Eisenhower, Education, and Civil Rights: a Reassessment of the Eisenhower Administration's Contribution to School Desegregation...

1956年，在德克萨斯州的曼斯菲尔德小镇，三名非洲裔美国儿童被州警阻止进入当地学校就读。尽管最高法院在1954年的布朗诉教育委员会案中宣布学校种族隔离违宪，但德克萨斯州州长还是采取了引人注目的措施，邀请武装人员阻止非裔美国儿童入学，并停止了曼斯菲尔德中心高中的种族隔离。第二年，阿肯色州的小石城也发生了同样的事情，该州州长动用国民警卫队阻止学校废除种族隔离。然而，联邦政府对这两件事的反应却明显不同。在小石城，艾森豪威尔政府派遣联邦军队确保学校废除种族隔离——曼斯菲尔德没有采取这种行动。正如小石城事件所表明的那样，联邦政府对曼斯菲尔德缺乏干预并非无能为力的结果；相反，这是决定不采取行动的结果。

In the small town of Mansfield, Texas, 1956, three African-American children were prevented by state troopers from enrolling in the local school. Despite the ruling of the Supreme Court known as Brown vs. Board of Education, 1954, declaring school segregation unconstitutional, the Governor of Texas took the dramatic step of inviting armed officers to block the enrolment of the African-American children, and to stop the desegregation of Mansfield's Central High. The same happened in the subsequent year in Little Rock, Arkansas,where the State Governor used the National Guard to prevent school desegregation. Yet, the Federal Government's reaction in these two instances was markedly different. In Little Rock, the Eisenhower administration sent Federal troops to ensure school desegregation -an action not taken in Mansfield. As the events in Little Rock suggest,the lack of Federal intervention in Mansfield was not the result of an inability to act; rather, it was the outcome of a decision not to act.