It was a Republican president that sent troops to Little Rock in 1957, and pushed through the 1957 Civil Rights Act and the 1960 Civil Rights Act, against oppositional Democrats. It was the Republican Dwight D. Eisenhower, not the Democrat Harry Truman, who fully desegregated the military.
The 1957 civil rights bill was passed on the intervention of Vice President Richard Nixon, and was opposed exclusively by Democrats — not "Southern" Democrats, but Democrats period. Indeed the bill was weakened, and its enforcement provisions were gutted, by none other than then-Senate Majority Leader Lyndon B. Johnson. Even with this stripping, the bill was still opposed by 18 senators — all of them Democrats.
Joe Courtney the Democrat beasts his breast about Steven Spielberg's Lincoln and demands that history be accurately recounted. Next time he takes to his soapbox, he ought to condemn his own party's history and give credit for the nation's progress on civil rights where due — to the GOP. •
Karen Lee Torre, a New Haven trial lawyer, litigates civil rights cases in the federal courts. Her email address is thimbleistlands@att.net.
