When did segration end in Arkansas?

Answer 1

Answer 1: Many people of color -- specifically African Americans (aka, "blacks" or "black Americans") -- would argue, even today, that it never really did; that segregation, even if not the official policy/practice of government and others, still exists as a practical matter.

However, the questioner is almost certainly asking when segregation became illegal, and/or no longer anyone's official policy in Arkansas. And the answer to that is that it began in the 1950s (actually, there was a case in 1948), and took place, at that time, mostly in schools. The 1948 case involved Silas Hunt, who enrolled at the University of Arkansas School of Law.

One of the most famous of Arkansas's 1950s cases was the desegregation of Central High School in Little Rock in 1957, and the story of the so-called "Little Rock Nine." The motivating cause, in that case, was the famous "Brown v. Board of Education" ruling, handed-down by the US Supreme Court in 1954; which ruling declared that state laws establishing separate public schools for black and white students was unconstitutional.

It was, however, the school board of the Fayetteville school system, in Washington County, Arkansas which was the first to approve segregation in schools in the state in 1954; and several school systems (Van Buren in Crawford County, Fort Smith in Sebastian County, Bentonville in Benton County, and Hot Springs in Garland County) quickly followed suit; and there was very little said about it because all of those places had at least sparse black populations.

However, there was quite a ruckus in the Hoxie school system in Lawrence County in 1955 when the school board declared, by unanimous vote, that "integration was morally right in the sight of God." Whites who had supported segregation got all up-in-arms and threatened to boycott the schools, and protest; and, in Little Rock, hroughout the 1950s and 1960s, schools openly defied the Supreme Court's ruling against segregation.

It took until the 1970s before the vast majority of black students were attending integrated schools; but "white flight" from such school districts have now created schools that are mostly or completely black, even though the goal was that those schools have substantial numbers of both white and black students.

The true answer to the question, though, is, technically, 1954, when the US Supreme Court handed-down its "Brown v. Board of Education" ruling. It took a few years, thereafter, though, in some places, for desegregation to really take hold; and, sadly, because of "white flight" from many desegregated areas, the goal of desegregation -- true integration -- has never quite been realized in many places.

Desegregation, however, was about more than just the hope of fully integrating schools with substantial numbers of both white and black students. The desegregation efforts of some at the college level helped to pave the way for the Civil Rights Movement (which is generally considered to have spanned the years from 1955 to 1968), itself. Specifically, the success, in 1963, of black students from Philander Smith College attempting to desegregate the Woolworth's lunch counter in downtown Little Rock ended-up being a hallmark moment in the Civil Rights movement, which had the aim of outlawing racial discrimination against black Americans, just generally; and also restoring their voting rights.