Arkansas has produced one president of the United States, William Jefferson Clinton (b.1946). Clinton, a Democrat, defeated President George Bush in the 1992 presidential election and was reelected in 1996. Hillary Rodham Clinton (b.Illinois, 1947), the wife of the former president, was elected as the US Senator for New York in 2000. Arkansas has yet to produce a vice president or a Supreme Court justice, although one Arkansan came close to reaching both offices: US Senator Joseph T. Robinson (1872–1937) was the Democratic nominee for vice president in 1928, on the ticket with Al Smith; later, he was Senate majority leader under President Franklin D. Roosevelt. At the time of his death, Robinson was leading the fight for Roosevelt's bill to expand the Supreme Court's membership and had reportedly been promised a seat on the court if the bill passed. Robinson's colleague, Hattie W. Caraway (b.Tennessee, 1878–1950), was the first woman elected to the US Senate, serving from 1931 to 1945.
After World War II (1939–45), Arkansas's congressional delegation included three men of considerable power and fame: Senator John L. McClellan (1896–1977), investigator of organized labor and organized crime and champion of the Arkansas River navigation project; Senator J. William Fulbright (b.Missouri, 1905–95), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee; and Representative Wilbur D. Mills (1909–92), chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee until scandal ended his political career in the mid-1970s.
Other federal officeholders include Brooks Hays (1898–1981), former congressman and special assistant to Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson, as well as president of the Southern Baptist Convention, the nation's largest Protestant denomination; and Frank Pace, Jr. (1912–88), secretary of the Army during the Truman administration.
General Douglas MacArthur (1880–1964), supreme commander of Allied forces in the Pacific during World War II, supervised the occupation of Japan and was supreme commander of UN troops in Korea until relieved of his command in April 1951 by President Truman.
Orval E. Faubus (1910–94) served six terms as governor (a record), drew international attention during the 1957 integration crisis at Little Rock Central High School, and headed the most powerful political machine in Arkansas history. Winthrop Rockefeller (b.New York, 1917–73) was Faubus's most prominent successor. At the time of his election in 1978, Bill Clinton was the nation's youngest governor.
Prominent business leaders include the Stephens brothers, W. R. "Witt" (1907–91) and Jackson T. (b.1923), whose Stephens, Inc., investment firm in Little Rock is the largest off Wall Street; and Kemmons Wilson (b.1913), founder of Holiday Inns.
Other distinguished Arkansans are Edward Durrell Stone (1902–78), renowned architect; C. Vann Woodward (1908–99), Sterling Professor Emeritus of History at Yale University; and the Right Reverend John M. Allin (1921–98), who served as bishop of the Episcopal Church of the United States. John H. Johnson (b.1918), publisher of the nation's leading black-oriented magazines— Ebony, Jet, and others—is an Arkansan, as is Helen Gurley Brown (b.1922), former editor of Cosmopolitan.
Harry S. Ashmore (b.South Carolina, 1916–98) won a Pulitzer Prize for his Arkansas Gazette editorials calling for peaceful integration of the schools during the 1957 crisis; the Gazette itself won a Pulitzer for meritorious public service that year. Paul Greenberg (b.Louisiana, 1937), of the Pine Bluff Commercial, is another Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist. John Gould Fletcher (1886–1950) was a Pulitzer Prize-winning poet. Other Arkansas writers include Dee Brown (b.Louisiana, 1908–2002), Maya Angelou (b.Missouri, 1928), Charles Portis (b.1933), and Eldridge Cleaver (1935–98).
Arkansas planter Colonel Sanford C. Faulkner (1803–74) is credited with having written the well-known fiddle tune "The Arkansas Traveler" and its accompanying dialogue. Perhaps the best-known country music performers from Arkansas are Johnny Cash (1932–2003) and Glen Campbell (b.1938). Film stars Dick Powell (1904–63) and Alan Ladd (1913–64) were also Arkansans.
Notable Arkansas sports personalities include Jerome Herman "Dizzy" Dean (1911–74) and Bill Dickey (1907–93), both members of the Baseball Hall of Fame; Brooks Robinson (b.1937), considered by some the best-fielding third baseman in baseball history; and star pass-catcher Lance Alworth (b.Mississippi, 1940), a University of Arkansas All-American and member of the Professional Football Hall of Fame.