35°N 92°W / 35°N 92°W / 35; -92 ( State of Arkansas )
171-635: NAACP member Little Rock Nine [REDACTED] State of Arkansas The Little Rock Nine were a group of nine African American students enrolled in Little Rock Central High School in 1957. Their enrollment was followed by the Little Rock Crisis , in which the students were initially prevented from entering the racially segregated school by Orval Faubus , the Governor of Arkansas . They then attended after
342-624: A humid subtropical climate . While not bordering the Gulf of Mexico , Arkansas, is still close enough to the warm, large body of water for it to influence the weather in the state. Generally, Arkansas, has hot, humid summers and slightly drier, mild to cool winters. In Little Rock , the daily high temperatures average around 93 °F (34 °C) with lows around 73 °F (23 °C) in July. In January highs average around 51 °F (11 °C) and lows around 32 °F (0 °C). In Siloam Springs in
513-743: A southern state, sub-categorized among the West South Central States . The Mississippi River forms most of its eastern border, except in Clay and Greene counties, where the St. Francis River forms the western boundary of the Missouri Bootheel , and in many places where the channel of the Mississippi has meandered (or been straightened by man) from its original 1836 course. Arkansas can generally be split into two halves,
684-581: A 2010 referendum in California gave the power to redraw congressional district lines to the California Citizens Redistricting Commission , which had been created to draw California State Senate and Assembly districts by a 2008 referendum. In stark contrast to the redistricting efforts that followed the 2000 census, the redistricting commission has created a number of the most competitive congressional districts in
855-672: A bilingual composition in English and Spanish denouncing the racial segregation in the United States . Melba Pattillo Beals wrote a memoir titled Warriors Don't Cry , published in 1994. Two made-for-television movies have depicted the events of the crisis: the 1981 CBS movie Crisis at Central High , and the 1993 Disney Channel movie The Ernest Green Story . In 1996, seven of the Little Rock Nine appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show . They came face to face with
1026-509: A black majority at Horace Mann High and a white majority at Hall High. This meant that, even though black students lived closer to Central, they would be placed in Horace Mann, thus confirming the intention of the school board to limit the impact of desegregation. The altered plan gave white students the choice of not attending Horace Mann, but did not give black students the option of attending Hall. This new Blossom Plan did not sit well with
1197-755: A controversy then simmering. (See Law and Government below.) After Reconstruction, the state began to receive more immigrants and migrants . Chinese, Italian , and Syrian men were recruited for farm labor in the developing Delta region. None of these nationalities stayed long at farm labor; the Chinese especially, as they quickly became small merchants in towns around the Delta. Many Chinese became such successful merchants in small towns that they were able to educate their children at college. Construction of railroads enabled more farmers to get their products to market. It also brought new development into different parts of
1368-443: A difficult position. They were forced to swear loyalty to Faubus's bills. Even though Faubus's idea of private schools never played out, the teachers were still bound by their contracts and expected to attend school every day. In May 1959, after the firing of forty-four teachers and administrative staff from the four high schools, three segregationist board members were replaced with three moderate ones. The new board members reinstated
1539-525: A district to the opposition, politicians can create more packed districts, leading to more comfortable margins in unpacked ones. Some political science research suggests that, contrary to common belief, gerrymandering does not decrease electoral competition and can even increase it. Some say that, rather than packing the voters of their party into uncompetitive districts, party leaders tend to prefer to spread their party's voters into multiple districts so that their party can win more races. (See scenario (c) in
1710-493: A few more sentences...emphasizing the harm done abroad". Dudziak highlights other evidence such as U.S. Department of Justice briefs and propaganda to show the global implications of Little Rock. The crisis came partly as a result of the Brown vs Board of Education case . U.S. Department of Justice briefs gave only one reason for involvement in cases like this; that segregation harmed U.S. foreign relations. The briefs argued that
1881-543: A few of the white students who had tormented them as well as one student who had befriended them. In 1997, Central High Museum, Inc. held a dedication ceremony in observation of the 40th anniversary of the desegregation. With restoration help from the Mobil Foundation, they opened the first visitor center near the High School that September, in a former Mobil gas station. African-American artist George Hunt
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#17327725853652052-481: A function of which districts each party represents or the distribution of constituency preferences." One state in which gerrymandering has arguably had an adverse effect on electoral competition is California. In 2000, a bipartisan redistricting effort redrew congressional district lines in ways that all but guaranteed incumbent victories; as a result, California saw only one congressional seat change hands between 2000 and 2010. In response to this obvious gerrymandering,
2223-467: A gerrymandered system from achieving proportional and descriptive representation , as the winners of elections are increasingly determined by who is drawing the districts, rather than the voters' preferences. Gerrymandering may be advocated to improve representation within the legislature among otherwise underrepresented minority groups by packing them into a single district. This can be controversial, as it may lead to those groups' remaining marginalized in
2394-721: A home base and entrepôt . During the colonial period, Arkansas changed hands between France and Spain following the Seven Years' War , although neither showed interest in the remote settlement of Arkansas Post. In April 1783, Arkansas saw its only battle of the American Revolutionary War , a brief siege of the post by British Captain James Colbert with the assistance of the Choctaw and Chickasaw . Napoleon Bonaparte sold French Louisiana to
2565-466: A line of soldiers blocking out the students made national headlines and polarized the nation. Regarding the accompanying crowd, one of the nine students, Elizabeth Eckford , recalled: They moved closer and closer. ... Somebody started yelling. ... I tried to see a friendly face somewhere in the crowd—someone who maybe could help. I looked into the face of an old woman and it seemed a kind face, but when I looked at her again, she spat on me. On September 9,
2736-457: A list of candidates any party puts forth. This method is used in Austria, Brazil, Sweden, and Switzerland. In the U.S., such reforms are controversial and face particularly strong opposition from groups that benefit from gerrymandering. In a more neutral system, they might lose considerable influence. The most commonly advocated electoral reform proposal targeted at gerrymandering is to change
2907-432: A local deputy, tried to break up a meeting of black sharecroppers who were trying to organize a farmers' union. After a white deputy was killed in a confrontation with guards at the meeting, word spread to town and around the area. Hundreds of whites from Phillips and neighboring areas rushed to suppress the blacks, and started attacking blacks at large. Governor Charles Hillman Brough requested federal troops to stop what
3078-737: A marked propensity for couching the process in secrecy; in May 2010, for example, the Republican National Committee held a redistricting training session in Ohio where the theme was "Keep it Secret, Keep it Safe". A 2012 investigation by The Center for Public Integrity reviewed every state's redistricting processes for both transparency and potential for public input, and ultimately assigned 24 states grades of either D or F. In response to these types of problems, redistricting transparency legislation has been introduced to US Congress
3249-526: A matter of many years. This original proposal was scrapped and replaced with one that more closely met a set of minimum standards worked out in attorney Richard B. McCulloch's brief. This finalized plan would start in September 1957 and would integrate one high school: Little Rock Central. The second phase of the plan would take place in 1960 and would open up a few junior high schools to a few black children. The final stage would involve limited desegregation of
3420-549: A network of public universities and colleges, including two major university systems: Arkansas State University System and University of Arkansas System . Arkansas's culture is observable in museums, theaters, novels, television shows, restaurants, and athletic venues across the state. The name Arkansas initially applied to the Arkansas River . It derives from a French term, Arcansas , their plural term for their transliteration of akansa , an Algonquian term for
3591-571: A number of times in recent years, including the Redistricting Transparency Acts of 2010, 2011, and 2013. Such policy proposals aim to increase the transparency and responsiveness of the redistricting systems in the US. The merit of increasing transparency in redistricting processes is based largely on the premise that lawmakers would be less inclined to draw gerrymandered districts if they were forced to defend such districts in
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#17327725853653762-468: A particular effort to a particular politician or group. Examples are the 1852 " Henry-mandering ", "Jerrymander" (referring to California Governor Jerry Brown ), "Perrymander" (a reference to Texas Governor Rick Perry ), " Tullymander " (after the Irish politician James Tully ), and " Bjelkemander " (referencing Australian politician Joh Bjelke-Petersen ). Gerrymandering's primary goals are to maximize
3933-432: A partisan gerrymander, the legislature instead agrees to ensure its own reelection. In an unusual occurrence in 2000, for example, the two dominant parties in the state of California cooperatively redrew both state and federal legislative districts to preserve the status quo, insulating the incumbents from unpredictable voting. This move proved completely effective, as no state or federal legislative office changed party in
4104-459: A professor at Morgan State University , describes it as politicians picking their voters instead of voters picking their politicians. The term gerrymandering is a portmanteau of a salamander and Elbridge Gerry , Vice President of the United States at the time of his death, who, as governor of Massachusetts in 1812, signed a bill that created a partisan district in the Boston area that
4275-553: A public forum. As gerrymandering relies on the wasted-vote effect , the use of a different voting system with fewer wasted votes can help reduce gerrymandering. In particular, the use of multi-member districts alongside voting systems establishing proportional representation such as party-list proportional representation or single transferable voting can reduce wasted votes and gerrymandering. Semi-proportional voting systems such as single non-transferable vote or cumulative voting are relatively simple and similar to first past
4446-403: A requirement for a literacy test , knowing it would exclude many blacks and whites. At the time, more than 25% of the population could neither read nor write. In 1892, they amended the state constitution to require a poll tax and more complex residency requirements, both of which adversely affected poor people and sharecroppers, forcing most blacks and many poor whites from voter rolls. By 1900
4617-480: A rule of one man, one vote . Another means to reduce gerrymandering is to create objective, precise criteria with which any district map must comply. Courts in the United States, for instance, have ruled that congressional districts must be contiguous in order to be constitutional. This, however, is not a particularly effective constraint, as very narrow strips of land with few or no voters in them may be used to connect separate regions for inclusion in one district, as
4788-582: A short time and often spawns smaller tornadoes. Little Rock has been Arkansas's capital city since 1821 when it replaced Arkansas Post as the capital of the Territory of Arkansas . The state capitol was moved to Hot Springs and later Washington during the American Civil War when the Union armies threatened the city in 1862, and state government did not return to Little Rock until after
4959-617: A small immigration of German , Slovak , and Scots-Irish from Europe. The German and Slovak peoples settled in the eastern part of the state known as the Prairie , and the Irish founded small communities in the southeast part of the state. The Germans were mostly Lutheran and the Slovaks were primarily Catholic. The Irish were mostly Protestant from Ulster , of Scots and Northern Borders descent. Some early 20th-century immigration included people from eastern Europe. Together, these immigrants made
5130-541: A substantial number of districts are designed to be polarized, then those districts' representation will also likely act in a heavily partisan manner, which can create and perpetuate partisan gridlock. Gerrymandering can thus have a deleterious effect on the principle of democratic accountability. With uncompetitive seats/districts reducing the fear that incumbent politicians may lose office, they have less incentive to represent their constituents' interests, even when those interests conform to majority support for an issue across
5301-574: A two and a half year delay on de-segregation, which would have meant that black students would only be permitted into public high schools in January 1961. Faubus argued that if the schools remained integrated there would be an increase in violence. However, in August 1958, the Federal Courts ruled against the delay of de-segregation, which incited Faubus to call together an Extraordinary Session of
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5472-554: A wide variety of classes, becoming almost as popular as Hot Springs . In the late 1880s, the worsening agricultural depression catalyzed Populist and third party movements, leading to interracial coalitions. Struggling to stay in power, in the 1890s the Democrats in Arkansas followed other Southern states in passing legislation and constitutional amendments that disfranchised blacks and poor whites. In 1891 state legislators passed
5643-518: Is Mount Magazine in the Ouachita Mountains , which is 2,753 feet (839 m) above sea level. Arkansas is home to many caves , such as Blanchard Springs Caverns . The State Archeologist has catalogued more than 43,000 Native American living, hunting and tool-making sites, many of them Pre-Columbian burial mounds and rock shelters. Crater of Diamonds State Park near Murfreesboro is the world's only diamond-bearing site accessible to
5814-663: Is a landlocked state in the West South Central region of the Southern United States . It borders Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, Texas to the southwest, and Oklahoma to the west. Its name derives from the Osage language , and refers to their relatives, the Quapaw people. The state's diverse geography ranges from the mountainous regions of
5985-547: Is active throughout the region. In eastern Arkansas, one can find Taxodium (cypress), Quercus nigra (water oaks), and hickories with their roots submerged in the Mississippi Valley bayous indicative of the Deep South. Saw palmetto and needle palm both range into Arkansas. Nearby Crowley's Ridge is the only home of the tulip tree in the state, and generally hosts more northeastern plant life such as
6156-427: Is another benefit of having a gerrymandered seat. Gerrymandering also has significant effects on the representation voters receive in gerrymandered districts. Because gerrymandering can be designed to increase the number of wasted votes among the electorate, the relative representation of particular groups can be drastically altered from their actual share of the voting population. This effect can significantly prevent
6327-515: Is believed to be the vicinity of modern-day McArthur, Arkansas , in May 1542. His body was weighted down with sand and he was consigned to a watery grave in the Mississippi River under cover of darkness by his men. De Soto had attempted to deceive the native population into thinking he was an immortal deity, sun of the sun, in order to forestall attack by outraged Native Americans on his by then weakened and bedraggled army. In order to keep
6498-850: Is divided into three broad ecoregions: the Ozark, Ouachita-Appalachian Forests , the Mississippi Alluvial and Southeast USA Coastal Plains , and the Southeastern USA Plains . The state is further divided into seven subregions: the Arkansas Valley, Boston Mountains , Mississippi Alluvial Plain , Mississippi Valley Loess Plain , Ozark Highlands, Ouachita Mountains, and the South Central Plains. A 2010 United States Forest Service survey determined 18,720,000 acres (7,580,000 ha) of Arkansas's land
6669-414: Is forestland, or 56% of the state's total area. Dominant species in Arkansas's forests include Quercus (oak), Carya (hickory), Pinus echinata (shortleaf pine) and Pinus taeda (loblolly pine). Arkansas's plant life varies with its climate and elevation. The pine belt stretching from the Arkansas delta to Texas consists of dense oak-hickory-pine growth. Lumbering and paper milling activity
6840-520: Is infrequent but most common in the northern half of the state. The half of the state south of Little Rock is more apt to see ice storms. Arkansas's record high is 120 °F (49 °C) at Ozark on August 10, 1936; the record low is −29 °F (−34 °C) at Gravette , on February 13, 1905. Arkansas is known for extreme weather and frequent storms. A typical year brings thunderstorms, tornadoes, and hail. Occasional cold snaps stand to bring varying amounts of snow, as well as ice storms. Between both
7011-744: Is part of the Ozark Plateau including the Ozark Mountains , to the south are the Ouachita Mountains , and these regions are divided by the Arkansas River ; the southern and eastern parts of Arkansas are called the Lowlands. These mountain ranges are part of the U.S. Interior Highlands region, the only major mountainous region between the Rocky Mountains and the Appalachian Mountains . The state's highest point
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7182-782: Is simply to stop redistricting altogether and use existing political boundaries such as state, county, or provincial lines. While this prevents future gerrymandering, any existing advantage may become deeply ingrained. The United States Senate , for instance, has more competitive elections than the House of Representatives due to the use of existing state borders rather than gerrymandered districts—Senators are elected by their entire state, while Representatives are elected in legislatively drawn districts. The use of fixed districts creates an additional problem, however, in that fixed districts do not take into account changes in population. Individual voters can come to have very different degrees of influence on
7353-562: Is the highest civilian award bestowed by Congress . It is given to those who have provided outstanding service to the country. To receive the Congressional Gold Medal, recipients must be co-sponsored by two-thirds of both the House and Senate . In 2004, art director Ethel Kessler selected George Hunt's Little Rock Nine/America Cares painting for a 37-cent U.S. Postage Stamp . It was one of 10 stamps depicting milestones of
7524-469: Is the political manipulation of electoral district boundaries to advantage a party, group, or socioeconomic class within the constituency. The manipulation may involve "cracking" (diluting the voting power of the opposing party's supporters across many districts) or "packing" (concentrating the opposing party's voting power in one district to reduce their voting power in other districts). Gerrymandering can also be used to protect incumbents . Wayne Dawkins,
7695-419: The 2004 election , although 53 congressional, 20 state senate, and 80 state assembly seats were potentially at risk. In 2006, the term "70/30 district" came to signify the equitable split of two evenly split (i.e. 50/50) districts. The resulting districts gave each party a guaranteed seat and retained their respective power base. Since the first handshake deal in 1981, whereby Republicans informally controlled
7866-551: The Arkansas Constitution after a 25-hour session, admitting Arkansas on June 15, 1836, as the 25th state and the 13th slave state , having a population of about 60,000. Arkansas struggled with taxation to support its new state government, a problem made worse by a state banking scandal and worse yet by the Panic of 1837 . In early antebellum Arkansas, the southeast Arkansas slave-based economy developed rapidly. On
8037-542: The Arkansas National Guard and ordered them to support the integration on September 23 of that year, after which they protected the African American students. One of the plans created during attempts to desegregate the schools of Little Rock was by school superintendent Virgil Blossom . The initial approach proposed substantial integration beginning quickly and extending to all grades within
8208-504: The Arkansas National Guard to help segregationists prevent nine African-American students from enrolling at Little Rock's Central High School. After attempting three times to contact Faubus, President Dwight D. Eisenhower sent 1,000 troops from the active-duty 101st Airborne Division to escort and protect the African-American students as they entered school on September 25, 1957. In defiance of federal court orders to integrate,
8379-552: The Arkansas Supreme Court James D. Johnson claimed to have hoaxed Governor Faubus into calling out the National Guard, supposedly to prevent a white mob from stopping the integration of Little Rock Central High School : "There wasn't any caravan. But we made Orval believe it. We said. 'They're lining up. They're coming in droves.' ... The only weapon we had was to leave the impression that the sky
8550-643: The Civil Rights Movement in a February 2005 Black History Month commemorative stamp panel, "To Form a More Perfect Union". Printed on top of the artwork on the stamp were the words, "1957 The Little Rock Nine". In 2007, the United States Mint made available the Little Rock Central High School Desegregation silver dollar , a commemorative coin to "recognize and pay tribute to the strength,
8721-604: The Great Plains and the Gulf States , Arkansas, receives around 60 days of thunderstorms. Arkansas is located in Dixie alley , and very near tornado alley . As a result, a few of the most destructive tornadoes in U.S. history have struck the state. While sufficiently far from the coast to avoid a direct hit from a hurricane, Arkansas can often get the remnants of a tropical system , which dumps tremendous amounts of rain in
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#17327725853658892-550: The Mississippi River . Additional Native American removals began in earnest during the territorial period, with final Quapaw removal complete by 1833 as they were pushed into Indian Territory. The capital was relocated from Arkansas Post to Little Rock in 1821, during the territorial period. When Arkansas applied for statehood, the slavery issue was again raised in Washington, D.C. Congress eventually approved
9063-649: The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) attempted to register black students in previously all-white schools in cities throughout the South . In Little Rock , Arkansas , the school board agreed to comply with the high court's ruling. Virgil Blossom , the Superintendent of Schools, submitted a plan of gradual integration to the school board on May 24, 1955, which
9234-614: The Ozark and Ouachita Mountains , which make up the U.S. Interior Highlands , to the densely forested land in the south known as the Arkansas Timberlands , to the eastern lowlands along the Mississippi River and the Arkansas Delta . Previously part of French Louisiana and the Louisiana Purchase , the Territory of Arkansas was admitted to the Union as the 25th state on June 15, 1836. Much of
9405-427: The Quapaw people, which is believed to translate to "south wind people." These were a Dhegiha Siouan -speaking people who settled in Arkansas around the 13th century. Kansa is likely also the root term for Kansas , which was named after the related Kaw people . The name has been pronounced and spelled in a variety of ways. In 1881, the state legislature defined the official pronunciation of Arkansas as having
9576-664: The Radical Republicans and Unionists, and led by Governor Powell Clayton , they presided over a time of great upheaval as Confederate sympathizers and the Ku Klux Klan fought the new developments, particularly voting rights for African Americans. In 1874, the Brooks-Baxter War , a political struggle between factions of the Republican Party shook Little Rock and the state governorship. It
9747-678: The Saline , Little Missouri , and Caddo Rivers are all tributaries to the Ouachita River in south Arkansas, which empties into the Mississippi in Louisiana. The Red River briefly forms the state's boundary with Texas. Arkansas has few natural lakes and many reservoirs, such as Bull Shoals Lake , Lake Ouachita , Greers Ferry Lake , Millwood Lake , Beaver Lake , Norfork Lake , DeGray Lake , and Lake Conway . Arkansas's mix of warm temperate moist forest and subtropical bottomland
9918-541: The Supreme Court ruled segregation in public schools unconstitutional in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas (1954), some students worked to integrate schools in the state. The Little Rock Nine brought Arkansas to national attention in 1957 when the federal government had to intervene to protect African-American students trying to integrate a high school in the capital. Governor Orval Faubus had ordered
10089-576: The Territory of Arkansas was organized on July 4, 1819. Gradual emancipation in Arkansas was struck down by one vote, the Speaker of the House Henry Clay , allowing Arkansas to organize as a slave territory. Slavery became a wedge issue in Arkansas, forming a geographic divide that remained for decades. Owners and operators of the cotton plantation economy in southeast Arkansas firmly supported slavery, as they perceived slave labor as
10260-537: The Walmart corporation, the world's largest company by revenue , headquartered in Bentonville . Arkansas is the 29th largest by area and the 34th most populous state, with a population of just over three million at the 2020 census . The capital and most populous city is Little Rock , in the central part of the state, a hub for transportation, business, culture, and government. The northwestern corner of
10431-434: The beech tree. The northwestern highlands are covered in an oak-hickory mixture, with Ozark white cedars , cornus (dogwoods), and Cercis canadensis (redbuds) also present. The higher peaks in the Arkansas River Valley play host to scores of ferns, including the Physematium scopulinum and Adiantum (maidenhair fern) on Mount Magazine. The white-tailed deer is the official state mammal. Arkansas generally has
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#173277258536510602-436: The "Little Rock Nine", Faubus ran as a moderate segregationist against Dale Alford, who was challenging Faubus for the Democratic nomination for governor in 1962. Several segregationist councils threatened to hold protests at Central High and physically block the black students from entering the school. Governor Orval Faubus deployed the Arkansas National Guard to support the segregationists on September 4, 1957. The sight of
10773-438: The 107 affected seats; in those seven states, Republicans received 50.4% of the votes but won in over 68% of the congressional districts. While it is but one example of how gerrymandering can have a significant effect on election outcomes, this kind of disproportional representation of the public will seems problematic for the legitimacy of democratic systems, regardless of one's political affiliation. In Michigan , redistricting
10944-428: The 2000 census. There, the equally numbered partisan appointees were unable to reach consensus in a reasonable time, and so the courts had to determine district lines. In the U.S. state of Iowa , the nonpartisan Legislative Services Bureau (LSB, akin to the U.S. Congressional Research Service ) determines electoral district boundaries. Aside from satisfying federally mandated contiguity and population equality criteria,
11115-404: The 2012 election for the state legislature, that gap in wasted votes meant that one party had 48.6% of the two-party votes but won 61% of the 99 districts. The wasted vote effect is strongest when a party wins by narrow margins across multiple districts, but gerrymandering narrow margins can be risky when voters are less predictable. To minimize the risk of demographic or political shifts swinging
11286-418: The Delta had been developed for cotton plantations, and landowners there largely depended on enslaved African Americans ' labor. In 1861, Arkansas seceded from the United States and joined the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War . On returning to the Union in 1868, Arkansas continued to suffer economically, due to its overreliance on the large-scale plantation economy . Cotton remained
11457-514: The Delta more diverse than the rest of the state. In the same years, some black migrants moved into the area because of opportunities to develop the bottomlands and own their own property. Black sharecroppers began to try to organize a farmers' union after World War I. They were seeking better conditions of payment and accounting from white landowners of the area cotton plantations. Whites resisted any change and often tried to break up their meetings. On September 30, 1919, two white men, including
11628-476: The Democratic Party expanded use of the white primary in county and state elections, further denying blacks a part in the political process. Only in the primary was there any competition among candidates, as Democrats held all the power. The state was a Democratic one-party state for decades, until after passage of the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965 to enforce constitutional rights. Between 1905 and 1911, Arkansas began to receive
11799-430: The Family , the Southern rights political force in antebellum Arkansas. Residents generally wanted to avoid a civil war. When the Gulf states seceded in early 1861, delegates to a convention called to determine whether Arkansas should secede referred the question back to the voters for a referendum to be held in August. Arkansas did not secede until Abraham Lincoln demanded Arkansas troops be sent to Fort Sumter to quell
11970-427: The General Assembly, that the only true pronunciation of the name of the state, in the opinion of this body, is that received by the French from the native Indians and committed to writing in the French word representing the sound. It should be pronounced in three (3) syllables, with the final "s" silent, the "a" in each syllable with the Italian sound, and the accent on the first and last syllables. The pronunciation with
12141-512: The House of Representatives received 83,000 more votes than Republican candidates, yet the Republican-controlled redistricting process in 2010 resulted in Democrats losing to their Republican counterparts in 13 of Pennsylvania's 18 districts. In the seven states where Republicans had complete control over the redistricting process, Republican House candidates received 16.7 million votes and Democratic House candidates received 16.4 million. The redistricting resulted in Republican victories in 73 out of
12312-491: The LSB mandates unity of counties and cities. Consideration of political factors such as location of incumbents, previous boundary locations, and political party proportions is specifically forbidden. Since Iowa's counties are chiefly regularly shaped polygons , the LSB process has led to districts that follow county lines. In 2005, the U.S. state of Ohio had a ballot measure to create an independent commission whose first priority
12483-669: The Little Rock Nine Foundation which established a scholarship program which had funded, by 2013, 60 university students. In 2013, the foundation decided to exclusively fund students attending the Clinton School of Public Service at the University of Arkansas . President Bill Clinton honored the Little Rock Nine in November 1999 when he presented them each with a Congressional Gold Medal . The medal
12654-691: The Little Rock School District and is now a National Historic Site that houses a Civil Rights Museum, administered in partnership with the National Park Service , to commemorate the events of 1957. The Daisy Bates House , home to Daisy Bates , then the president of the Arkansas NAACP and a focal point for the students, was designated a National Historic Landmark in 2001 for its role in the episode. In 1958, Cuban poet Nicolás Guillén published "Little Rock",
12825-532: The Little Rock School District issued a statement condemning the governor's deployment of soldiers to the school, and called for a citywide prayer service on September 12. Even President Dwight Eisenhower attempted to de-escalate the situation by summoning Faubus for a meeting, warning him not to defy the Supreme Court's ruling. Woodrow Wilson Mann , the mayor of Little Rock, asked President Eisenhower to send federal troops to enforce integration and protect
12996-587: The Mississippi River include the Arkansas River , the White River , and the St. Francis River . The Arkansas is fed by the Mulberry and Fourche LaFave Rivers in the Arkansas River Valley, which is also home to Lake Dardanelle . The Buffalo , Little Red , Black and Cache Rivers are all tributaries to the White River , which also empties into the Mississippi. Bayou Bartholomew and
13167-585: The NAACP and, after failed negotiations with the school board, the NAACP filed a lawsuit on February 8, 1956. This lawsuit, along with a number of other factors, contributed to the Little Rock School Crisis of 1957. Although Faubus had indicated that he would consider bringing Arkansas into compliance with the high court's decision in 1956, desegregation was opposed by his own southern Democratic Party , which dominated all Southern politics at
13338-615: The Ozark Mountains, Ouachita Mountains, Arkansas River Valley , Gulf Coastal Plain, Crowley's Ridge , and the Arkansas Delta, with Central Arkansas sometimes included as a blend of multiple regions. The southeastern part of Arkansas along the Mississippi Alluvial Plain is sometimes called the Arkansas Delta. This region is a flat landscape of rich alluvial soils formed by repeated flooding of
13509-508: The Republican Party (which had limited support among African Americans and could concentrate its power elsewhere) and by minority representatives elected as Democrats from these constituencies, who then had safe seats. The 2012 election provides a number of examples of how partisan gerrymandering can adversely affect the descriptive function of states' congressional delegations. In Pennsylvania, for example, Democratic candidates for
13680-562: The State Legislature on August 26 in order to enact his segregation bills. Claiming that Little Rock had to assert their rights and freedom against the federal decision, in September 1958, Faubus signed acts that enabled him and the Little Rock School District to close all public schools. Thus, with this bill signed, on Monday September 15, Faubus ordered the closure of all four public high schools, preventing both black and white students from attending school. Despite Faubus's decree,
13851-506: The U.S. federal government's primary concern in their response was the world's perception of the U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles was particularly aware of the global impact, telling Attorney General Herbert Brownell over a phone call that "this situation was ruining our foreign policy". Brownell asked Dulles to look over a draft of the President's speech in Arkansas following the crisis, where he suggested that Eisenhower "put in
14022-540: The U.S. the Alabama Legislature refused to redistrict for more than 60 years, despite major changes in population patterns. By 1960 less than a quarter of the state's population controlled the majority of seats in the legislature. This practice of using fixed districts for state legislatures was effectively banned in the United States after the Reynolds v. Sims Supreme Court decision in 1964, establishing
14193-534: The Union in June 1868, after the Legislature accepted the 14th Amendment. The Republican-controlled reconstruction legislature established universal male suffrage (though temporarily disfranchising former Confederate Army officers, who were all Democrats), a public education system for blacks and whites, and passed general issues to improve the state and help more of the population. The State soon came under control of
14364-498: The United States as the state of Arkansas on June 15, 1836. The name was historically / ˈ ɑːr k ən s ɔː / , / ɑːr ˈ k æ n z ə s / , and several other variants. Historically and modernly, the people of Arkansas call themselves either "Arkansans" or "Arkansawyers". In 1881, the Arkansas General Assembly passed Arkansas Code 1-4-105 (official text): Whereas, confusion of practice has arisen in
14535-402: The United States in 1803, including all of Arkansas, in a transaction known today as the Louisiana Purchase . French soldiers remained as a garrison at Arkansas Post . Following the purchase, the balanced give-and-take relationship between settlers and Native Americans began to change all along the frontier, including in Arkansas. Following a controversy over allowing slavery in the territory ,
14706-438: The accent on the second syllable with the sound of "a" in "man" and the sounding of the terminal "s" is an innovation to be discouraged. Citizens of the state of Kansas often pronounce the Arkansas River as / ɑːr ˈ k æ n z ə s / , in a manner similar to the common pronunciation of the name of their state. Settlers, such as fur trappers, moved to Arkansas in the early 18th century. These people used Arkansas Post as
14877-524: The adjacent Mississippi. Farther from the river, in the southeastern part of the state, the Grand Prairie has a more undulating landscape. Both are fertile agricultural areas. The Delta region is bisected by a geological formation known as Crowley's Ridge . A narrow band of rolling hills, Crowley's Ridge rises 250 to 500 feet (76 to 152 m) above the surrounding alluvial plain and underlies many of eastern Arkansas's major towns. Northwest Arkansas
15048-650: The benefit of the Democratic-Republican Party . When mapped, one of the contorted districts in the Boston area was said to resemble a mythological salamander . Appearing with the term, and helping spread and sustain its popularity, was a political cartoon depicting a strange animal with claws, wings and a dragon-like head that supposedly resembled the oddly shaped district. The cartoon was most likely drawn by Elkanah Tisdale , an early-19th-century painter, designer, and engraver who lived in Boston at
15219-544: The best or "only" economically viable method of harvesting their commodity crops. The "hill country" of northwest Arkansas was unable to grow cotton and relied on a cash-scarce, subsistence farming economy. As European Americans settled throughout the East Coast and into the Midwest, in the 1830s the United States government forced the removal of many Native American tribes to Arkansas and Indian Territory west of
15390-465: The black students had a difficult time getting past mobs to enter the school, and, once inside, they were often subject to physical and emotional abuse. The students were back at school and everything would eventually resume normal function, but the Lost Year would be a pretext for new hatred toward the black students in the public high school. Little Rock Central High School still functions as part of
15561-524: The board can be denied information that might aid in gerrymandering, such as the demographic makeup or voting patterns of the population. As a further constraint, consensus requirements can be imposed to ensure that the resulting district map reflects a wider perception of fairness, such as a requirement for a supermajority approval of the commission for any district proposal. But consensus requirements can lead to deadlock, as occurred in Missouri following
15732-658: The board unanimously approved. The plan would be implemented during the fall of the 1957 school year, which would begin in September 1957. By 1957, the NAACP had registered nine black students to attend the previously all-white Little Rock Central High, selected on the criteria of excellent grades and attendance. Called the "Little Rock Nine", they were Ernest Green (b. 1941), Elizabeth Eckford (b. 1941), Jefferson Thomas (1942–2010), Terrence Roberts (b. 1941), Carlotta Walls LaNier (b. 1942), Minnijean Brown (b. 1941), Gloria Ray Karlmark (b. 1942), Thelma Mothershed (1940–2024), and Melba Pattillo Beals (b. 1941). Ernest Green
15903-526: The border in Missouri shocked many Arkansans who thought the war would be a quick and decisive Southern victory. Battles early in the war took place in northwest Arkansas, including the Battle of Cane Hill , Battle of Pea Ridge , and Battle of Prairie Grove . Union general Samuel Curtis swept across the state to Helena in the Delta in 1862. Little Rock was captured the following year. The government shifted
16074-418: The box.) This may lead to increased competition. Instead of gerrymandering, some researchers find that other factors, such as partisan polarization and the incumbency advantage, have driven the recent decreases in electoral competition. Similarly, a 2009 study found that "congressional polarization is primarily a function of the differences in how Democrats and Republicans represent the same districts rather than
16245-642: The boys and was suspended for six days. Two months later, after more confrontation, Brown was suspended for the rest of the school year. She transferred to the New Lincoln School in New York City . As depicted in the 1981 made-for-TV docudrama Crisis at Central High , and as mentioned by Melba Pattillo Beals in Warriors Don't Cry , white students were punished only when their offense was "both egregious and witnessed by an adult". The drama
16416-520: The city's grade schools at an unspecified time, possibly as late as 1963. This plan was met with varied reactions from the NAACP branch of Little Rock. Militant members like the Bateses opposed the plan on the grounds that it was "vague, indefinite, slow-moving and indicative of an intent to stall further on public integration." Despite this view, the majority accepted the plan; most felt that Blossom and
16587-449: The city's population had the chance of refuting the bill since the school-closing law necessitated a referendum . The referendum, which would either condone or condemn Faubus's law, was to take place within thirty days. A week before the referendum, which was scheduled to take place on September 27, Faubus addressed the citizens of Little Rock in an attempt to secure their votes. Faubus urged the population to vote against integration since he
16758-422: The country. The effect of gerrymandering for incumbents is particularly advantageous, as they are far more likely to be reelected under conditions of gerrymandering. For example, in 2002, according to political scientists Norman Ornstein and Thomas Mann , only four challengers were able to defeat incumbent members of the U.S. Congress, the lowest number in modern American history. Incumbents are likely to be of
16929-505: The determination and the courage displayed by African-American high school students in the fall of 1957." The obverse depicts students accompanied by a soldier, with nine stars symbolizing the Little Rock Nine. The reverse depicts an image of Little Rock Central High School, c. 1957. Proceeds from the coin sales were used to improve the National Historic Site. On December 9, 2008, the Little Rock Nine were invited to attend
17100-546: The effect of supporters' votes and minimize the effect of opponents' votes. A partisan gerrymander's main purpose is to influence not only the districting statute but the entire corpus of legislative decisions enacted in its path. These can be accomplished in a number of ways: These tactics are typically combined in some form, creating a few "forfeit" seats for packed voters of one type in order to secure more seats and greater representation for voters of another type. This results in candidates of one party (the one responsible for
17271-450: The elections, fewer wasted votes, and a wider variety of political opinions represented. Electoral systems with election of just one winner in each district (i.e., "winner-takes-all" electoral systems) and no proportional distribution of extra mandates to smaller parties tend to create two-party systems. This effect, labeled Duverger's law by political scientists, was described by Maurice Duverger . Another way to avoid gerrymandering
17442-399: The electorate as a whole. Incumbent politicians may look out more for their party's interests than for those of their constituents. Gerrymandering can affect campaign costs for district elections. If districts become increasingly stretched out, candidates may incur higher costs for transportation and campaign advertising across a district. The incumbent's advantage in campaign fundraising
17613-421: The entire way, he and his men returned to the Mississippi River where de Soto fell ill. From his deathbed he ordered his men to massacre all the men of the nearby village of Anilco, who he feared had been plotting with a powerful polity down the Mississippi River, Quigualtam . His men obeyed and did not stop with the men, but were said to have massacred women and children as well. He died the following day in what
17784-463: The eponymous Gerry is pronounced with a hard g /ɡ/ as in get , the word gerrymander was originally pronounced / ˈ ɡ ɛr i m æ n d ər / , but pronunciation as / ˈ dʒ ɛr i m æ n d ər / , with a soft g /dʒ/ as in gentle, has become dominant. Residents of Marblehead, Massachusetts , Gerry's hometown, continue to use the original pronunciation. From time to time, other names have been suffixed with -mander to tie
17955-517: The eve of the American Civil War in 1860, enslaved African Americans numbered 111,115 people, just over 25% of the state's population. A plantation system based largely on cotton agriculture developed that, after the war, kept the state and region behind the nation for decades. The wealth developed among planters of southeast Arkansas caused a political rift between the northwest and southeast. Many politicians were elected to office from
18126-657: The existence of discrimination had an adverse effect on relations with other countries, especially countries in the third world who had been targeted by the Truman Doctrine . Evidence of U.S. propaganda can be seen in the booklet The Negro in American Life , which was translated into fifteen languages and distributed to many countries. It aimed to reverse the global shame surrounding discrimination in America, accentuated by Soviet propaganda, and instead boasted of
18297-556: The fact that legislators often draw distorted legislative districts even when doing so does not give their party an advantage. Gerrymandering of state legislative districts can effectively guarantee an incumbent's victory by "shoring up" a district with higher levels of partisan support, without disproportionately benefiting a particular political party. This can be highly problematic from a governance perspective, because forming districts to ensure high levels of partisanship often leads to higher levels of partisanship in legislative bodies. If
18468-463: The final "s" be silent (as it would be in French). A dispute had arisen between the state's two senators over the pronunciation issue. One favored / ˈ ɑːr k ən s ɔː / ( AR -kən-saw ), the other / ɑːr ˈ k æ n z ə s / ( ar- KAN -zəs ). In 2007, the state legislature passed a non-binding resolution declaring that the possessive form of the state's name is Arkansas's , which
18639-479: The first European settlement in the territory. The early Spanish or French explorers of the state gave it its name, which is probably a phonetic spelling of the Illinois tribe's name for the Quapaw people, who lived downriver from them. The name Arkansas has been pronounced and spelled in a variety of fashions. The region was organized as the Territory of Arkansaw on July 4, 1819, with the territory admitted to
18810-424: The forty-four staff members to their positions. The new board of directors then began an attempt to reopen the schools, much to Faubus's dismay. In order to avoid any further complications, the public high schools were scheduled to open earlier than usual, on August 12, 1959. Although the Lost Year had come to a close, the black students who returned to the high schools were not welcomed by the other students. Rather,
18981-440: The gerrymandering) winning by small majorities in most of the districts, and another party winning by a large majority in only a few. Any party that endeavors to make a district more favorable to voting for it based on the physical boundary is gerrymandering. Gerrymandering is effective because of the wasted vote effect . Wasted votes are votes that did not contribute to electing a candidate, either because they were in excess of
19152-437: The government as they become confined to a single district. Candidates outside that district no longer need to represent them to win elections. As an example, much of the redistricting conducted in the U.S. in the early 1990s involved the intentional creation of additional "majority-minority" districts where racial minorities such as African Americans were packed into the majority. This "maximization policy" drew support from both
19323-471: The governor and city of Little Rock decided to close the high schools for the remainder of the school year. By the fall of 1959, the Little Rock high schools were completely integrated. Arkansas borders Louisiana to the south, Texas to the southwest, Oklahoma to the west, Missouri to the north, and Tennessee and Mississippi to the east. The United States Census Bureau classifies Arkansas as
19494-405: The greater metropolitan areas. The Kent County seat is currently held by Hilary Scholten, a Democratic. landslide . Gerrymandering can also be done to help incumbents as a whole, effectively making every district a packed one and greatly reducing the potential for competitive elections. This is particularly likely to occur when the minority party has significant obstruction power: unable to enact
19665-629: The highlands in the northwest and the lowlands of the southeast. The highlands are part of the Southern Interior Highlands, including The Ozarks and the Ouachita Mountains . The southern lowlands include the Gulf Coastal Plain and the Arkansas Delta . This split can yield to a regional division into northwest, southwest, northeast, southeast, and central Arkansas. These regions are broad and not defined along county lines. Arkansas has seven distinct natural regions:
19836-740: The inauguration of President-elect Barack Obama , the first African-American to be elected President of the United States. On February 9, 2010, Marquette University honored the group by presenting them with the Père Marquette Discovery Award, the university's highest honor, one that had previously been given to Mother Teresa , Archbishop Desmond Tutu , Karl Rahner , and the Apollo 11 astronauts. On November 19, 2022, Elizabeth Eckford, Ernest Green, Gloria Ray Karlmark, Carlotta Walls LaNier and Thelma Mothershed-Wair etched their initials onto metal plates that were then welded onto
20007-425: The incumbents contesting a primary or general election won their races. Prison-based gerrymandering occurs when prisoners are counted as residents of a district, increasing its population with non-voters when assigning political apportionment. This phenomenon violates the principle of one person, one vote because, although many prisoners come from (and return to) urban communities, they are counted as "residents" of
20178-457: The independent Australian Electoral Commission and its state-based counterparts determine electoral boundaries for federal, state and local jurisdictions. To help ensure neutrality, members of a redistricting agency may be appointed from relatively apolitical sources, such as retired judges or longstanding members of the civil service, possibly with requirements for adequate representation among competing political parties. Additionally, members of
20349-481: The intervention of President Dwight D. Eisenhower . The U.S. Supreme Court issued its historic Brown v. Board of Education , 347 U.S. 483, on May 17, 1954. Tied to the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution , the decision declared all laws establishing segregated schools to be unconstitutional , and it called for the desegregation of all schools throughout the nation. After the decision,
20520-492: The keel of the attack submarine USS Arkansas (SSN-800) in a ceremony at Newport News Shipbuilding in Newport News, Virginia . The plates will remain affixed to the submarine throughout its life. Melba Pattillo Beals and Minnijean Brown-Trickey were also named sponsors of the ship, and all members of the Little Rock Nine were honored. Elizabeth Eckford said "(Former Navy) Secretary Ray Mabus asked us to be supporters of
20691-457: The leading commodity crop, and the cotton market declined. Because farmers and businessmen did not diversify and there was little industrial investment, the state fell behind in economic opportunity. In the late 19th century, the state instituted various Jim Crow laws to disenfranchise and segregate the African-American population. White interests dominated Arkansas's politics, with disenfranchisement of African Americans and refusal to reapportion
20862-606: The legislative process. This malapportionment can greatly affect representation after long periods of time or large population movements. In the United Kingdom during the Industrial Revolution , several constituencies that had been fixed since they gained representation in the Parliament of England became so small that they could be won with only a handful of voters ( rotten boroughs ). Similarly, in
21033-402: The legislature; only after the federal legislation passed were more African Americans able to vote. During the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s, Arkansas and particularly Little Rock were major battlegrounds for efforts to integrate schools. Following World War II in the 1940s, Arkansas began to diversify its economy and see prosperity. During the 1960s, the state became the base of
21204-483: The locals. The expedition promptly backtracked to Arkansas. After building a small fleet of boats they then headed down the Mississippi River and eventually on to Mexico by water. Later explorers included the French Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet in 1673, and Frenchmen Robert La Salle and Henri de Tonti in 1681. Tonti established Arkansas Post at a Quapaw village in 1686, making it
21375-443: The majority of districts and are drawn to produce a result favoring the incumbent party. A quantitative measure of the effect of gerrymandering is the efficiency gap , computed from the difference in the wasted votes for two different political parties summed over all the districts. Citing in part an efficiency gap of 11.69% to 13%, a U.S. District Court in 2016 ruled against the 2011 drawing of Wisconsin legislative districts. In
21546-591: The majority party orchestrating a gerrymander, and are usually easily renominated in subsequent elections, including incumbents among the minority. Mann, a Senior Fellow of Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution , has also noted that "Redistricting is a deeply political process, with incumbents actively seeking to minimize the risk to themselves (via bipartisan gerrymanders) or to gain additional seats for their party (via partisan gerrymanders)". The bipartisan gerrymandering Mann mentions refers to
21717-500: The name Gerry and the animal salamander ) was used for the first time in the Boston Gazette on 26 March 1812 in Boston, Massachusetts , United States . This word was created in reaction to a redrawing of Massachusetts Senate election districts under Governor Elbridge Gerry , later Vice President of the United States . Gerry, who personally disapproved of the practice, signed a bill that redistricted Massachusetts for
21888-700: The nine students. On September 24, Eisenhower invoked the Insurrection Act of 1807 to enable troops to perform domestic law enforcement. The president ordered the 101st Airborne Division of the United States Army to Little Rock—initially without its black soldiers at the request of the Department of Justice—and federalized the entire 10,000-member Arkansas National Guard, taking it out of Faubus's control. Two segregationists were injured in clashes with federal troops on September 25; one who
22059-401: The northwest part of the state, the average high and low temperatures in July are 89 and 67 °F (32 and 19 °C) and in January the average high and low are 44 and 23 °F (7 and −5 °C). Annual precipitation throughout the state averages between about 40 and 60 inches (1,000 and 1,500 mm); it is somewhat wetter in the south and drier in the northern part of the state. Snowfall
22230-401: The number needed for victory or because the candidate lost. By moving geographic boundaries, the incumbent party packs opposition voters into a few districts they will already win, wasting the extra votes. Other districts are more tightly constructed, with the opposition party allowed a bare minority count, thereby wasting all the minority votes for the losing candidate. These districts constitute
22401-703: The order of President Franklin D. Roosevelt given shortly after Imperial Japan 's attack on Pearl Harbor , nearly 16,000 Japanese Americans were forcibly removed from the West Coast of the United States and incarcerated in two internment camps in the Arkansas Delta . The Rohwer Camp in Desha County operated from September 1942 to November 1945 and at its peak interned 8,475 prisoners. The Jerome War Relocation Center in Drew County operated from October 1942 to June 1944 and held about 8,000. After
22572-433: The population of Arkansas was 3,017,804 on July 1, 2019, a 3.49% increase since the 2010 United States census . At the 2020 U.S. census , Arkansas had a resident population of 3,011,524. Gerrymandering In representative electoral systems , gerrymandering ( / ˈ dʒ ɛr i m æ n d ər ɪ ŋ / JERR -ee-man-dər-ing , originally / ˈ ɡ ɛr i m æ n d ər ɪ ŋ / GHERR -ee-man-dər-ing )
22743-400: The post and can also reduce the proportion of wasted votes and thus potential gerrymandering. Electoral reformers have advocated all three as replacement systems. Electoral systems with various forms of proportional representation are now found in nearly all European countries, resulting in multi-party systems (with many parties represented in the parliaments) with higher voter attendance in
22914-511: The practice more difficult or less effective. Countries such as the UK, Australia, Canada and most of those in Europe have transferred responsibility for defining constituency boundaries to neutral or cross-party bodies. In Spain, they are constitutionally fixed since 1978. Open party-list proportional representation makes gerrymandering obsolete by erasing district lines and empowering voters to rank
23085-532: The progress that they believed could be achieved in an American democracy. The impact of foreign relations, foreign policy and America's global reputation played an important role in Eisenhower's response to the crisis at Little Rock. This eventually culminated in his decisions to order the intervention of the 101st Airborne Division and to federalize the National Guard. Arkansas Arkansas ( / ˈ ɑːr k ən s ɔː / AR -kən-saw )
23256-654: The pronunciation of the name of our state and it is deemed important that the true pronunciation should be determined for use in oral official proceedings. And, whereas, the matter has been thoroughly investigated by the State Historical Society and the Eclectic Society of Little Rock, which have agreed upon the correct pronunciation as derived from history, and the early usage of the American immigrants. Be it therefore resolved by both houses of
23427-405: The public for digging. Arkansas is home to a dozen Wilderness Areas totaling 158,444 acres (641.20 km ). These areas are set aside for outdoor recreation and are open to hunting, fishing, hiking, and primitive camping. No mechanized vehicles nor developed campgrounds are allowed in these areas. Arkansas has many rivers, lakes, and reservoirs within or along its borders. Major tributaries to
23598-528: The rebellion there . On May 6, the members of the state convention, having been recalled by the convention president, voted to terminate Arkansas's membership in the Union and join the Confederate States of America . Arkansas held a very important position for the Rebels, maintaining control of the Mississippi River and surrounding Southern states. The bloody Battle of Wilson's Creek just across
23769-589: The redistricting process. The I-cut-you-choose method achieves fairness by putting the two major-parties in direct competition. I-cut-you-choose is a fair division method to divide resources amongst two parties, regardless of which party cuts first. This method typically relies on assumptions of contiguity of districts but ignores all other constraints such as keeping communities of interest together. This method has been applied to nominal redistricting problems but it generally has less public interest than other types of redistricting reforms. The I-cut-you-choose concept
23940-560: The redistricting process. Under these proposals, an independent and presumably objective commission is created specifically for redistricting, rather than having the legislature do it. This is the system used in the UK, where independent boundary commissions determine the boundaries for constituencies in the House of Commons and the devolved legislatures , subject to ratification by the body in question (almost always granted without debate). A similar situation exists in Australia, where
24111-583: The rest of 1812. This suggests an organized activity by the Federalists to disparage Gerry in particular and the growing Democratic-Republican party in general. Gerrymandering soon began to be used to describe cases of district shape manipulation for partisan gain in other states. According to the Oxford English Dictionary , the word's acceptance was marked by its publication in a dictionary (1848) and in an encyclopedia (1868). Since
24282-522: The rural districts that contain large prisons, artificially inflating the political representation in districts with prisons at the expense of voters in districts without them. Others contend that prisoners should not be counted as residents of their original districts when they do not reside there and are not legally eligible to vote . Due to the perceived issues associated with gerrymandering and its effect on competitive elections and democratic accountability, numerous countries have enacted reforms making
24453-553: The ruse up, his men informed the locals that de Soto had ascended into the sky. His will at the time of his death listed "four Indian slaves, three horses and 700 hogs" which were auctioned off. The starving men, who had been living off maize stolen from natives, immediately started butchering the hogs and later, commanded by former aide-de-camp Moscoso, attempted an overland return to Mexico. They made it as far as Texas before running into territory too dry for maize farming and too thinly populated to sustain themselves by stealing food from
24624-419: The school board should have the chance to prove themselves, that the plan was reasonable, and that the white community would accept it. This view was short-lived, however. Changes were made to the plan, the most detrimental being a new transfer system that would allow students to move out of the attendance zone to which they were assigned. The altered Blossom Plan had gerrymandered school districts to guarantee
24795-472: The school officials. We were told we would have to take a lot and were warned not to fight back if anything happened. One girl ran up to me and said, 'I'm so glad you're here. Won't you go to lunch with me today?' I never saw her again. Minnijean Brown was also taunted by members of a group of white male students in December 1957 in the school cafeteria during lunch. She dropped her lunch, a bowl of chili, onto
24966-497: The ship and its crew. I signed on to be a foster grandmother...President Eisenhower sent 1,000 paratroopers to Little Rock to disperse a mob, bring order, and they made it possible for us to enter Central High School. From that point, I've had very high regard for specially trained forces." The crisis at Little Rock took place amid the Cold War . Civil rights historian Mary L. Dudziak argues that President Dwight D. Eisenhower and
25137-559: The state Confederate capital to Hot Springs , and then again to Washington from 1863 to 1865, for the remainder of the war. Throughout the state, guerrilla warfare ravaged the countryside and destroyed cities. Passion for the Confederate cause waned after implementation of programs such as the draft, high taxes, and martial law. Under the Military Reconstruction Act , Congress declared Arkansas restored to
25308-488: The state government has increasingly followed. Before European settlement of North America, Arkansas, was inhabited by indigenous peoples for thousands of years. The Caddo , Osage , and Quapaw peoples encountered European explorers. The first of these Europeans was Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto in 1541, who crossed the Mississippi and marched across central Arkansas and the Ozark Mountains. After finding nothing he considered of value and encountering native resistance
25479-486: The state senate redistricting process and Democrats informally controlled the state assembly redistricting process, New York has experienced some of the nation's least competitive legislative elections. One study by the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University Law School found that over one ten-year period, as many members of the state legislature died in office as were defeated in elections. More than 99% of
25650-581: The state, including the Fayetteville–Springdale–Rogers Metropolitan Area and Fort Smith metropolitan area , is a population, education, and economic center. The largest city in the state's eastern part is Jonesboro . The largest city in the state's southeastern part is Pine Bluff . In the 21st century, Arkansas's economy is based on service industries, aircraft, poultry, steel, and tourism, along with important commodity crops of cotton, soybeans and rice . The state supports
25821-618: The state, including the Ozarks, where some areas were developed as resorts. In a few years at the end of the 19th century, for instance, Eureka Springs in Carroll County grew to 10,000 people, rapidly becoming a tourist destination and the fourth-largest city of the state. It featured newly constructed, elegant resort hotels and spas planned around its natural springs, considered to have healthful properties. The town's attractions included horse racing and other entertainment. It appealed to
25992-562: The time. Tisdale had the engraving skills to cut the woodblocks to print the original cartoon. These woodblocks survive and are preserved in the Library of Congress . The creator of the term gerrymander , however, may never be definitively established. Historians widely believe that the Federalist newspaper editors Nathan Hale and Benjamin and John Russell coined the term, but there is no definitive evidence as to who created or uttered
26163-412: The time. Faubus risked losing political support in the upcoming 1958 Democratic gubernatorial primary if he showed support for integration. Most histories of the crisis conclude that Faubus, facing pressure as he campaigned for a third term, decided to appease racist elements in the state by calling out the National Guard to prevent the black students from entering Central High. Former associate justice of
26334-475: The two largest metropolitan areas. Other cities in Arkansas include Pine Bluff , Crossett , Bryant , Lake Village , Hot Springs , Bentonville , Texarkana , Sherwood , Jacksonville , Russellville , Bella Vista , West Memphis , Paragould , Cabot , Searcy , Van Buren , El Dorado , Blytheville , Harrison , Dumas , Rison , Warren , and Mountain Home . The United States Census Bureau estimated that
26505-751: The war ended. Today, the Little Rock–North Little Rock–Conway metropolitan area is the largest in the state, with a population of 724,385 in 2013. The Fayetteville–Springdale–Rogers Metropolitan Area is the second-largest metropolitan area in Arkansas, growing at the fastest rate due to the influx of businesses and the growth of the University of Arkansas and Walmart . The state has eight cities with populations above 50,000 (based on 2010 census). In descending order of size, they are Little Rock , Fort Smith , Fayetteville , Springdale , Jonesboro , North Little Rock , Conway , and Rogers . Of these, only Fort Smith and Jonesboro are outside
26676-421: The white students. Melba Pattillo had acid thrown into her eyes and also recalled in her book, Warriors Don't Cry , an incident in which a group of white girls trapped her in a stall in the girls' washroom and attempted to burn her by dropping pieces of flaming paper on her from above. Another one of the students, Minnijean Brown , was verbally confronted and abused. She said I was one of the kids 'approved' by
26847-726: The word for the first time. The redistricting was a notable success for Gerry's Democratic-Republican Party. In the 1812 election , both the Massachusetts House and governorship were comfortably won by Federalists , losing Gerry his job, but the redistricted state senate remained firmly in Democratic-Republican hands. The word gerrymander was reprinted numerous times in Federalist newspapers in Massachusetts, New England , and nationwide for
27018-538: Was based on a book by Elizabeth Huckaby , a vice-principal during the crisis. In the summer of 1958, as the school year was drawing to a close, Faubus decided to petition the decision by the Federal District Court in order to postpone the desegregation of public high schools in Little Rock. In the Cooper v. Aaron case, the Little Rock School District, under the leadership of Orval Faubus , fought for
27189-490: Was blocked by an injunction by the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals , which caused some citizens of Little Rock to turn on the black community. The black community became a target for hate crimes since people blamed them for the closing of the schools. Daisy Bates , head of the NAACP chapter in Little Rock, was a primary victim of these crimes, in addition to the black students enrolled at Little Rock Central High School and their families. The city's teachers were also placed in
27360-549: Was called the Elaine massacre . White mobs spread throughout the county, killing an estimated 237 blacks before most of the violence was suppressed after October 1. Five whites also died in the incident. The governor accompanied the troops to the scene; President Woodrow Wilson had approved their use. The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 flooded the areas along the Ouachita Rivers along with many other rivers. Based on
27531-415: Was compared to the shape of a mythological salamander . The term has negative connotations, and gerrymandering is almost always considered a corruption of the democratic process. The resulting district is known as a gerrymander ( / ˈ dʒ ɛr i ˌ m æ n d ər , ˈ ɡ ɛr i -/ ). The word is also a verb for the process. The word gerrymander (originally written Gerry-mander ; a portmanteau of
27702-598: Was competitive districts, a sort of "reverse gerrymander". A complex mathematical formula was to be used to determine the competitiveness of a district. The measure failed voter approval chiefly due to voter concerns that communities of interest would be broken up. In 2017, Representative John Delaney submitted the Open Our Democracy Act of 2017 to the U.S. House of Representatives as a means to implement nonpartisan redistricting. Many redistricting reforms seek to remove partisanship to ensure fairness in
27873-541: Was conducted by a Republican legislature in 2011. Federal congressional districts were designed so that cities such as Battle Creek , Grand Rapids , Jackson , Kalamazoo , Lansing , and East Lansing were separated into districts with large conservative-leaning hinterlands that diluted the Democratic votes in those cities in Congressional elections. Since 2022 some districts have been redrawn to just include
28044-487: Was frustrated by the success his political opponents were having in using segregationist rhetoric to stir white voters. Congressman Brooks Hays , who tried to mediate between the federal government and Faubus, was later defeated by a last minute write-in candidate, Dale Alford , a member of the Little Rock School Board who had the backing of Faubus's allies. A few years later, despite the incident with
28215-420: Was going to fall." He later claimed that Faubus asked him to raise a mob to justify his actions. Harry Ashmore , the editor of the Arkansas Gazette , won a 1958 Pulitzer Prize for his editorials on the crisis. Ashmore portrayed the fight over Central High as a crisis manufactured by Faubus; in his interpretation, Faubus used the Arkansas National Guard to keep black children out of Central High School because he
28386-446: Was hired to produce a painting of the Little Rock Nine for the event. In November 1998, legislation passed designating Little Rock Central High School National Historic Site as a unit of the National Park Service, and Central High Museum, Inc., donated their property to the park service. While the NPS visitor center was under construction, Hunt's painting, titled "America Cares", hung in the White House. In February 1999, members created
28557-401: Was planning on leasing the public school buildings to private schools, and, in doing so, would educate the white and black students separately. Faubus was successful in his appeal and won the referendum. This year came to be known as the "Lost Year". Faubus's victory led to a series of consequences that affected Little Rock society. Faubus and the school board's intention to open private schools
28728-471: Was popularized by the board game Berrymandering. Problems with this method arise when minor parties are shut-out of the process which will reinforce the two-party system . Additionally, while this method is provably fair to the two parties creating the districts, it is not necessarily fair to the communities they represent. When a single political party controls both legislative houses of a state during redistricting, both Democrats and Republicans have displayed
28899-401: Was settled only when President Ulysses S. Grant ordered Joseph Brooks to disperse his militant supporters. Following the Brooks-Baxter War, a new state constitution was ratified, re-enfranchising former Confederates and effectively bringing an end to Reconstruction. In 1881, the Arkansas state legislature enacted a bill that adopted an official pronunciation of the state's name, to combat
29070-405: Was struck in the face with a buttstock after trying to grab a soldier's rifle, and a second who received a minor bayonet wound to the arm. By the end of September 1957, the nine were admitted to Little Rock Central High under the protection of the 101st Airborne Division (and later the Arkansas National Guard ), but they were still subjected to a year of physical and verbal abuse by many of
29241-468: Was the first African American to graduate from Central High School. When integration began on September 4, 1957, the Arkansas National Guard was called in to "preserve the peace". Originally at orders of the governor, they were meant to prevent the black students from entering due to claims that there was "imminent danger of tumult, riot and breach of peace" at the integration. However, President Eisenhower issued Executive Order 10730 , which federalized
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