when Cherry died in 1965, Faubus put politics aside and was magnanimous in praising his predecessor.
In the 1954 general election
campaign against Little Rock Mayor
Pratt C. Remmel
, Faubus secured the endorsement of the previous 1950 and 1952 Republican
gubernatorial nominee, Jefferson W. Speck
, a planter from Mississippi County in eastern Arkansas. Faubus defeated Remmel by a 63% to 37% percent margin. Remmel, a businessman and scion of a prominent Republican family, polled the strongest vote at the time for a GOP candidate since Reconstruction.
The 1954 election made Faubus sensitive to attacks from the political right. It has been suggested that this sensitivity contributed to his later stance against integration when he was challenged by segregationist elements within his own party. Faubus was known as a particularly effective one-on-one campaigner and was said to have never turned away anyone who sought to shake his hand, no matter how much time it took.
Faubus' name became internationally known during the Little Rock Crisis
of 1957, when he used the National Guard to stop African Americans from attending Little Rock Central High School as part of federally ordered racial desegregation. His strong stand on this issue may seem surprising considering Faubus' 1954 run for governor as a progressive candidate promising to increase spending on schools and roads. During the first few months of his administration, Faubus desegregated state buses and public transportation and began to investigate the possibility of introducing multi-racial schools.
In 1956, Faubus easily blocked a primary election challenge from State Senator James D. Johnson
of Conway, the segregationist leader of conservatives. Johnson's wife, Virginia Morris Johnson
, made campaign speeches for her husband and later became the first woman (1968) to seek the office of Arkansas governor. By the start of 1957, Faubus in his second term had obtained legislative passage of a controversial tax to increase teacher salaries.
Critics have long charged that Faubus' fight in Little Rock against the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education
decision by the U.S. Supreme Court
that separate schools were inherently unequal, was politically motivated. The ensuing battle helped to shield him from the political fallout from the tax increase, and to diminish Johnson's appeal. Journalist Harry Ashmore
(who won a Pulitzer Prize
for his columns on the subject) portrayed the fight over Central High as a crisis manufactured by Faubus. Ashmore said that Faubus used the Guard to keep blacks out of Central High School because he was frustrated by the success his political opponents were having in using segregationist rhetoric to arouse white voters.
Faubus' decision led to a showdown with President Dwight D. Eisenhower
and former Governor Sid McMath. In October 1957, Eisenhower federalized the Arkansas National Guard and ordered them to return to their armories which effectively removed them from Faubus' control. Eisenhower then sent elements of the 101st Airborne Division
to Arkansas to protect the black students and enforce the Federal court order. In retaliation, Faubus shut down Little Rock high schools for the 1958—1959 school years. This is often referred to as "The Lost Year" in Little Rock.
Though Faubus later lost general popularity as a result of his stand against desegregation, at the time he was included among the "Ten Men in the World Most Admired by Americans", according to Gallup's most admired man and woman poll
for 1958. This dichotomy was later summed up as follows: Faubus was both the "best loved" and "most hated" of Arkansas politicians of the second half of the twentieth century.
and Lyndon B. Johnson
, with each of whom he remained cordial, and both of whom carried Arkansas.
In the 1956 general election, Faubus, having already eliminated Jim Johnson, overwhelmed GOP candidate Roy Mitchell, 321,797 (80.7%) to 77,215 (19.4%). In 1958, he defeated Republican George W. Johnson of Greenwood
in Sebastian County by drawing 82.5% of the votes.
In 1960, Faubus defeated Attorney General
Bruce Bennett
in the Democratic gubernatorial primary for and then crushed the Republican choice, Henry M. Britt
, an attorney
from Hot Springs
, to secure reelection. Faubus polled 292,064 votes (69.2%) to Britt's 129,921 (30.8%). In the presidential election contest, however, Democrat John F. Kennedy
won Arkansas over the Republican Richard M. Nixon by less than expected. Britt was later a circuit judge in Garland County from 1967 to 1983.
In 1962, Faubus broke with the White Citizens' Council
s and other rightist groups, who preferred, but did not officially endorse, U.S. Representative Dale Alford
in that year's gubernatorial primary. Faubus cast himself as a moderate, he completely ignored the race issue during the 1962 election campaign, and barely secured a majority over Alford, McMath, and three other candidates. He then handily defeated the Republican Willis Ricketts
, a then 37-year-old pharmacist from Fayetteville
in the general election.
While he was still an outcast from black leaders, Faubus nevertheless won a large percent of the black vote. In 1964, when he defeated the Republican Winthrop Rockefeller
by a 57% to 43% margin, Faubus secured 81% of the black vote.
Faubus chose not to run for re-election to a seventh term in what would likely have been a difficult race in 1966. Former gubernatorial candidate James D. Johnson
, by then an elected Arkansas Supreme Court
Justice, narrowly won the Democratic nomination over another justice, the moderate Frank Holt. Johnson was then defeated in the general election by Rockefeller, who became the state's first GOP governor since Reconstruction. Ironically, years later, Johnson himself became a Republican and supported Governor Frank D. White
, later a benefactor of Faubus.
In 1968, Faubus was among five people considered for the vice-presidential slot of third-party presidential candidate George Wallace
. However, in light of the public perception of both as segregationists, Wallace ended up selecting retired General Curtis LeMay
.
During the 1969 season, Faubus was hired by new owner Jess Odom to be general manager of his Li'l Abner
theme park in the Ozark Mountains, Dogpatch USA
. According to newspaper articles, Faubus was said to have commented that managing the park was similar to running state government because some of the same tricks applied to both.
Faubus sought the governorship again in 1970, 1974, and 1986 but was defeated in the Democratic primaries by Dale Bumpers
, David Pryor
, and Bill Clinton
, respectively, each of whom went on to defeat Republican opponents. In the 1970 race, two other Democratic candidates in the running, Joe Purcell
and Hayes McClerkin
, failed to make the runoff, and Bumpers barely edged Purcell for the chance to face Faubus directly. In his last race, 1986, Faubus polled 174,402 votes (33.5 percent) to Clinton's 315,397 (60.6 percent).
Faubus' decline occurred when the Democrats reformed their own party in response to public acceptance of the progressive polices followed by Rockefeller. Thus, a new generation of popular Democratic candidates easily contrasted themselves favorably in voters' minds with Faubus' old-style politics and a more conservative Republican Party which followed Rockefeller's tenure in the state.
In 1976, a report surfaced that Arkansas Republican leaders had approached Faubus about running for governor that year against Pryor, but both Faubus and the GOP denied the claim. The GOP instead ran the 40-year-old Pine Bluff
plumber
Leon Griffith
as its sacrificial lamb candidate against Pryor, who won the second of his two gubernatorial terms with more than 80 percent of the ballots.
Desegregation
Desegregation is the process of ending the separation of two groups usually referring to races. This is most commonly used in reference to the United States. Desegregation was long a focus of the American Civil Rights Movement, both before and after the United States Supreme Court's decision in...
of Little Rock
Little Rock, Arkansas
Little Rock is the capital and the largest city of the U.S. state of Arkansas. The Metropolitan Statistical Area had a population of 699,757 people in the 2010 census...
public schools during the Little Rock Crisis, in which he defied a unanimous decision of the United States Supreme Court
Supreme Court of the United States
The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all state and federal courts, and original jurisdiction over a small range of cases...
by ordering the Arkansas National Guard
Arkansas National Guard
The Arkansas National Guard comprises both Army and Air components. The Constitution of the United States specifically charges the National Guard with dual federal and state missions. In fact, the National Guard is the only United States military force empowered to function in a state status...
to stop African American
African American
African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...
students from attending Little Rock Central High School.
Despite his initial staunch segregationist stances, Faubus moderated his positions later in life.
Early life
Faubus was born to Sam Faubus (1887–1966), and the former Addie Joslen in the Combs Community near HuntsvilleHuntsville, Arkansas
Huntsville is a city in mountainous Madison County, Arkansas, United States. The population was 2,046 at the 2010 census. The city is the county seat of Madison County. During the American Civil War it was the site of what became known as the Huntsville Massacre...
, the seat of Madison County
Madison County, Arkansas
Madison County is a county located in the U.S. state of Arkansas. As of 2010, the population was 15,717. The county seat is Huntsville. The county was formed on September 30, 1836, and named for James Madison, President of the United States...
in northwestern Arkansas
Arkansas
Arkansas is a state located in the southern region of the United States. Its name is an Algonquian name of the Quapaw Indians. Arkansas shares borders with six states , and its eastern border is largely defined by the Mississippi River...
. He was born prematurely and weighed only four pounds at birth. According to his father, "Little Orval was different from most boys. Kids liked to get into mischief, but all he ever did was read books. He never done anything if he couldn't do it perfectly. You'd never find a weed in his row of corn."
Political work
Faubus' first political race was in 1936 when he contested a seat in the Arkansas House of RepresentativesArkansas House of Representatives
The Arkansas House of Representatives is the lower house of the Arkansas General Assembly, the state legislature of the U.S. state of Arkansas. The House is composed of 100 members elected from an equal amount of constituencies across the state. Each district has an average population of 26,734...
, a race in which he finished second. He was urged to challenge the result but declined, which earned him the gratitude of the Democratic Party
History of the United States Democratic Party
The history of the Democratic Party of the United States is an account of the oldest political party in the United States and arguably the oldest democratic party in the world....
. As a result, he was elected circuit clerk and recorder and recorder of Madison County, a post he held for two-terms.
When the United States entered World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, Faubus joined the United States Army
United States Army
The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...
and served as an intelligence officer with the Third Army of General George Patton. He rose to the rank of major and was in combat several times. His book, This Faraway Land, documents the military period of his life. He was active in veterans' causes for the remainder of his life.
When Faubus returned from the war, he cultivated ties with leaders of Arkansas' Democratic Party, particularly with progressive reform Governor Sid McMath
Sid McMath
Sidney Sanders McMath was a decorated U.S. Marine, attorney and the 34th Governor of Arkansas who, in defiance of his state's political establishment, championed rapid rural electrification, massive highway and school construction, the building of the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences,...
, leader of the post-war "GI Revolt" against corruption, under whom he served as director of the state's highway commission. Meanwhile, conservative Francis Cherry
Francis Cherry
Francis Adams Cherry was the 35th Governor of Arkansas, elected as a Democrat for a single two-year term from 1953 to 1955. He was only the second governor in Arkansas history to have been denied a second term—the first was Tom Jefferson Terral, who was defeated in 1926. After the...
defeated McMath's bid for a third term in the 1952 Democratic primary. Cherry became unpopular with voters, and Faubus challenged him in the 1954 primary.
Faubus rejected his father's radicalism for the more mainline New Deal, a pragmatic move. He was elected governor as a liberal Democrat. A 'moderate' on racial issues, his political realism resurfaced as he adopted racial policies that were palatable to influential white voters in the Delta
Arkansas Delta
The Arkansas Delta is one of the five natural regions of the state of Arkansas. It runs along the eastern border of the state next to the Mississippi River. It is part of the Mississippi River alluvial plain, itself part of the Mississippi embayment...
region as part of a strategy to effect key social reforms and economic growth in Arkansas.
The 1954 campaign
In the 1954 campaign, Faubus was compelled to defend his attendance at the defunct northwest Arkansas Commonwealth CollegeCommonwealth College, Arkansas
Commonwealth College was started in 1923 to recruit and train people to take the lead in socio-economic reform and prepare them for unconventional roles in a new and different society. Although in the 1930s commonwealth was essentially orieneted towards training organizers for the rapidly growing...
in Mena
Mena, Arkansas
Mena is a city in Polk County, Arkansas, United States. It is also the county seat of Polk County.It was founded by Arthur Edward Stilwell during the building of the Kansas City, Pittsburg and Gulf Railroad . It was Stilwell who decided Mena would be the name of this new town along the route to...
, as well as his early political upbringing. Commonwealth College had been formed by leftist academic and social activists, some of whom later were revealed to have had close ties with the Communist Party of the United States of America
Communist Party USA
The Communist Party USA is a Marxist political party in the United States, established in 1919. It has a long, complex history that is closely related to the histories of similar communist parties worldwide and the U.S. labor movement....
. Most of those who attended and taught there were idealistic young people who sought an education or, in the case of the faculty, a job which came with room and board. During the runoff, Cherry and his surrogates accused Faubus of having attended a "communist" school and implied that his sympathies remained leftist. Faubus at first denied attending, and then admitted enrolling "for only a few weeks". Later, it was shown that he had remained at the school for more than a year, earned good grades, and was elected student body president. Faubus led a group of students who testified on behalf of the college's accreditation before the state legislature. Nevertheless, efforts to paint the candidate as a communist sympathizer backfired in a climate of growing resentment against such allegations. Faubus hence narrowly defeated Cherry to win the Democratic gubernatorial nomination. Relations were cool between the two men for years, but when Cherry died in 1965, Faubus put politics aside and was magnanimous in praising his predecessor.
In the 1954 general election
General election
In a parliamentary political system, a general election is an election in which all or most members of a given political body are chosen. The term is usually used to refer to elections held for a nation's primary legislative body, as distinguished from by-elections and local elections.The term...
campaign against Little Rock Mayor
Mayor
In many countries, a Mayor is the highest ranking officer in the municipal government of a town or a large urban city....
Pratt C. Remmel
Pratt C. Remmel
Pratt Cates Remmel, Sr. , was the only 20th century Republican elected on a partisan ballot to have served as mayor of Little Rock, Arkansas. He was elected to the first of two two-year terms in 1951, was reelected in 1953, and then defeated in 1955 by the Democrat Woodrow Wilson Mann, who like...
, Faubus secured the endorsement of the previous 1950 and 1952 Republican
Republican Party (United States)
The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...
gubernatorial nominee, Jefferson W. Speck
Jefferson W. Speck
Jefferson W. Speck was a planter and businessman from Mississippi County, Arkansas, who was the Republican gubernatorial nominee in 1950 and again in 1952. He was a leader in the Dwight D...
, a planter from Mississippi County in eastern Arkansas. Faubus defeated Remmel by a 63% to 37% percent margin. Remmel, a businessman and scion of a prominent Republican family, polled the strongest vote at the time for a GOP candidate since Reconstruction.
The 1954 election made Faubus sensitive to attacks from the political right. It has been suggested that this sensitivity contributed to his later stance against integration when he was challenged by segregationist elements within his own party. Faubus was known as a particularly effective one-on-one campaigner and was said to have never turned away anyone who sought to shake his hand, no matter how much time it took.
Little Rock integration crisis
Little Rock Nine
The Little Rock Nine was a group of African-American students who were enrolled in Little Rock Central High School in 1957. The ensuing Little Rock Crisis, in which the students were initially prevented from entering the racially segregated school by Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus, and then...
of 1957, when he used the National Guard to stop African Americans from attending Little Rock Central High School as part of federally ordered racial desegregation. His strong stand on this issue may seem surprising considering Faubus' 1954 run for governor as a progressive candidate promising to increase spending on schools and roads. During the first few months of his administration, Faubus desegregated state buses and public transportation and began to investigate the possibility of introducing multi-racial schools.
In 1956, Faubus easily blocked a primary election challenge from State Senator James D. Johnson
James D. Johnson
James Douglas Johnson, known as Justice Jim Johnson , was a former associate justice of the Arkansas Supreme Court, a two-time candidate for governor of Arkansas in 1956 and 1966, and in 1968 an unsuccessful candidate for the U.S...
of Conway, the segregationist leader of conservatives. Johnson's wife, Virginia Morris Johnson
Virginia Johnson (Arkansas)
Virginia Lillian Morris Johnson , was, in 1968, the first woman to seek the office of governor of Arkansas.-Early years:...
, made campaign speeches for her husband and later became the first woman (1968) to seek the office of Arkansas governor. By the start of 1957, Faubus in his second term had obtained legislative passage of a controversial tax to increase teacher salaries.
Critics have long charged that Faubus' fight in Little Rock against the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education
Brown v. Board of Education
Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483 , was a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court that declared state laws establishing separate public schools for black and white students unconstitutional. The decision overturned the Plessy v. Ferguson decision of 1896 which...
decision by the U.S. Supreme Court
Supreme Court of the United States
The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all state and federal courts, and original jurisdiction over a small range of cases...
that separate schools were inherently unequal, was politically motivated. The ensuing battle helped to shield him from the political fallout from the tax increase, and to diminish Johnson's appeal. Journalist Harry Ashmore
Harry Ashmore
Harry Scott Ashmore was an American journalist who won a Pulitzer Prize for his editorials in 1957 on the school integration conflict in Little Rock, Arkansas....
(who won a Pulitzer Prize
Pulitzer Prize
The Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City...
for his columns on the subject) portrayed the fight over Central High as a crisis manufactured by Faubus. Ashmore said that Faubus used the Guard to keep blacks out of Central High School because he was frustrated by the success his political opponents were having in using segregationist rhetoric to arouse white voters.
Faubus' decision led to a showdown with President Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower was the 34th President of the United States, from 1953 until 1961. He was a five-star general in the United States Army...
and former Governor Sid McMath. In October 1957, Eisenhower federalized the Arkansas National Guard and ordered them to return to their armories which effectively removed them from Faubus' control. Eisenhower then sent elements of the 101st Airborne Division
101st Airborne Division
The 101st Airborne Division—the "Screaming Eagles"—is a U.S. Army modular light infantry division trained for air assault operations. During World War II, it was renowned for its role in Operation Overlord, the D-Day landings on 6 June 1944, in Normandy, France, Operation Market Garden, the...
to Arkansas to protect the black students and enforce the Federal court order. In retaliation, Faubus shut down Little Rock high schools for the 1958—1959 school years. This is often referred to as "The Lost Year" in Little Rock.
Though Faubus later lost general popularity as a result of his stand against desegregation, at the time he was included among the "Ten Men in the World Most Admired by Americans", according to Gallup's most admired man and woman poll
Gallup's most admired man and woman poll
Gallup’s most admired man and woman poll is an annual poll that Gallup has conducted at the end of virtually every single year since 1948. Americans are asked, without prompting, to say what man and woman "living today in any part of the world, do [they] admire most?" The result is published as a...
for 1958. This dichotomy was later summed up as follows: Faubus was both the "best loved" and "most hated" of Arkansas politicians of the second half of the twentieth century.
Faubus-style politics
Faubus was elected governor to six two-year terms and hence served for twelve years. He maintained a defiant, populist image, while he shifted toward a less confrontational stance with the federal government, particularly during the administrations of Presidents John F. KennedyJohn F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....
and Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson , often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States...
, with each of whom he remained cordial, and both of whom carried Arkansas.
In the 1956 general election, Faubus, having already eliminated Jim Johnson, overwhelmed GOP candidate Roy Mitchell, 321,797 (80.7%) to 77,215 (19.4%). In 1958, he defeated Republican George W. Johnson of Greenwood
Greenwood, Arkansas
Greenwood is a city in and one of the two county seats of Sebastian County, Arkansas, United States, perhaps best known locally for its Arkansas high school football...
in Sebastian County by drawing 82.5% of the votes.
In 1960, Faubus defeated Attorney General
Attorney General
In most common law jurisdictions, the attorney general, or attorney-general, is the main legal advisor to the government, and in some jurisdictions he or she may also have executive responsibility for law enforcement or responsibility for public prosecutions.The term is used to refer to any person...
Bruce Bennett
Bruce Bennett (Arkansas politician)
Bruce Bennett was a Democratic politician from El Dorado, Arkansas, who served as his state's attorney general from 1957–1960 and from 1963–1966...
in the Democratic gubernatorial primary for and then crushed the Republican choice, Henry M. Britt
Henry M. Britt
Henry Middleton Britt, III , was a Hot Springs lawyer who was a pioneer in the revitalization of the Republican Party in the heavily Democratic state of Arkansas, primarily during the 1960s and 1970s. He was the Republican gubernatorial nominee in 1960, having been decisively defeated by Orval...
, an attorney
Lawyer
A lawyer, according to Black's Law Dictionary, is "a person learned in the law; as an attorney, counsel or solicitor; a person who is practicing law." Law is the system of rules of conduct established by the sovereign government of a society to correct wrongs, maintain the stability of political...
from Hot Springs
Hot Springs, Arkansas
Hot Springs is the 10th most populous city in the U.S. state of Arkansas, the county seat of Garland County, and the principal city of the Hot Springs Metropolitan Statistical Area encompassing all of Garland County...
, to secure reelection. Faubus polled 292,064 votes (69.2%) to Britt's 129,921 (30.8%). In the presidential election contest, however, Democrat John F. Kennedy
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....
won Arkansas over the Republican Richard M. Nixon by less than expected. Britt was later a circuit judge in Garland County from 1967 to 1983.
In 1962, Faubus broke with the White Citizens' Council
White Citizens' Council
The White Citizens' Council was an American white supremacist organization formed on July 11, 1954. After 1956, it was known as the Citizens' Councils of America...
s and other rightist groups, who preferred, but did not officially endorse, U.S. Representative Dale Alford
Dale Alford
Thomas Dale Alford, Sr. was an ophthalmologist and politician from the U.S. state of Arkansas who served as a conservative Democrat in the United States House of Representatives from Little Rock from 1959 to 1963....
in that year's gubernatorial primary. Faubus cast himself as a moderate, he completely ignored the race issue during the 1962 election campaign, and barely secured a majority over Alford, McMath, and three other candidates. He then handily defeated the Republican Willis Ricketts
Willis Ricketts
Willis Harvey "Bubs" Ricketts was the Republican Party gubernatorial nominee in the U.S. state of Arkansas in 1962, having been overwhelmingly defeated by the incumbent Democrat Orval Eugene Faubus...
, a then 37-year-old pharmacist from Fayetteville
Fayetteville, Arkansas
Fayetteville is the county seat of Washington County, and the third largest city in Arkansas. The city is centrally located within the county and is home to the University of Arkansas. Fayetteville is also deep in the Boston Mountains, a subset of The Ozarks...
in the general election.
While he was still an outcast from black leaders, Faubus nevertheless won a large percent of the black vote. In 1964, when he defeated the Republican Winthrop Rockefeller
Winthrop Rockefeller
Winthrop Rockefeller was a politician and philanthropist who served as the first Republican Governor of Arkansas since Reconstruction. He was a third-generation member of the Rockefeller family.-Early life:...
by a 57% to 43% margin, Faubus secured 81% of the black vote.
Faubus chose not to run for re-election to a seventh term in what would likely have been a difficult race in 1966. Former gubernatorial candidate James D. Johnson
James D. Johnson
James Douglas Johnson, known as Justice Jim Johnson , was a former associate justice of the Arkansas Supreme Court, a two-time candidate for governor of Arkansas in 1956 and 1966, and in 1968 an unsuccessful candidate for the U.S...
, by then an elected Arkansas Supreme Court
Arkansas Supreme Court
The Arkansas Supreme Court is the highest court in the U.S. state of Arkansas. Since 1925, it has consisted of a Chief Justice and six Associate Justices, and at times Special Justices are called upon in the absence of a regular justice...
Justice, narrowly won the Democratic nomination over another justice, the moderate Frank Holt. Johnson was then defeated in the general election by Rockefeller, who became the state's first GOP governor since Reconstruction. Ironically, years later, Johnson himself became a Republican and supported Governor Frank D. White
Frank D. White
Frank Durward White was the 41st Governor of the U.S. state of Arkansas since Reconstruction. He served a single two-year term from 1981 to 1983. He is one of only two people to have defeated President Bill Clinton in an election. Frank Durward White (June 4, 1933 – May 21, 2003) was...
, later a benefactor of Faubus.
In 1968, Faubus was among five people considered for the vice-presidential slot of third-party presidential candidate George Wallace
George Wallace
George Corley Wallace, Jr. was the 45th Governor of Alabama, serving four terms: 1963–1967, 1971–1979 and 1983–1987. "The most influential loser" in 20th-century U.S. politics, according to biographers Dan T. Carter and Stephan Lesher, he ran for U.S...
. However, in light of the public perception of both as segregationists, Wallace ended up selecting retired General Curtis LeMay
Curtis LeMay
Curtis Emerson LeMay was a general in the United States Air Force and the vice presidential running mate of American Independent Party candidate George Wallace in 1968....
.
During the 1969 season, Faubus was hired by new owner Jess Odom to be general manager of his Li'l Abner
Li'l Abner
Li'l Abner is a satirical American comic strip that appeared in many newspapers in the United States, Canada and Europe, featuring a fictional clan of hillbillies in the impoverished town of Dogpatch, Kentucky. Written and drawn by Al Capp , the strip ran for 43 years, from August 13, 1934 through...
theme park in the Ozark Mountains, Dogpatch USA
Dogpatch USA
Dogpatch USA is an abandoned theme park located on State Highway 7 between the cities of Harrison and Jasper in Arkansas, USA, an area known today as Marble Falls...
. According to newspaper articles, Faubus was said to have commented that managing the park was similar to running state government because some of the same tricks applied to both.
Faubus sought the governorship again in 1970, 1974, and 1986 but was defeated in the Democratic primaries by Dale Bumpers
Dale Bumpers
Dale Leon Bumpers is an American politician who served as the 38th Governor of Arkansas from 1971 to 1975; and then in the United States Senate from 1975 until his retirement in January 1999. He is a member of the Democratic Party. Senator Bumpers is currently counsel at the Washington, D.C...
, David Pryor
David Pryor
David Hampton Pryor is a former Democratic member of the United States House of Representatives and United States Senator from the State of Arkansas. Pryor also served as 39th Governor of Arkansas from 1975 to 1979 and was a member of the Arkansas House of Representatives from 1960 to 1966...
, and Bill Clinton
Bill Clinton
William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...
, respectively, each of whom went on to defeat Republican opponents. In the 1970 race, two other Democratic candidates in the running, Joe Purcell
Joe Purcell
Joseph Gregory Purcell -References:...
and Hayes McClerkin
Hayes McClerkin
Hayes C. McClerkin is a commercial and environmental law attorney in Texarkana, Arkansas, who served as a member of the Arkansas House of Representatives from 1961–1970 and as Speaker from 1969-1970. He succeeded Speaker Sterling R...
, failed to make the runoff, and Bumpers barely edged Purcell for the chance to face Faubus directly. In his last race, 1986, Faubus polled 174,402 votes (33.5 percent) to Clinton's 315,397 (60.6 percent).
Faubus' decline occurred when the Democrats reformed their own party in response to public acceptance of the progressive polices followed by Rockefeller. Thus, a new generation of popular Democratic candidates easily contrasted themselves favorably in voters' minds with Faubus' old-style politics and a more conservative Republican Party which followed Rockefeller's tenure in the state.
In 1976, a report surfaced that Arkansas Republican leaders had approached Faubus about running for governor that year against Pryor, but both Faubus and the GOP denied the claim. The GOP instead ran the 40-year-old Pine Bluff
Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Pine Bluff is the largest city and county seat of Jefferson County, Arkansas, United States. It is also the principal city of the Pine Bluff Metropolitan Statistical Area and part of the Little Rock-North Little Rock-Pine Bluff, Arkansas Combined Statistical Area...
plumber
Plumber
A plumber is a tradesperson who specializes in installing and maintaining systems used for potable water, sewage, and drainage in plumbing systems. The term dates from ancient times, and is related to the Latin word for lead, "plumbum." A person engaged in fixing metaphorical "leaks" may also be...
Leon Griffith
Leon Griffith
Louis Leon Griffith was a master plumber from North Little Rock, who was the Arkansas Republican gubernatorial nominee in 1976, losing the election to Democratic incumbent Governor David H. Pryor....
as its sacrificial lamb candidate against Pryor, who won the second of his two gubernatorial terms with more than 80 percent of the ballots.
Further reading
- Freyer, Tony A. "Politics and Law in the Little Rock Crisis, 1954-1957", Arkansas Historical Quarterly 2007 66(2): 145–66
- Hathorn, Billy. "Friendly Rivalry: Winthrop Rockefeller Challenges Orval Faubus in 1964", Arkansas Historical Quarterly 1994 53(1): 446–73
- Reed, Roy. "Orval E. Faubus: out of Socialism into Realism", Arkansas Historical Quarterly 2007 66(2): 167–80.
External links
- Oral History Interview with Orval Faubus from Oral Histories of the American South
- Orval E. Faubus, Down From the Hills, memoirs (1980)
- Orval Faubus interviewed by Mike WallaceMike Wallace (journalist)Myron Leon "Mike" Wallace is an American journalist, former game show host, actor and media personality. During his 60+ year career, he has interviewed a wide range of prominent newsmakers....
on The Mike Wallace Interview Sept. 15, 1957