Hays's position during the Little Rock crisis
Hays did not advocate immediate integration throughout American society. Even his more limited position, however, put him at odds with the segregationists who then constituted a majority of Arkansas voters. During the 1957 Central High School crisis, he sought to bring President Dwight Eisenhower and Arkansas Gov. Orval Faubus together.
According to Arkansas historian Kyle Day, Hays arranged their meeting in Newport, Rhode Island, at the height of the confrontation. Faubus refused to withdraw the Arkansas National Guard and let the Little Rock Nine enroll at Central High.
Hays's record also included opposition to desegregation. He signed the Southern Manifesto in 1956, joining other Southern members of Congress in denouncing the Brown v. Board decision. He later expressed regret for signing it. In the 1958 Democratic primary, he defeated segregationist leader and Little Rock attorney Amis Guthridge by a 3-to-2 margin.
Alongside his congressional work, Hays served as Southern Baptist Convention president in 1957 and 1958, an office rarely held by a layman. Day credits him with challenging racial and denominational divisions in Southern religious life, including helping begin efforts to desegregate the Southern Baptist Church. Hays later became his denomination's first leader to meet formally with the pope.
Alford's campaign against school desegregation
Alford entered the Little Rock School Board in 1955 and became its most uncompromising opponent of desegregation. He alone opposed Superintendent Virgil Blossom's desegregation plan. Before the 101st Airborne Division arrived in September 1957, he spoke against any public school desegregation; the following summer, he condemned the board's censure of Faubus.
On Sept. 26, 1958, Alford used a televised address to advocate private, segregated education. Little Rock voters were to decide the next day whether to close their schools rather than accept desegregation. Alford portrayed desegregation as part of an international communist conspiracy, alleging that communists were using Black Southerners as propaganda tools in the Cold War. Day writes that the speech helped secure approval of the school-closing referendum.
The city's public schools remained closed throughout the 1958-59 school year. Families responded by enrolling children in newly established private schools or arranging for them to stay with relatives and friends elsewhere in Arkansas. Districts around the state accepted white students displaced from Little Rock.
Hundreds of letters supporting Alford's stand against desegregation, along with a petition urging him to challenge Hays, encouraged his congressional bid, according to Day. He announced his write-in candidacy on Oct. 27, 1958, and segregationist organizations quickly rallied behind him.
Faubus publicly kept his distance from the campaign but assigned a key aide, Claude Carpenter Jr., to run it. Day describes that assistance as an effective endorsement from the popular governor.
Hays was the only one of Arkansas's six House incumbents to face a general-election challenger. The state's congressional delegation was entirely Democratic, and E.C. Gathings, Wilbur Mills, James Trimble, Oren Harris and William Norrell all ran unopposed.
The physician behind the candidacy
Alford brought an established medical career and extensive civic ties to the race. Born in Murfreesboro in January 1916, he was the son of two teachers. His father went on to lead the Arkansas Education Association and served as state education commissioner under Gov. Carl Bailey during the 1930s.
After graduating from Rector High School in Clay County and the institution now called the University of Central Arkansas, Alford completed his medical degree in 1939 at what is now the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. While studying ophthalmology, he also worked as a radio announcer for businessman T.H. Barton, hosting the Lion Oil Co.-sponsored program "Pigskin Parade." He served in the Army Medical Corps from 1940 through 1946.
Day describes Alford as a nationally respected ophthalmologist in the postwar years. He practiced in Atlanta and taught at Emory University Medical School in 1947-48 before returning to Arkansas, where his practice treated both Black and white patients. He also worked on hospital staffs and taught at his medical alma mater.
An Episcopalian, Alford participated in medical organizations and civic groups. His leadership roles included the presidencies of the Arkansas State Opera Company and the Little Rock Civitan Club.
A narrow victory and two reviews
The final vote was 30,739 for Alford, or 51 percent, against 29,483 for Hays, or 49 percent, according to Congressional Quarterly's Guide to U.S. Elections as cited by Wikipedia.
Hays supporters alleged fraud and irregularities. Osro Cobb, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas, convened a grand jury and secured a court order to impound all ballots. In his memoirs, as quoted by Wikipedia, Cobb said the jury's review found the count "unusually accurate for each candidate." The jurors also considered indicting those who had made the accusations.
Alford's election faced a separate challenge in Congress. On Jan. 7, 1959, just before the oath-taking ceremony, Michigan Representative-elect John Dingell objected to seating him. Speaker Sam Rayburn instructed Alford to remain seated while the other members took the oath.
The House then passed House Resolution 1, allowing Alford to be sworn in while directing the Committee on House Administration to investigate the election. Its Subcommittee on Elections reported in Alford's favor on Sept. 8, 1959.
Their careers after the election
Alford's House service lasted two terms, from Jan. 3, 1959, through Jan. 3, 1963. Arkansas lost a congressional seat after the 1960 census, and the legislature combined his Little Rock-based district with Wilbur D. Mills's 2nd District. Instead of challenging Mills in the 1962 primary, Alford sought the governorship. He placed third behind Faubus and Sid McMath, then made another gubernatorial bid in 1966 and finished fourth.
Hays received a series of appointments from Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson after losing his seat. His role in Little Rock also drew recognition from Martin Luther King Jr. At a White House encounter about six years after the crisis, King told an accompanying Baptist minister, "Mr. Hays has suffered with us." Hays took those words as a reference to the Little Rock crisis and his electoral defeat.
Hays unsuccessfully sought the Democratic nomination for governor in 1966. He moved to North Carolina in 1968 for a position at Wake Forest University and lost a congressional race there in 1972. He died in 1981.
