James Oliver Eastland

James Eastland, born in the Delta in 1904, grew up in Forest and sat in the state House for Scott County from 1928 to 1932. After Brown v. Board of Education he said in a speech at Senatobia on August 12, 1955, that the decision had destroyed the Constitution, defended segregation as a law of nature, signed the Southern Manifesto and worked with the White Citizens' Councils, which a 1956 critic called the new Klan. Chairing the Senate Judiciary Committee from the mid-1950s, he also led the security subcommittee that subpoenaed New York Times employees.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Roosevelt State Park — 13 mi
  A Civilian Conservation Corps state park on 150-acre Shadow Lake beside Bienville National Forest, with rustic cabins the CCC built between 1935 and 1940.

More markers nearby

• Arthur Crudup — 1.2 mi
• Choctaw Line — 16 mi
• Leake County Revelers — 16 mi
• Confederate Hospital — 17 mi