Was President Eisenhower Deranged?
Democrat politicians (again) tout their support for those preventing, hindering, or delaying the execution of federal laws.
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Now on to the meat
In September 1957, President Eisenhower ordered the deployment of elements of the 101st Airborne Division to Little Rock, Arkansas, to enforce federal law that was being flaunted by a Democratic governor. The only one who complained were die-hard white supremacists. My, hasn’t the worm turned? Let’s start with Gavin Newsom’s calumny and then look at this history. We will then wrap up with a short synopsis that shows how prominent Democrats have drummed up anti-ICE hysteria to support those who seek to “prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of the laws of the United States.”
Gavin Newsom
Deranged? So SECDEF Hegseth, and by extension, President Trump, are deranged because they threatened — and now have — to deploy active-duty Marines to protect ICE’s enforcement of federal immigration law. Obviously, Newsom applies the same “logic” to President Trump’s federalization and deployment of the California National Guard. Let’s take a look to see if there is any precedent for the deployment of federal troops to force compliance with federal law or if it really is deranged. Plot spoiler — if this did mean Trump and Hegseth are deranged, they would be in good company.
Back to the 50’s
In 1954 in Brown v. Board of Education the Supreme Court’s declared that segregated schools were unconstitutional. A lower federal court subsequently ordered the desegregation of Little Rock Central High School.
Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus resisted integration. He deployed the Arkansas National Guard to block nine black students from entering the school.
President Eisenhower reportedly was not a fan of the Supreme Court’s Brown ruling but he also was a fierce advocate of the federal government’s obligation to enforce its laws. He had zero tolerance for a state’s defiance of federal law. A binding precedent on that issue had been forcefully established a century earlier by another West Point graduate who also had preceded him as President, Ulysses S. Grant.
Eisenhower, prioritizing federal authority and the enforcement of federal law, issued an Executive Order that federalized the Arkansas National Guard and deployed approximately 1,000 paratroopers from the famous “Screaming Eagles,” the 101st Airborne Division. Their mission was to enforce federal law compelling integration of Central High School by ensuring the safety of the black students and protecting them from violent protests by segregationist mobs.
The 101st paratroopers meant business.
My parents would not allow me to go anywhere near Central High School during these events, but I followed the protests in the local newspapers. But what really intrigued 14-year-old me was the thought of having real-life paratroopers from the Screaming Eagles right in my hometown.
These were the heroes who had parachuted into Normandy in the black of the night on June 5, 1944. The same men who told the Nazis where to stick it when they were surrounded at Bastogne. Outnumbered and surrounded they kicked SS ass. They were not going to take any flak from a bunch of white supremacist punks who were intent upon defying the laws of the United States.
I still remember reading an Arkansas newspaper interview with a local protester who complained that even though he was a World War II vet, a 101st paratrooper bayoneted him in the arm because he didn’t move fast enough when ordered. Although I cannot find that particular article today, it might have been the protestor below clutching his arm as the paratroopers provide steel-tipped guidance on where to go. If he really was a WW II vet, he should have known better than to mess with the Screaming Eagles.
Los Angeles criminal rioters, not protesters
We are now seeing violent “protests” in Los Angeles and nationwide, attempting to shut down ICE’s enforcement of federal law. I put “protests” in quotes because when they burn cars, assault police and federal agents, prepare Molotov cocktails, actively interfere with attempts to arrest lawbreakers, and hurl chunks of concrete at federal agents and their cars, then they are criminal rioters, not protesters. Excusing them as “protestors” supports their criminal conduct.
State officials: “Protestors? What, Me worry?“
State officials in California proved to be unwilling to take effective measures to stop the rioting. Mayors of self-declared “sanctuary cities” made clear that their priorities were with the lawbreakers, not with officers trying to do their duty to protect the public. When ICE agents were surrounded by people who wanted to hurt or kill them, they called the LAPD for back-up. The director of ICE said that the local cops took over two hours to get there. The LAPD police chief contended that they responded in 38 minutes but even though that is an unacceptably long delay, there was a lot of traffic, large crowds, and tear gas had been used in the area. No police had been pre-positioned in the area with the necessary equipment. Why not, you ask? The Chief explained:
I also want to be unequivocally clear: the Los Angeles Police Department does not participate in or coordinate with immigration and customs enforcement on civil immigration enforcement. We’ve said this over and over again and I can’t stress it enough for the people in our community who have high levels of anxiety.
Yes, they have stressed their refusal to cooperate in the enforcement of federal law “over and over again.”This kind of indifference and tolerance led to the violence you see in the above images.
Trump nationalizes and deploys the California National Guard. Politicians react.
After Los Angeles and the State of California showed that they were unwilling to control the mayhem, President Trump issued a Presidential Memorandum on June 7, that federalized and ordered the deployment of 2,000 California National Guard troops to Los Angeles in response to violent protests over immigration enforcement. He invoked 10 U.S.C. § 12406, which allows the president to take control of a state’s National Guard without the governor’s consent in cases of rebellion or when it is deemed necessary to enforce federal law. Like President Eisenhower in 1957 and President Johnson in 1965, President, President Trump did not have the Governor’s consent, and Newsom’s subsequent statements have made it crystal clear that under no circumstances would he ever have given any consent, no matter how many federal buildings were burned or how many criminals went free.
Predictable reaction from other Democrat politicians
Mayor Karen Bass
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass brags that she has been in “close coordination with immigrant rights community organizations.” In that, at least, she is telling the truth. These riots are not spontaneous and Huck demonstrations by well-meaning people. They obviously are highly organized and funded by “immigrant rights, community organizations” and other NGOs.
“We will not stand for this.” Blatant encouragement of the mob’s violence.
Kamala Harris
Harris would have us know that the riots are “overwhelmingly peaceful. She will also continue to support the rioters:
Note that Harris does not make a single mention of the crimes committed by any of those whom she calls “our immigrant neighbors.” It would take a Heimlich maneuver to force Harris to cough up an admission that ICE has rounded up convicted murderers, child rapists, arsonists, human traffickers, and other sub-human criminals, or that Trump has any interest in protecting the public from these barbarians.
Bernie Sanders
Bernie Sanders, naturally, could not resist weighing in. According to the Washington Post, for him the problem was not that rioters were burning cars, destroying property and fighting federal agents. Rather, the problem was that President Trump’s decision to deploy the California Guard within California “is a sign that the country is moving ‘rapidly into authoritarianism’ and that it was ‘high time’ that Republicans in Congress ‘stood up for our Constitution.’” Sanders is not a fool, but he is a two-faced charlatan.
Chuck Schumer
Speaking of two-faced charlatans, here is Chuck:
“The Trump administration’s disturbing pattern of arresting and detaining American citizens for exercising their right to free speech and protest is not only sickening—it’s a blatant abuse of power and a stain on our democracy.”
Chuck’s free speech:
The ancien régime media
And, of course, rioters and anti-American criminals always are backed-up by the ever-reliable porte paroles in the ancien regime media.
CNN’s Dana Bash hosted a friendly encounter with California Congresswoman Nanette Barragán, who claimed, without contradiction that,
“We are having an administration that’s targeting peaceful protests, people that are there to protest. The president is sending the National Guard because he doesn’t like the scenes. He doesn’t like the scenes of people peacefully protesting.”
ABC’s Marc Brown provided support for the rioters by condemning any deployment of military force because all the fuss was merely about “just a bunch of people having fun watching cars burn.” I am not making that up. Listen to him here: https://x.com/SteveGuest/status/1932043760860328336
Wrapping it up.
18 U.S. Code § 2384 - Seditious conspiracy
If two or more persons in any State or Territory, or in any place subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, conspire to overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force the Government of the United States, or to levy war against them, or to oppose by force the authority thereof, or by force to prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of any law of the United States, or by force to seize, take, or possess any property of the United States contrary to the authority thereof, they shall each be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both.
We are watching sedition in real time, on TV. It will get worse.
By the way, this whole chapter of current events reminds me of South Carolina's assertion of the doctrine of "nullification" during the period around 1830. That doctrine held that each state is sovereign and can nullify enforcement of selected federal laws within its borders. California's Democrat leadership is attempting to revive that doctrine, which came close to resulting in civil war during the Jackson administration.
Newsom is no different than any of the governors in the Southern states who tried to block federal integration laws. He refuses to obey federal immigration laws and he’s done his best to interfere with their enforcement. He acts like California is its own sovereign state.
This started when the Federal government sat on its hands and let states and cities declare themselves “sanctuaries”, who then vowed to not obey US immigration laws and obstructed their enforcement. By shielding illegal aliens from ICE these "sanctuary" entities are in direct violation of 8 USC 1324. It's beyond belief that the federal government, even now, hasn't acted to defend the concept of the supremacy of federal laws.
States and cities don’t get to conjure up their own immigration policies. Any state or city that impedes Federal agents from enforcing our laws, and who encourage people to disobey the law or obstruct their enforcement ought to be declared to be in a state of rebellion against the United States. Newsom and Bass - and politicians like them - are engaged in real sedition and rebellion. Perhaps they've forgotten that state nullification of federal law didn't work out so well in 1861.
Liberals love to accuse their political opponents of sedition, or of being fascists or traitors…except when they’re the ones actually engaging in it. Then it’s “patriotic protest.”