page_title: Orval Faubus
section_title: Faubus-style politics
hierarchical_section_title: Orval Faubus / Governor of Arkansas (1955-1967) / Faubus-style politics
context_page_description: Orval Eugene Faubus was an American politician who served as the 36th Governor of Arkansas from 1955 to 1967, as a member of the Democratic Party. In 1957, he refused to comply with a unanimous decision of the United States Supreme Court in the 1954 case Brown v. Board of Education, and ordered the Arkansas National Guard to prevent black students from attending Little Rock Central High School. This event became known as the Little Rock Crisis.
context_section_description: Faubus was elected governor to six two-year terms and hence served for twelve years. He maintained a defiant, populist image, while he shifted toward a less confrontational stance with the federal government, particularly during the administrations of Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson, with each of whom he remained cordial, and both of whom carried Arkansas.
  In the 1956 general election, Faubus, having already eliminated Jim Johnson, overwhelmed GOP candidate Roy Mitchell, later the GOP state chairman from Hot Springs,  321,797 (80.7%) to 77,215 (19.4%). In 1958, he defeated Republican George W. Johnson of Greenwood in Sebastian County by drawing 82.5% of the votes.
  In 1960, Faubus defeated Attorney General Bruce Bennett in the Democratic gubernatorial primary for and then crushed the Republican choice, Henry M. Britt, an attorney from Hot Springs, to secure reelection. Faubus polled 292,064 votes (69.2%) to Britt's 129,921 (30.8%). In the presidential election contest, however, Democrat John F. Kennedy won Arkansas over the Republican Richard M. Nixon by less than expected. Britt was later a circuit judge in Garland County from 1967 to 1983.
  In 1962, Faubus broke with the White Citizens' Councils and other groups, who preferred, but did not officially endorse, U.S. Representative Dale Alford in that year's gubernatorial primary. Faubus cast himself as a moderate, he completely ignored the race issue during the 1962 election campaign, and barely secured a majority over Alford, McMath, and three other candidates. He then handily defeated the Republican Willis Ricketts, a then 37-year-old pharmacist from Fayetteville in the general election.
  While Faubus was still an outcast from black leaders, he nevertheless won a large percent of the black vote. In 1964, when he defeated the Republican Winthrop Rockefeller by a 57-43 percent margin, Faubus secured 81 percent of the black vote. He even collected a share of the base Republican vote from the conservative party members who had sided with former Republican state chairman William L. Spicer of Fort Smith, an intraparty rival of Rockefeller.
caption: Faubus with President Dwight D. Eisenhower and Congressman Brooks Hays in 1957
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