Although the governors' powers were limited in the early years of the United States as a country, each governor was designated as the commander-in-chief of their state. During the 1950s and 1960s, southern governors used this power to control the National Guard, a state agency in those days, for resisting desegregation in their state. Later, the U.S. President federalized the National Guard and ordered the agency to work for the federal government against those governors.
