Executive Order 10730: Little Rock Desegregation

About the Author

Dwight David Eisenhower was born in Denison, Texas, on October 14, 1890, and grew up in Abilene, Kansas, where his family had moved only months after he was born. He graduated from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in 1915, but his career as an officer in the U.S. Army began slowly. It took almost a decade until he gained recognition from his superiors. He served as a military aide in the 1920s to General John J. Pershing, the commander of U.S. forces in World War I, and in the 1930s to General Douglas MacArthur in the Philippines. He returned to the United States in 1939, earned a promotion to brigadier general two years later, and then went to Washington, D.C., shortly after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 to help in planning U.S. strategy in World War II.

During the war, Eisenhower led Allied forces to victory. He commanded the invasions of North Africa in 1942 and of Italy in 1943. As Supreme Allied Commander, he gave the order for the D-day invasion on June 6, 1944, that began the liberation of Nazi-occupied France. By the time he accepted the German surrender in Europe on May 8, 1945, he had become one of the greatest war leaders in American history.

After the war, Eisenhower served as army chief of staff (1945–1948) and president of Columbia University (1948–1950). In 1951, after the outbreak of the Korean War, he returned to active duty as the first commander of the armed forces of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. In 1952, he decided to leave that command to campaign for the Republican nomination for president. He capitalized on his reputation as a war hero and his winning personality to win the nomination and the election in November. Millions of voters agreed with his campaign slogan: “I like Ike.”

As president, Eisenhower gave highest priority to fighting the cold war. He believed that the Soviet Union posed a threat not only to U.S. security but also to U.S. values and principles. To meet this global challenge, he increased U.S. nuclear strength, ordered the Central Intelligence Agency to overthrow governments in Iran, Guatemala, and Indonesia that he considered hostile or dangerous, and launched a vigorous campaign to win the hearts and minds of peoples in the emerging third world nations of Africa and Asia to prevent them from turning to Communism. He agreed to an armistice in July 1953 that ended the fighting in Korea, and he was determined to avoid major wars that would strain the U.S. economy and weaken American efforts to contain Soviet influence. While making vigorous efforts to stop the spread of Communism, Eisenhower also hoped to improve Soviet-American relations and to curb the arms race between the two nations. He met with the Soviet leader, Nikita Khrushchev, in Geneva in July 1955—the first U.S.-Soviet summit since the end of World War II—and held two more meetings with the Soviet premier in 1959 and 1960. But the president's hopes for a nuclear test ban treaty evaporated when the Soviets shot down an American U-2 spy plane over their territory on May 1, 1960, just days before Eisenhower and Khrushchev met in Paris.

In domestic affairs, the president's approach was “middle-way Republicanism.” Eisenhower was a moderate conservative at a time when the Republican Party had many strong conservatives who wished to severely reduce or even eliminate programs for social welfare or regulation of the economy enacted during the New Deal of President Franklin D. Roosevelt (1933–1945) or the Fair Deal of President Harry S. Truman (1945–1953). Although Eisenhower worried that “big government” programs might diminish individual freedom and personal responsibility, he also feared that political conflict and even social chaos might occur if the federal government did not provide for Americans in need. While Eisenhower was president, Social Security benefits were expanded to cover payments to disabled workers. In 1956 the president signed legislation that established the interstate highway system. In 1957 and 1960, Eisenhower approved new civil rights acts—the first such legislation since Reconstruction—and he also ordered an end to racial discrimination in federal facilities in Washington, D.C. But he opposed vigorous government efforts to end segregation in public schools or other discriminatory practices and instead favored gradual change.

Eisenhower was an extremely popular president. He easily won reelection in 1956, and his approval rating in the polls never fell below 60 percent. After leaving the White House in 1961, he retired to his farm at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. He died on March 28, 1969.