How did the federal governments response to the civil rights movement change from 1957 to 1964?

Nineteen
fifty-seven was the year in which the first Southern public school was integrated. Central High
School in Little Rock, Arkansas was integrated by nine black teenagers, upon the orders of the
Supreme Court which had decided that segregation in public schools was a violation of the
"equal protection" clause in the Fourteenth Amendment (Brown v. Board of
Education of Topeka, Kansas) in 1954. The Court had also ordered the integration of
Southern schools "with all deliberate speed" in 1955 (Brown v.
Board II).

President Dwight D. Eisenhower had appointed
Chief Justice Earl Warren, formerly the governor of California, to the Supreme Court. Warren had
secured a unanimous decision on Brown v. Board. Due to the importance of
states following national laws, Eisenhower demanded that Arkansas governor Orval Faubus
cooperate with the integration of the school and warned Faubus against using Arkansas National
Guard troops to hinder the progress of integration. Faubus claimed to worry that integration
would only spark violence. Eisenhower's attitude was less about direct activism than ensuring
obedience to federal law.

In 1960, John F. Kennedy was elected. Kennedy was
less concerned about civil rights than he was about international policy, particularly the
spread of Communism, which resulted in his disastrous attempt to overthrow Castro in Cuba in the
Bay of Pigs incident and the United States's initial involvement in Vietnam.

Civil rights leaders' relationship with the Kennedy Administration was ambivalent. They
were aware of being wire-tapped by Robert F. Kennedy, who served as attorney general.
Furthermore, Kennedy seemed sympathetic to civil rights but failed to express any direct concern
until he witnessed the reaction in Birmingham, Alabama to protesters from the Southern Christian
Leadership Conference (SCLC) in April 1963. This prompted Kennedy to deliver the Civil Rights
Address and to lay the groundwork for the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963, leading to Lyndon B. Johnson's
presidency. It is possible that the Civil Rights Act may not have passed through Congress if it
were not for Johnson's skillful maneuvering. Nicknamed "Master of the Senate" during
his years as a senator from Texas, Johnson was adept at securing the passage of legislation that
was otherwise difficult to get through Congress. As president, he resorted to every possible
technique to secure passage of key legislation.

In the early 1960s, Congress
was still overwhelmed by the conservative coalition, which included a group of long-term
incumbent Southern Democrats who were hostile to civil rights. Though they encouraged Johnson to
wait on the passage of the civil rights bill, Johnson refused and signed it into law once he got
his majority. However, upon signing the bill, he famously said that, with the stroke of his pen,
the Democrats would lose the South forever. He was right. Southern states have since been
solidly Republican in every presidential election.