Winthrop Rocekfeller, brother of NY Governor and 41st Vice President of the United States Nelson Rocekfeller, was the governor of Arkansas from 1967-1971. He was a progressive Democrat. Some of his accomplishments include the integration of Arkansas schools that had been such a political bombshell only a few years before when President Eisenhower had to send in US Airborne troops to enforce federal integration requirements. (Ike loved the Airborne. When he was Supreme Allied Commander in WWII it was the Airborne he called in to save the day at the Battle of the Bulge). He established the Council on Human Relations despite opposition from the legislature. Draft boards in the state boasted the highest level of racial integration of any U.S. state by the time that Rockefeller left office. He was also the only governor from a Southern state to hold a public memorial for Dr. Martin King. On December 29, 1970, having lost his reelection bid, and with two days left in his term, he drove to the Arkansas prison holding death row inmates, and interviewed each one of them. He reviewed all of their files, and the case facts, and the next day he commuted all of their death sentences, the largest single act of commutation of death sentences until 2003 when then outgoing Illinois Governor George Ryan commuted the death sentences of 167 inmates on death row.
Politicians were different back then. Some cared and did the right thing.
No comments:
Post a Comment