No. I felt very strongly that Eisenhower was a fair-minded man of
goodwill. And that if there were any opportunity for a settlement it
would have to be between the president and myself on that basis.
Therefore I did not take an attorney. Now I was misled in this respect.
When I got there they had the attorney general of the United States
there and I was not informed of that nor led to believe that there would
be any such. The only person that I had with me was my executive
secretary, Arnold Sykes, who was not a well-informed person on matters
of that kind at all, and Brooks Hays, who hadn't practiced law for
years, just been a member of Congress. I think he is a licensed
attorney, not sure of that. Because I didn't think it could be settled
by arguing over technical points or legal points. I felt it had to be
some kind of understanding, a meeting of the minds, on the basis of
goodwill, and that we both preferred harmony and peaceful methods rather
than any other. And in that, I do not believe I was mistaken about
President Eisenhower. But Eisenhower was not a man of his own. He had to
rely, as he always had in the military, on staff. Second nature to him.
And I'm not sure that he had the independence to rely completely upon
himself.
Page 23 He was the most misinformed man about
the situation in Arkansas and Little Rock than any man I've ever talked
to about any subject with which he had to deal in the manner with which
Eisenhower had to deal with this problem. In fact, on the outside,
Hagerty, visiting with Arnold Sykes, asked Arnold if school had begun
yet in Little Rock! Heaven's sake, that's what the controversy was all
about!
[Laughter]
They had told Eisenhower nothing about the situation. I thought about it
in this respect. That if I, as a state executive, had had a controversy
with the authorities in a certain county, before I had a meeting with
those county authorities or leaders to try to settle an issue like that,
I would want all the information there was available about that
situation. The personalities and attitudes of the leaders. What was the
situation? What had they accomplished before? How near had they come to
complying with what was required on the part of the state? Or in the
case of the federal government, required on the part of the federal
government of the state. He didn't have any of it. And at first he
lectured me like a colonel, you know, talking to a second lieutenant.
And I sat and listened until he got through. Then I said, "Mr.
President, I have a lot of information about the situation which you may
not be aware. And with your permission, I'd like to make it known to
you." Then I began to tell him. For example, I was the first governor in
all the South to put black men on the state Democratic central
committee. Did that in 1954 before I was inaugurated. We desegregated
all the institutions of higher learning without any fanfare, without any
difficulty. This was accomplished by a meeting with the college
presidents where they followed my advice. We had more integrated public
schools in Arkansas alone than eleven other states combined that had a
comparable problem. We had black people serving as school board members.
Aldermen, in some cities like Hot Springs. We had
Page 24
Negroes on boards and commissions. More in my administration than any
other, although McMath had made some progress in this field. And then I
went even farther, and we had black people in positions of
administration and law enforcement. Like we had some black people in,
I'll call it beverage control. Enforcement agents. Never held positions
like that before. We had already desegregated all our transportation in
Arkansas, and we had a bus system in Little Rock at the time, without
any particular difficulty. And most businesses and eating
establishments. There were a few that held out.
Well, the president was amazed at this information. As most people in the
nation could be right now, because the press never took the trouble to
tell anyone. In fact, my son was attending an integrated college at the
time,
[unclear]. So when we went back out
then, to join Brooks Hays and Sherman Adams. We had four people in the
conference. The president confirmed all of this from Brooks Hays. So
then he called in Brownell. I never shall forget talking to him. Oh
yeah, we had black people also in the state committee of the Republican
Party as well as the Democratic Party. Not in the Democratic Party
until, by my wishes, in 1954 after I was nominated. And I never shall
forget the president talking to Attorney General Brownell. Called him
Herb. And he began to tell him, "Now the governor tells me thus and so,"
and he cited a number of these things. And Congressman Hays here
confirms it. "Why," he said, "they've even got Negroes on . . ." and he
was trying to think of the party machinery central committee and he
couldn't think of it. And he said, "Oh, you know, the setup." Meaning
the political setup. So then he said to him, said, "Why can't you go
down to Arkansas, or send one of your men, and ask the court to postpone
the implementation of this order for a certain amount of time and give
things a chance to cool off and see
Page 25 if this won't
work out peacably." And I had told the president that in my opinion this
was the only thing that might help to bring it about peaceably, as it
had in Charleston, Fort Smith, Bentonville, Fayetteville, and the other
schools across the state where integration had already been implemented.
And the state supported institutions of higher learning as well. And
Brownell—he was a cold-faced individual, in my opinion, ruthless, unfair
if he had to be to gain his ends, and motivated almost completely by
politics. Maybe philosophically also, I don't know the man well enough
to judge that. And he told the president, he said, "It isn't legally
possible. We just can't do it, Mr. President. It's not possible at all."
Well, it was a complete falsehood. An outright lie. Now the attorney
general lied to the president in my presence either intentionally or
through ignorance. And either one to me is inexcusable in the attorney
general of the United States advising the president on a question that
had become so widely known and disputed.
So the president just yielded. Wasn't any more that could be done. I
started to speak up and to argue, but I'm not an attorney. I didn't
think I could dispute effectively from a legal standpoint with the
attorney general of the United States. But just as soon as we got away I
told Brooks Hays, I said, "Brooks, the attorney general is wrong. I have
read the court order. And the Justice Department is invited in by the
court to make any recommendations or suggestions that it sees fit." That
was in the court order itself. But we didn't have one with us. Because I
hadn't gone to argue the legalities of it. I'd gone to try to work out
something with the president, in which I was very successful in laying
the groundwork for it. And had him in the attitude of trying to help.
Now, I didn't tell him it would solve the problem, but I told him that
was the only opportunity. Said, "I can't assure you, Mr. President, that
this
Page 26 if you will write the bill to authorize
the governor to call an election in the district and let the people vote
on what they want to do, then I'll sign it. And then if the occasion
arises, I will use the authority which is given me." So that's the way
the measure was passed, and then when it came up in 1958, I didn't have
the authority to close the schools. I had only the authority to call an
election, which under the laws, an administerial function of the
governor, he can be mandamused to do so, if he declined. So I called the
election and the people voted, almost three to one, to close the schools
themselves rather than have them integrated under a federal court
order.