The Little Rock Nine and Ruby Bridges: a story of school segregation in the USA

Thèmes abordés

Little Rock Nine, Ruby Bridges, segregation, USA, all-white schools, National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), Black people, White people, Orval Faubus, Eisenhower, KKK

Résumé du document

During segregation, colored people and white people were separated in many places like in buses, in churches, in restaurants and even in school. When segregation was abolished in 1956, those kinds of separations were now illegal. However, many of people did not accept that black people were allowed to frequent the old white establishment, and they were often protestation of segregationist. This is what happened in the city of Little Rock the capital of the Arkansas state.

Extraits

[...] They were all written or thrown by the white crowd, even if it's not seen in the picture. This painting is normally exposed in the Norman Rockwell museum but Barack Obama took it for the White House. Those two cases embody the civil right movements. Black people had to fight for their human rights and for the end of segregation. But even if laws made segregation illegal, it still remained hard for black people to go to establishment which were all-white. [...]

[...] The mayor of Little Rock asked for more help from Eisenhower, so he sent the army in Little Rock in order to escort the nine students in school and maintain their safety. The troops of the 101st Airborne Division of the United States Army were here the 25 September 1957 in order to escort the student in their class and maintain their security. It was a hard decision for Eisenhower because for 80 years, no armies were sent in an ex-confederated state. [...]

[...] The Little Rock Nine and Ruby Bridges: a story of school segregation in the USA During segregation, colored people and white people were separated in many places like in buses, in churches, in restaurants and even in school. When segregation was abolished in 1956, those kinds of separations were then illegal. However, many of people did not accept that black people were allowed to frequent the old white establishment, and there were often protestation of segregationists. This is what happened in the city of Little Rock, the capital of the Arkansas state. [...]

[...] There were many people around, most of them were segregationists. They yelled at her and threw to her object. Ruby wasn't warned that she could face protestation, so she only believed it was Mardi-Gras, a fest which is widely celebrates in New-Orleans. When she entered the school, many white parents took away their white children and forbade them to go school with a black pupil. All the teachers also refused to take Ruby in their classroom expect for Barbara Henry, a white teacher. [...]

[...] Two months later, after more confrontation, Brown was suspended for the rest of the school year. She transferred to New Lincoln High School in New York City. White students were punished only when their offense was "both egregious and witnessed by an adult". These events have marked the American society. Even now, they remembered the nine students who struggled to go to their school. Fifty years later, the 25 September 2007, Bill Clinton and other politics made a gala in order to commemorate the events. [...]