Eisenhower, Dwight D. (Dwight David), 1890-1969

Biography:

Dwight David Eisenhower 34th president of the United States (1953–61), who had been supreme commander of the Allied forces in western Europe during World War II. When the U.S. Supreme Court, on May 17, 1954, declared racial segregation in public schools unconstitutional (Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka), controversy and violence broke out, especially in the South. In September 1957 Eisenhower dispatched 1,000 federal troops to Little Rock, Arkansas, to halt an attempt by Governor Orval E. Faubus to obstruct a federal court order integrating a high school. This action was the most serious challenge of his presidency. On several occasions Eisenhower had expressed distaste for racial segregation, though he doubtless believed that the process of integration would take time. Significantly, the Civil Rights Act of 1957 was the first such law passed since 1875. -- Encyclopaedia Britannica

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