The Unenviable Position of a Southern Mayor
On Sunday, April 5, Frank Scott, Jr., the mayor of Little Rock, Arkansas, finally found a moment to rest. Then he received a call from his police chief, Keith Humphrey.
Dozens of cars had lined up on Asher Avenue, a busy thoroughfare in the city. Residents and out-of-towners were standing shoulder to shoulder to watch drag races. Drivers peeled out, forming clouds of smoke. Muscle cars drifted and spun donuts in the parking lot of a local gym, leaving looping skid marks on the asphalt. On social media, the afternoon came to be known as the “coronavirus parade.” The event wasn’t what Scott had feared would happen over the weekend; it was worse.
“What you saw was our young-adult crowd, who may have thought that they were invincible, and maybe going a bit—maybe having a bit of cabin fever,” the 36-year-old Scott told me. Arkansas is one of only five states where residents have not been told to shelter in place. “If we would have had a
