In 1954, a unanimous U.S. Supreme Court held in Brown v. Board of Education that state laws establishing racial segregation in public schools were unconstitutional.
Three years later, the Arkansas branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) recruited nine African American students to attempt to integrate Central High School in Little Rock.
On September 4, 1957, the first day of school, a white mob gathered in front of Central High, and Governor Orval Faubus, a staunch segregationist, deployed the Arkansas National Guard to prevent the black students from entering.
In response, the NAACP won a federal district court injunction to prohibit Faubus from blocking the students’ entry. Pursuant to that order, police escorted the students through a side entrance at Central High. However, due to the threat of mob violence, they were quickly sent home.
The standoff between the federal court and Faubus reached the desk of President Dwight Eisenhower.
Although Eisenhower was no fan of the Brown decision, he took swift and decisive action to enforce the federal court order. He promptly federalized the Arkansas National Guard and dispatched the 101st Airborne Division to protect the black students and integrate the school.
Upon their arrival at Central High, wielding rifles with unsheathed fixed bayonets, the 101st Airborne “Screaming Eagles” waded into the white mob. With the support of the federalized Arkansas National Guard, the paratroopers busted heads and inflicted at least one minor stab wound as they herded the mob away from the school. This prompted segregationists to denounce Eisenhower’s use of the military as “Brotherhood by Bayonet.”
Nevertheless, once the students were admitted to Central High, the 101st Airborne remained on scene for the next nine weeks to keep the peace. After that, the federalized Arkansas National Guard took over and maintained order for the next five months. In other words, for over eight months, military forces under Eisenhower’s command occupied Little Rock to suppress domestic violence.
That was how Central High was integrated. And no one in the then mainstream media, academia, or the liberal establishment ever argued that President Eisenhower lacked the authority to use the federalized Arkansas National Guard and regular Army troops either to enforce a federal court order or to restore and maintain law and order in an American city without the consent of state and local authorities.
In fact, the Insurrection Act (10 U.S.C. Sec. 251 – 255) expressly authorizes the president to use military force to suppress domestic violence that threatens the rights of others when state authorities either cannot or will not maintain order. Furthermore, under long-standing caselaw, the president has broad authority to determine when conditions warrant invoking the Act, with courts presuming the president has done so in good faith unless clear evidence shows otherwise.
Which brings us to President Trump’s musings about deploying the National Guard to suppress violent crime in Chicago. (RELATED: Crime in DC Is NOT at a 30-Year Low)
On August 22, 2025, during a press briefing in the Oval Office, Trump referenced his successful use of the National Guard to significantly reduce crime in the District of Columbia. He then announced that Chicago would be the next city targeted for a federal crime crackdown. (RELATED: The Spectacle Ep. 263: The Numbers Prove Trump Is Making DC Safer)
Of Chicago’s approximately 147,899 violent, non-violent, and property crimes reported in 2024, only 16.2 percent resulted in arrests.
This caused Illinois Governor JB Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson to channel the spirit of the late Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus by publicly opposing the proposed troop deployment as “illegal,” “unconstitutional,” and a “power grab.” To hear them tell it, they’ve got things well under control despite the fact that, at over 600 homicides in 2024, Chicago’s murder rate per capita was three times that of Los Angeles and nearly five times that of New York City. Moreover, in 2024, there were an additional 28,443 reported violent crimes as well as approximately 46,899 property crimes, including burglaries, larceny-thefts, motor vehicle thefts, and arsons.
Most tellingly, of Chicago’s approximately 147,899 violent, non-violent, and property crimes reported in 2024, only 16.2 percent resulted in arrests.
And this appalling state of anarchy has continued unabated into 2025.
Nevertheless, on August 23, 2025, Pritzker stated that there is “no emergency that warrants the President of the United States federalizing the Illinois National Guard, deploying the National Guard from other states, or sending active duty military within our borders.”
Two days later, during a press conference in Chicago, looking like fear-crazed barricaded men, Pritzker and Johnson hysterically characterized Trump’s proposal — and, I am not making this up — as a “declaration of war on our people”.
That same day, during remarks in the Oval Office, Trump correctly described Chicago as a city plagued by severe crime, calling it a “disaster” and a “killing field.” But, when pressed about sending troops to Chicago, he replied, “I didn’t get a request from the governor,” and said that he might wait for such a request before acting. However, after asserting that he could deploy troops without state and local approval, he added, “We may just go in and do it, which is probably what we should do.”
Trump then signed an executive order to create “specialized units” in the National Guard to address crime in cities. The order directed the Secretary of Defense to designate and train National Guard units for rapid deployment to assist law enforcement in “quelling civil disturbances and ensuring public safety.”
Then, on August 30, 2025, Trump posted the following on Truth Social:
“Six people were killed, and 24 people were shot in Chicago last weekend, and JB Pritzker, the weak and pathetic governor of Illinois, just said he doesn’t need help in preventing crime. He is crazy!!! He better straighten it out, FAST, or we’re coming.”
So what’s going on here? Is Trump just playing rope-a-dope with Pritzker and Johnson as he tricks them into idiotically defending the indefensible state of affairs in crime-ravaged Chicago? Or is he about to send in the troops?
And, if the latter, under the terms of the Insurrection Act, is he legally permitted to do so over the objections of Pritzker and Johnson?
In 1957, the rationale for the protracted military occupation of Little Rock was, in essence, to protect the rights of nine high school students.
So what about the rights of 2.4 million Chicagoans to live free of the pervasive and oppressive threat of unchecked and out-of-control crime? Are their rights legally cognizable under the terms of the Insurrection Act? And, given that Pritzker and Johnson either will not or cannot protect those rights, does President Trump have legal justification to order the military invasion of Chicago?
Crime has always been a problem in Chicago. But, in recent years, following decades of the wholesale mass production of government-funded fatherless homes and feral youths, the city’s crime, violence, and oppressive anarchy have grown to unprecedented levels beyond the control of the feckless and buffoonish local authorities.
Given these stark and brutal facts, it is more than reasonable to contend that, despite the objections of Pritzker and Johnson, President Trump would be legally and morally justified to send in the troops to quell the madness.
POSTSCRIPT: And the hits just keep on coming. The New York Post reports that over the Labor Day weekend end “at least 32 separate shootings occurred in Chicago between Friday evening and noon on Monday.” Fifty-four persons were shot, including seven killed.
George Parry is a former federal and state prosecutor. He blogs at knowledgeisgood.net.
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