Arkansas

Arkansas is a state located in the Southern region of the United States. Its name is an Algonquian name of the Quapaw Indians. The state's diverse geography ranges from the mountainous regions of the Ozarks and the Ouachita Mountains, which make up the U.S. Interior Highlands, to the eastern lowlands along the Mississippi River and the Arkansas Delta. Arkansas is the 29th most extensive and the 32nd most populous of the 50 United States. The capital and most populous city is Little Rock, located in the central portion of the state. The Territory of Arkansas was admitted to the union as the 25th state on June 15, 1836.

Etymology
The name “Arkansas” derives from the same root as the name for the state of Kansas. The Kansa tribe of Native Americans are closely associated with the Sioux tribes of the Great Plains. The word “Arkansas” itself is a French pronunciation (“Arcansas”) of a Quapaw (a related “Kaw” tribe) word, akakaze, meaning “land of downriver people” or the Sioux word akakaze meaning “people of the south wind”. The pronunciation of Arkansas was made official by an act of the state legislature in 1881, after a dispute between two U.S. Senators from Arkansas. One wanted to pronounce the name  and the other wanted  .The name Arkansas has been pronounced and spelled in a variety of fashions. The region was organized as the Territory of Arkansaw on July 4, 1819, but the territory was admitted to the United States as the state of Arkansas on June 15, 1836. The name was historically, , and several other variants. In 1881, the Arkansas General Assembly passed the following concurrent resolution, now Arkansas Code 1-4-105 (official text): "Whereas, confusion of practice has arisen in the pronunciation of the name of our state and it is deemed important that the true pronunciation should be determined for use in oral official proceedings." "And, whereas, the matter has been thoroughly investigated by the State Historical Society and the Eclectic Society of Little Rock, which have agreed upon the correct pronunciation as derived from history, and the early usage of the American immigrants." "Be it therefore resolved by both houses of the General Assembly, that the only true pronunciation of the name of the state, in the opinion of this body, is that received by the French from the native Indians and committed to writing in the French word representing the sound. It should be pronounced in three (3) syllables, with the final 's' silent, the 'a' in each syllable with the Italian sound, and the accent on the first and last syllables. The pronunciation with the accent on the second syllable with the sound of 'a' in 'man' and the sounding of the terminal 's' is an innovation to be discouraged." Citizens of the state of Kansas often pronounce the Arkansas River as, in a manner similar to the common pronunciation of the name of their state.

In 2007, the state legislature passed a non-binding resolution declaring the possessive form of the state's name to be Arkansas's, which has been followed increasingly by the state government.

Geography
Arkansas borders Louisiana to the south, Texas to the southwest, Oklahoma to the west, Missouri to the north, and Tennessee and Mississippi on the east. The United States Census Bureau classifies Arkansas as a southern state, sub categorized among the West South Central States. The Mississippi River forms most of Arkansas's eastern border, except in Clay and Greene counties where the St. Francis River forms the western boundary of the Missouri Bootheel, and in dozens of places where the current channel of the Mississippi has meandered from where it had last been legally specified. The state line along the Mississippi River is indeterminate along much of the eastern border with Mississippi due to these meanders.

Arkansas can generally be split into two halves, the highlands in the northwest half and the lowlands of the southeastern half. The highlands are part of the Southern Interior Highlands, including The Ozarks and the Ouachita Mountains. The southern lowlands include the Gulf Coastal Plain and the Arkansas Delta. This dual split is somewhat simplistic, however, and thus usually yields to general regions named northwest, southwest, northeast, southeast, or central Arkansas. These directionally named regions are also not defined along county lines and are also broad. Arkansas has seven distinct natural regions: the Ozark Mountains, Ouachita Mountains, Arkansas River Valley, Gulf Coastal Plain, Crowley's Ridge, and the Arkansas Delta, with Central Arkansas sometimes included as a blend of multiple regions.

The southeastern part of Arkansas along the Mississippi Alluvial Plain is sometimes called the Arkansas Delta. This region is a flat landscape of rich alluvial soils formed by repeated flooding of the adjacent Mississippi. Farther away from the river, in the southeast portion of the state, the Grand Prairie consists of a more undulating landscape. Both are fertile agricultural areas. The Delta region is bisected by an unusual geological formation known as Crowley's Ridge. A narrow band of rolling hills, Crowley's Ridge rises from 250 to 500 ft above the surrounding alluvial plain and underlies many of the major towns of eastern Arkansas.

Northwest Arkansas is part of the Ozark Plateau including the Ozark Mountains, to the south are the Ouachita Mountains, and these regions are divided by the Arkansas River; the southern and eastern parts of Arkansas are called the Lowlands. These mountain ranges are part of the U.S. Interior Highlands region, the only major mountainous region between the Rocky Mountains and the Appalachian Mountains. The highest point in the state is Mount Magazine in the Ouachita Mountains; it rises to 2753 ft above sea level.

Arkansas has many rivers, lakes, and reservoirs within or along its borders. Major tributaries of the Mississippi River include the Arkansas River, White River, and St. Francis River. The Arkansas is fed by the Mulberry River, and Fourche LaFave River in the Arkansas River Valley, which is also home to Lake Dardanelle. The Buffalo River, Little Red River, Black River and Cache River all serve as tributaries to the White River, which also empties into the Mississippi. The Saline River, Little Missouri River, Bayou Bartholomew, and the Caddo River all serve as tributaries to the Ouachita River in south Arkansas, which eventually empties into the Mississippi in Louisiana. The Red River briefly serves as the state's boundary with Texas. Arkansas has few natural lakes but many major reservoirs, including Bull Shoals Lake, Lake Ouachita, Greers Ferry Lake, Millwood Lake, Beaver Lake, Norfork Lake, DeGray Lake, and Lake Conway.

Arkansas is home to many caves, such as Blanchard Springs Caverns. More than 43,000 Native American living, hunting and tool making sites, many of them Pre-Columbian burial mounds and rock shelters, have been catalogued by the State Archeologist. Arkansas is currently the only U.S. state in which diamonds are mined—although by members of the public with primitive digging tools for a small daily fee, not by commercial interests. (near Murfreesboro).

Arkansas is home to a dozen Wilderness Areas totaling around 150000 acre. These areas are set aside for outdoor recreation and are open to hunting, fishing, hiking, and primitive camping. No mechanized vehicles are allowed in these areas, some of which are rarely visited and can provide a good experience of feeling as if you are the only person to have ever stepped foot there.

Flora and fauna
Arkansas is divided into three broad ecoregions, the Ozark, Ouachita-Appalachian Forests, Mississippi Alluvial and Southeast USA Coastal Plains, and the Southeastern USA Plains. The state is further divided into seven subregions: the Arkansas Valley, Boston Mountains, Mississippi Alluvial Plain, Mississippi Valley Loess Plain, Ozark Highlands, Ouachita Mountains, and the South Central Plains. A 2010 United States Forest Service survey determined 18720000 acre of Arkansas's land is forestland, or 56% of the state's total area. Dominant species in Arkansas's forests include Quercus (oak), Carya (hickory), Pinus echinata (shortleaf pine) and Pinus taeda (Loblolly pine).

Climate
Arkansas generally has humid subtropical climate, which borders on humid continental in some northern highland areas. While not bordering the Gulf of Mexico, Arkansas is still close enough to this warm, large body of water for it to influence the weather in the state. Generally, Arkansas has hot, humid summers and cold, slightly drier winters. In Little Rock, the daily high temperatures average around 93 °F with lows around 73 °F in the month of July. In January highs average around 51 °F and lows around 32 °F. In Siloam Springs in the northwest part of the state, the average high and low temperatures in July are 89 °F and 67 °F and in January the average high and lows are 44 °F and 23 °F. Annual precipitation throughout the state averages between about 40 and 60 in; somewhat wetter in the south and drier in the northern part of the state. Snowfall is common, more so in the north half of the state, which usually gets several snowfalls each winter. This is not only due to its proximity to the plains states, but also to the higher elevations found throughout the Ozark and Ouachita mountains. The half of the state south of Little Rock gets less snow, and is more apt to see ice storms, however, sleet and freezing rain are expected throughout the state during the winter months, and can significantly impact travel and day to day life. Arkansas' all time record high is 120 F at Ozark on August 10, 1936; the all time record low is -29 F at Round Pond, on February 13, 1905.

Arkansas is known for extreme weather. A typical year will see thunderstorms, tornadoes, hail, snow and ice storms. Between both the Great Plains and the Gulf States, Arkansas receives around 60 days of thunderstorms. A few of the most destructive tornadoes in U.S. history have struck the state. While being sufficiently away from the coast to be safe from a direct hit from a hurricane, Arkansas can often get the remnants of a tropical system which dumps tremendous amounts of rain in a short time and often spawns smaller tornadoes.

History
The first European to reach Arkansas was the Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto, a veteran of Pizarro's conquest of Peru who died near Lake Village on the Mississippi River in 1542 after almost a year traversing the southern part of the state in search of gold and a passage to China. Arkansas is one of several US states formed from the territory purchased from Napoleon Bonaparte in the Louisiana Purchase. The early Spanish or French explorers of the state gave it its name, which is probably a phonetic spelling of the Illinois tribe's name for the Quapaw people, who lived downriver from them. Other Native American tribes who lived in Arkansas before moving west were the Quapaw, Caddo, and Osage nations. In their forced move westward (under U.S. Indian removal policies), the Five Civilized Tribes inhabited Arkansas during its territorial period.

The Territory of Arkansas was organized on July 4, 1819. On June 15, 1836, the state of Arkansas was admitted to the Union as the 25th state and the 13th slave state. Planters settled in the Delta to cultivate cotton; this was the area of the state where most enslaved African Americans were held. Other areas had more subsistence farmers and mixed farming.

Arkansas played a key role in aiding Texas in its war for independence from Mexico; it sent troops and materials to Texas to help fight the war. The proximity of the city of Washington to the Texas border involved the town in the Texas Revolution of 1835–36. Some evidence suggests Sam Houston and his compatriots planned the revolt in a tavern at Washington in 1834. When the fighting began, a stream of volunteers from Arkansas and the southeastern states flowed through the town toward the Texas battle fields.

When the Mexican-American War began in 1846, Washington became a rendezvous for volunteer troops. Governor Thomas S. Drew issued a proclamation calling on the state to furnish one regiment of cavalry and one battalion of infantry to join the United States Army. Ten companies of men assembled here, where they were formed into the first Regiment of Arkansas Cavalry.

The state developed a cotton culture in the east in lands of the Mississippi Delta. This was where enslaved labor was used most extensively, as planters brought with them or imported slaves from the Upper South. On the eve of the Civil War in 1860, enslaved African Americans numbered 111,115 people, just over 25% of the state's population.

Arkansas did not secede in early 1861, when the gulf states did, and only joined the Confederate States of America after United States President Abraham Lincoln demanded they provide Union troops to help conquer following the Fort Sumter, South Carolina. Arkansas proclaimed its secession from the Union on May 6, 1861. While overshadowed by the larger engagements in the east, Arkansas was the scene of many skirmishes and small battles during the American Civil War. Arkansans of note of that time include Confederate Major General Patrick Cleburne. Considered by many to be one of the most brilliant of the Confederate division commanders, Cleburne was often called "The Stonewall of the West." Major General Thomas C. Hindman, a former Congressman, led the Confederate forces at the Battle of Cane Hill and Battle of Prairie Grove, both in northwestern Arkansas.

Under the Military Reconstruction Act, Congress declared Arkansas restored to the Union in June 1868. The Republican controlled reconstruction legislature established universal male suffrage (though disenfranchising all former Confederates, who were mostly Democrats), a public education system, and passed general issues to improve the state and help more of the population. The state soon came under almost exclusive control of the Radical Republicans, (those who moved in from the North being derided as "carpetbaggers" based on allegations of corruption), and led by Governor Powell Clayton they presided over a time of great upheaval and racial violence in the state between Republican state militia and the Ku Klux Klan.

In 1874, the Brooks-Baxter War, a political struggle between factions of the Republican Party shook Little Rock and the state governorship. It was settled only when President Ulysses S. Grant ordered Joseph Brooks to disperse his militant supporters.

Following the Brooks-Baxter War, a new state constitution was ratified re-enfranchising former Confederates.

In 1881, the Arkansas state legislature enacted a bill that adopted an official pronunciation of the state's name, to combat a controversy then simmering. (See Law and Government below.)

After Reconstruction, the state began to receive more immigrants and migrants. Chinese, Italian, and Syrian men were recruited for farm labor in the developing Delta region. None of these nationalities stayed long at farm labor; the Chinese especially quickly became small merchants in towns around the Delta. Some early 20th century immigration included people from eastern Europe. Together, these immigrants made the Delta more diverse than the rest of the state. In the same years, some black migrants moved into the area because of opportunities to develop the bottomlands and own their own property. Many Chinese became such successful merchants in small towns that they were able to educate their children at college. Construction of railroads enabled more farmers to get their products to market. It also brought new development into different parts of the state, including the Ozarks, where some areas were developed as resorts. In a few years at the end of the 19th century, for instance, Eureka Springs in Carroll County grew to 10,000 people, rapidly becoming a tourist destination and the fourth largest city of the state. It featured newly constructed, elegant resort hotels and spas planned around its natural springs, considered to have healthful properties. The town's attractions included horse racing and other entertainment. It appealed to a wide variety of classes, becoming almost as popular as Hot Springs.

In the late 1880s, the worsening agricultural depression catalyzed Populist and third party movements, leading to interracial coalitions. Struggling to stay in power, in the 1890s the Democrats in Arkansas followed other Southern states in passing legislation and constitutional amendments that disfranchised blacks and poor whites. Democrats wanted to prevent their alliance. In 1891 state legislators passed a requirement for a literacy test, knowing that many blacks and whites would be excluded, at a time when more than 25% of the population could neither read nor write. In 1892 they amended the state constitution to include a poll tax and more complex residency requirements, both of which adversely affected poor people and sharecroppers, and forced them from electoral rolls.

By 1900 the Democratic Party expanded use of the white primary in county and state elections, further denying blacks a part in the political process. Only in the primary was there any competition among candidates, as Democrats held all the power. The state was a Democratic one-party state for decades, until after the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965 were passed.

Between 1905 and 1911, Arkansas began to receive a small migration of German, Slovak, and Irish immigrants. The German and Slovak peoples settled in the eastern part of the state known as the Prairie, and the Irish founded small communities in the southeast part of the state. The Germans were mostly Lutheran and the Slovaks were primarily Catholic. The Irish were mostly Protestant from Ulster.

After the Supreme Court's decision in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas in 1954, the Little Rock Nine brought Arkansas to national attention when the Federal government intervened to protect African-American students trying to integrate a high school in the Arkansas capital. Governor Orval Faubus ordered the Arkansas National Guard to aid segregationists in preventing nine African-American students from enrolling at Little Rock's Central High School. After attempting three times to contact Faubus, President Dwight D. Eisenhower sent 1000 troops from the active-duty 101st Airborne Division to escort and protect the African-American students as they entered school on September 25, 1957. In defiance of federal court orders to integrate, the governor and city of Little Rock decided to close the high schools for the remainder of the school year. By the fall of 1959, the Little Rock high schools were completely integrated.

Bill Clinton, the 42nd President of the United States, was born in Hope, Arkansas. Before his presidency, Clinton served as the 40th and 42nd Governor of Arkansas, a total of nearly 12 years.

Cities and towns


Little Rock has been Arkansas's capital city since 1821 when it replaced Arkansas Post as the capitol of the Territory of Arkansas. The state capitol was moved to Hot Springs and later Washington during the Civil War when the Union armies threatened the city in 1862, and state government did not return to Little Rock until after the war ended. Today, the Little Rock–North Little Rock–Conway metropolitan area is the largest in the state, with a population of 709,910 in 2011.

The Fayetteville–Springdale–Rogers Metropolitan Area is the second-largest metropolitan area in Arkansas, growing at the fastest rate due to the influx of businesses and the growth of the University of Arkansas. The state has eight cities with populations above 50,000 (based on 2010 census). In descending order of size they are Little Rock, Fort Smith, Fayetteville, Springdale, Jonesboro, North Little Rock, Conway and Rogers. Of these, only Fort Smith and Jonesboro are outside the two largest metropolitan areas.

Population


As of 2011, Arkansas has an estimated population of 2,937,979. From fewer that 15,000 in 1820, Arkansas's population grew to 52,240 during a special census in 1835, far exceeding the 40,000 required to apply for statehood. Following statehood in 1836, the population doubled each decade until the 1870 Census conducted following the Civil War. The state recorded growth in each successive decade, although slowing until recording losses in the 1950 and 1960 Censuses. This outmigration was a result of multiple factors, including mechanization on the farm reducing the number of laborers needed and young educated people leaving the state due to a lack of non-farming industry in the state. Arkansas again began to grow, recording positive growth rates ever since and exceeding the 2 million mark during the 1980 Census. Arkansas's current rate of change, age distributions, and gender distributions mirror national averages. Minority group data also approximates national averages, with the exception of persons of Hispanic or Latino origin approximately 10% below the national percentage in Arkansas. The center of population of Arkansas for 2000 was located in Perry County, near Nogal.

Ancestry
In terms of race and ethnicity, the state was 80.1% White (74.2% non-Hispanic White), 15.6% Black or African American, 0.9% American Indian and Alaska Native, 1.3% Asian, and 1.8% from Two or More Races. Hispanics or Latinos of any race made up 6.6% of the population.

As of 2011, 39.0% of Arkansas's population younger than age 1 were minorities.

European Americans have a strong presence in the northwestern Ozarks and the central part of the state. African Americans live mainly in the southern and eastern parts of the state. Arkansans of Irish, English and German ancestry are mostly found in the far northwestern Ozarks near the Missouri border. Ancestors of the Irish in the Ozarks were chiefly Scotch-Irish, Protestants from Northern Ireland, the Scottish lowlands and northern England part of the largest group of immigrants from Great Britain and Ireland before the American Revolution. English and Scotch-Irish immigrants settled throughout the backcountry of the South and in the more mountainous areas. Americans of English stock are found throughout the state.

The principal ancestries of Arkansas's residents in 2010 were surveyed to be the following:
 * 20.7% English
 * 15.6% African American
 * 12.5% Irish
 * 11.2% German
 * 2.1% French
 * 1.7% Dutch
 * 1.6% Italian
 * 1.6% Scottish
 * 1.3% Scotch-Irish

Many of these same people cite that they are of "American" ancestry are actually of English descent and some are of Scotch-Irish descent, however they have families that have been in the state so long, in many cases since before statehood, that they choose to identify simply as having "American" ancestry or do not in fact know their own ancestry. Their ancestry primarily goes back to the original thirteen colonies and for this reason many of them today simply claim "American" ancestry, though they are of predominately English ancestry. Many people who identify themselves as Irish descent are in fact of Scotch-Irish descent.

According to the 2006–2008 American Community Survey, 93.8% of Arkansas' population (over the age of five) spoke only English at home. About 4.5% of the state's population spoke Spanish at home. About 0.7% of the state's population spoke any other Indo-European language. About 0.8% of the state's population spoke an Asian language, and 0.2% spoke other languages.

Religion
Arkansas, like most other Southern states, is part of the Bible Belt and is predominantly Protestant. The largest denominations by number of adherents in 2000 were the Southern Baptist Convention with 665,307; the United Methodist Church with 179,383; the Roman Catholic Church with 115,967; and the American Baptist Association with 115,916.

Economy
Once a state with a cashless society in the uplands and plantation agriculture in the lowlands, Arkansas's has evolved and diversified to meet the needs of today's consumer. The state's gross domestic product (GDP) was $105 billion in 2010. Four Fortune 500 companies are based in Arkansas, including the world's #1 retailer, Walmart. The Natural State's per capita income (in current dollars) for 2010 was $36,027. The state's agriculture outputs are poultry and eggs, soybeans, sorghum, cattle, cotton, rice, hogs, and milk. Its industrial outputs are food processing, electric equipment, fabricated metal products, machinery, and paper products. Mines in Arkansas produce natural gas, oil, crushed stone, bromine, and vanadium.



As of August 2011, the state's unemployment rate is 8.3%.

Several global companies are headquartered in the northwest corner of Arkansas, including Wal-Mart (the world's largest public corporation by revenue in 2007), J.B. Hunt and Tyson Foods. This area of the state has experienced an economic boom since the 1970s as a result.

In recent years, automobile parts manufacturers have opened factories in eastern Arkansas to support auto plants in other states.

Tourism is also very important to the Arkansas economy; the official state nickname "The Natural State" was originally created (as "Arkansas Is A Natural") for state tourism advertising in the 1970s, and is still regularly used to this day.

According to Forbes.com Arkansas currently ranks 21st for The Best States for Business, 9th for Business Cost, 40th for Labor, 22nd for Regulatory Environment, 17th for Economic Climate, 9th for Growth Prospects, 34th in Gross Domestic Product, and positive economic change of 3.8% or ranked 22nd.

The University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, including the UAMS Medical Center, is included in the state of Arkansas' numbers, and would rank in the top ten if listed separately.

Aquaculture
The state also ranks third in terms of channel catfish aquaculture, with about 19200 acre under catfish farming in 2010. The peak of catfish farming in the state was in the year 2002, when 38000 acre were under farming. In 2007, the state’s catfish producers generated sales of $71.5 million – 16 percent of the total U.S. market. Arkansas was the first state to develop commercial catfish farms in the late 1950s. The number of catfish farms in the state grew through the 1990s as farmers entered the catfish business as a way to provide additional income during a time of low prices for cotton and soybeans. Banks loaned money to support what they saw as a stable source of revenue.

Taxation
Arkansas imposes a state income tax with six brackets, ranging from 1.0% to 7.0%. The first $9,000 of military pay of enlisted personnel is exempt from Arkansas tax; officers do not have to pay state income tax on the first $6,000 of their military pay. Retirees pay no tax on Social Security, or on the first $6,000 in gain on their pensions along with recovery of cost basis. Residents of Texarkana, Arkansas are exempt from Arkansas income tax; wages and business income earned there by residents of Texarkana, Texas are also exempt. Arkansas's gross receipts (sales) tax and compensating (use) tax rate is currently 6%. The state has also mandated that various services be subject to sales tax collection. They include wrecker and towing services; dry cleaning and laundry; body piercing, tattooing and electrolysis; pest control; security and alarm monitoring; self-storage facilities; boat storage and docking; and pet grooming and kennel services.

Along with the state sales tax, there are more than 300 local taxes in Arkansas. Cities and counties have the authority to enact additional local sales and use taxes if they are passed by the voters in their area. These local taxes have a ceiling or cap; they cannot exceed $25 for each 1% of tax assessed. These additional taxes are collected by the state, which distributes the money back to the local jurisdictions monthly. Low-income taxpayers with a total annual household income of less than $12,000 are permitted a sales tax exemption for electricity usage.

Sales of alcoholic beverages account for added taxes. A 10% supplemental mixed drink tax is imposed on the sale of alcoholic beverages (excluding beer) at restaurants. A 4% tax is due on the sale of all mixed drinks (except beer and wine) sold for "on-premises" consumption. A 3% tax is due on beer sold for off-premises consumption.

Property taxes are assessed on real and personal property; only 20% of the value is used as the tax base.

Education


Education in Arkansas has historically been a major issue, and is a problem that continues to this day. Part of the problem has been the resistance to needed reforms, including low teacher salaries and small budgets for spending on students. The state's refusal to integrate, refusal to teach evolution, and poor school facilities also contribute to the poor performance of Arkansas students. Arkansas's education funding mechanism was found unconstitutional in 1983 and again in 2001. Governor Mike Beebe has made improving education a major issue again through his attempts to spend more on education. The failure to commit necessary funds and attention to education has resulted in an undereducated populace. Arkansas ranks as the 32nd smartest state on the Morgan Quitno Smartest State Award, 44th in percentage of residents with at least a high school diploma, and 48th in percentage of bachelor's degree attainment.

In 2010 Arkansas students earned an average score of 20.3 on the ACT exam, just below the national average of 21. These results were expected due to the large increase in the number of students taking the exam since the establishment of the Academic Challenge Scholarship. Top high schools receiving recognition from the U.S. News and World Report are spread across the state, including Haas Hall Academy in Fayetteville, KIPP Delta Collegiate in Helena-West Helena, Bentonville, Rogers, Rogers Heritage, Valley Springs, Searcy, and McCrory. A total of 81 Arkansas high schools were ranked by the U.S. News and World Report in 2012.

The state supports a network of public universities and colleges, including two major university systems: Arkansas State University System and University of Arkansas System. Other public institutions include Arkansas Tech University, Henderson State University, Southern Arkansas University, and University of Central Arkansas across the state. It is also home to 11 private colleges and universities including Hendrix College, one of the nation's top 100 liberal arts colleges, according to U.S. News & World Report.

Transportation
Transportation in Arkansas is overseen by the Arkansas State Highway and Transportation Department (AHTD), headquartered in Little Rock. Several main corridors pass through Little Rock, including Interstate 30 and Interstate 40 (the nation’s 3rd-busiest trucking corridor). In northeast Arkansas, Interstate 55 runs north from Memphis to Missouri, with a new spur to Jonesboro (Interstate 555). Northwest Arkansas is served by Interstate 540 from Fort Smith to Bella Vista, a segment of future Interstate 49. The state also has the 13th largest state highway system in the nation.

Arkansas is served by 2750 mi of railroad track divided among twenty-six railroad companies including three Class I railroads. Freight railroads are concentrated in southeast Arkansas to serve the industries in the region. The Texas Eagle, an Amtrak passenger train, serves five stations in the state Walnut Ridge, Little Rock, Malvern, Arkadelphia, and Texarkana.

Arkansas also benefits from the use of its rivers for commerce. The Mississippi River and Arkansas River are both major rivers. The United States Army Corps of Engineers maintains the McClellan-Kerr Arkansas River Navigation System, allowing barge traffic up the Arkansas River to the Port of Catoosa in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

There are four airports with commercial service: Little Rock National Airport, Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport, Fort Smith Regional Airport, and Texarkana Regional Airport, with dozens of smaller airports in the state.

Public transit and community transport services for the elderly or those with developmental disabilities are provided by agencies such as the Central Arkansas Transit Authority and the Ozark Regional Transit, organizations that are part of the Arkansas Transit Association.

Law and government
The current Governor of Arkansas is Mike Beebe, a Democrat, who was elected on November 7, 2006.

One of Arkansas's U.S. Senators is Democrat Mark Pryor, and the other one is Republican John Boozman. The state has four seats in U.S. House of Representatives. One seat is held by Democrats: Mike Ross (map), and three are held by Republicans: Rick Crawford (politician), (map), Tim Griffin(map), and Steve Womack(map).

The Democratic Party holds majority status in the Arkansas General Assembly. A majority of local and statewide offices are also held by Democrats. This is increasingly uncommon in the modern South, where a majority of statewide offices are now held by Republicans. Arkansas had the distinction in 1992 of being the only state in the country to give the majority of its vote to a single candidate in the presidential election—native son Bill Clinton—while every other state's electoral votes were won by pluralities of the vote among the three candidates. Arkansas has become more reliably Republican in presidential elections in recent years. The state voted for John McCain in 2008 by a margin of 20 percentage points, making it one of the few states in the country to vote more Republican than it had in 2004. (The others were Louisiana, Tennessee, Oklahoma and West Virginia.) Obama's relatively poor showing in Arkansas was likely due to a lack of enthusiasm from state Democrats following former Arkansas First Lady Hillary Clinton's failure to win the nomination, and his relatively poor performance among rural white voters. However, the Democratic presence remains strong on the state level; in 2006, Democrats were elected to all statewide offices by the voters in a Democratic sweep that included the Democratic Party of Arkansas regaining the governorship, and in 2008, freshman Senator Mark Pryor was re-elected with nearly 80% of the vote against Green candidate Rebekah Kennedy with no Republican opposition.

Most Republican strength lies mainly in the northwestern part of the state, particularly Fort Smith and Bentonville, as well as North Central Arkansas around the Mountain Home area. In the latter area, Republicans have been known to get 90 percent or more of the vote. The rest of the state is more Democratic. Arkansas has only elected two Republicans to the U.S. Senate since Reconstruction, Tim Hutchinson, who was defeated after one term by Mark Pryor and John Boozman, who defeated incumbent Blanche Lincoln. The General Assembly has not been controlled by the Republican Party since Reconstruction and is the fourth most heavily Democratic Legislature in the country, after Massachusetts, Hawaii, and Connecticut. Arkansas was one of just three states among the states of the former Confederacy that sent two Democrats to the U.S. Senate (the others being Florida and Virginia) during the first decade of the 21st century.

Although Democrats have an overwhelming majority of registered voters, Arkansas Democrats tend to be much more conservative than their national counterparts, particularly outside Little Rock. Arkansas' Democratic congressman is a member of the Blue Dog Coalition, which tends to be more pro-business, pro-military, and socially conservative than the center-left Democratic mainstream. Reflecting the state's large evangelical population, the state has a strong social conservative bent. Under the Arkansas Constitution Arkansas is a right to work state, its voters passed a ban on same-sex marriage with 75% voting yes, and the state is one of a handful with legislation on its books banning abortion in the event Roe v. Wade is ever overturned.

In Arkansas, the lieutenant governor is elected separately from the governor and thus can be from a different political party.

Each officer's term is four years long. Office holders are term-limited to two full terms plus any partial terms before the first full term. Arkansas governors served two-year terms until a referendum lengthened the term to four years, effective with the 1986 general election. Statewide elections are held two years after presidential elections.

Some of Arkansas's counties have two county seats, as opposed to the usual one seat. The arrangement dates back to when travel was extremely difficult in the state. The seats are usually on opposite sides of the county. Though travel is no longer the difficulty it once was, there are few efforts to eliminate the two seat arrangement where it exists, since the county seat is a source of pride (and jobs) to the city involved.

Arkansas is the only state to specify the pronunciation of its name by law (AR-kan-saw).

Article 19 (Miscellaneous Provisions), Item 1 in the Arkansas Constitution is entitled "Atheists disqualified from holding office or testifying as witness," and states that "No person who denies the being of a God shall hold any office in the civil departments of this State, nor be competent to testify as a witness in any Court." However, in 1961, the United States Supreme Court in Torcaso v. Watkins (1961), held that a similar requirement in Maryland was unenforceable because it violated the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the US Constitution. The latter amendment, per current precedent, makes the federal Bill of Rights binding on the states. As a result, this provision has not been known to have been enforced in modern times, and it is understood that it would be struck down if challenged in court.

Attractions
Arkansas is home to many areas protected by the National Park System. These include:


 * Arkansas Post National Memorial at Gillett
 * Buffalo National River
 * Fort Smith National Historic Site
 * Hot Springs National Park
 * Little Rock Central High School National Historic Site
 * Pea Ridge National Military Park
 * President William Jefferson Clinton Birthplace Home National Historic Site