Ku Klux Klan

Davis White

White power, racism, Southern heritage, Aryan nation, lynching, morality, Confederate, grand wizard, Klan, Kloran, social order

I. Abstract

The Ku Klux Klan was formed in 1867 as a Southern response to the federal government’s Reconstruction policies. It is a secret, oath-bound order dedicated to providing law and order by putting non-whites in their inferior position, and is often associated with clandestine murder and masked rebellion. Its influence, though intangible and secret, is to a degree incalculable since it is wholly different from any other known force. The Klan targeted all Catholics, Jews, Negroes, and Republicans who were seen as a threat to white southerners. Catholics also provided a symbolic target for aggression and blame along with the Jewish banker, alien radical, or leering Negro. The organization of the Klan was marked by extreme local autonomy. The Klan was a combination of discipline and irresponsibility, each Klavern was governed by rigid rules but in practice was sovereign in its own affairs. Isolated pockets of Klansmen continue to exist today, but their influence and power is a shadow of its former self.

II. Scope and Purpose

The Ku Klux Klan is a white supremacist organization dedicated to preserving the white race as sole masters of American. Ku Klux Klan members, known as Klansmen, reacted harshly to post-Civil War threats to white supremacy and Democratic Party rule. In public view and behind closed doors, Klansmen defied the law with acts of terrorism and intimidation against newly freed African-American slaves, Union army occupiers of the southern states, and white Republicans (Horowitz, 2). The Klan expanded upon Masonic and fraternal-order protocol to demand strict organizational loyalty, and limited membership to native born white Protestant males. Klansmen must possess a sincere desire to maintain the social order of the day, which required advancing white southern interests at the expense of the remainder of society. The Klan’s covert constitution required initiates to swear oaths to secrecy, obedience, fidelity, and “Klannishness” (Horowitz, 2). Initiation requires Klansmen to support “100 percent” American Anglo-Saxon citizens and values instead of alternative ethnics in trade and public affairs.

In areas of the nation in which the KKK exercised substantial influence, local units worked closely with Protestant clergy, mainly nonfundamentalists in the Methodist, Presbyterian, and Christian churches. The Klan often tapped skilled manual laborers and other middle class citizens who mirrored the casual racial and ethnic prejudices of national life after the Civil War. On the local level, the movement’s ideological emphasis on white domination often translated into economic boycotts, political vendettas, or outright acts of intimidation and violence against Catholics, Jews, foreigners, and people of color. Due to its influential presence but secret nature of its membership, rituals, and overall behavior, the Klan was often referred to as the Invisible Empire, It dedicated itself to sacrifice, service, and purity; all activities signify devotion to the common people. KKK ideology and publications promoted the American and Confederate flags, the Constitution, and the Bible as the movement’s core symbols. As a secret, nocturnal organization on the surface operating outside of the law during lawless times, the KKK soon turned into a vigilante force. The Klan offers members a program of strict nationalism, biased law enforcement, and fanatical resistance to any and all powers that in any way could be represented as coming into conflict with the teaching of the Christian Bible.

III. A. Sources and Criteria of Knowledge

The Ku Klux Klan looks to the Bible to justify their exclusive and often violent policies. They put their absolute faith in the Bible for spiritual guidance, but the sacred rules and rituals of the KKK is the Kloran (Kennedy, 55). Due to the secret nature of the organization, an exact copy of the Kloran is available for public view and scrutiny. The Kloran has not been published by accident or by defecting members, leaving the outside world at a loss for official Klan ideology scripture. The Kloran acts as their constitution and manual, but the actual text does not claim to be revealed or inspired by God or any other divine being. In the “Warning” of the book, it decrees that its contents must be rigidly safeguarded. It must be protected at all costs, and a “sufficient” penalty will be “speedily enforced” if the secrecy of the Klan is compromised (Kennedy, 55). Disorganization and internal struggle remains rampant in the Klan, and there is not a uniquely wise board of elders that every national sect recognizes and respects. Since power is lost and won almost monthly, the leaders are not held accountable for their ideas and beliefs. They serve as an illustration of the prevailing views of the day, with no security in their respective posts.

2. Methods of Inquiry

The insight of spiritual leaders of the Klan consists of taking Bible excerpts and twisting the words to fit their purpose. They use the Bible to condemn African-Americans, Jews, and Catholics, often emphasizing one biblical verse while ignoring the next. Passages are used to marginalize and attack homosexuality, with a broad range of subjectivity given to Klan interpretations. “For this cause God gave upon them vile affections; for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature.” (Romans 1:26). Their empirical evidence abruptly stops with the Bible. A substantial percentage of Klan leaders are ordained ministers who carry the message of white power. With nonexistent scientific support, the Bible remains the only authoritative source to justify Klan ideology. Loyal members are merely encouraged to live their upright moral lives according to the teachings of Jesus Christ.

The Ku Klux Klan is a grass-roots “nativistic” movement that overflows with individual passion and fanatical devotion, but the organization lacks credible textual foundation. One must acquire knowledge of their own Aryan history to fully appreciate the superior role of white citizens in America. The Klan was founded on its core principles of building “America for Americans,” and there still today leaves little room for debate in ideology and practice. Although rival “Klaverns” disagree constantly, all Klansmen share the basic ideas set forth in the Kloran. The basic “proof” in the creditability of the Klan ideology resides within the social, moral, and religious beliefs of each of its members. Individual acts to “benefit America” are encouraged, but must not be performed publicly in the name of the whole organization. Their “scientific” evidence for racial inferiority significantly lacks recent convincing support from the medical field. In light of the lack of scientific support for white supremacy, the Klan focuses on its claims that minorities inflict harm on innocent American citizens.

C. Institutions and Professional Structure

The professional organization of the Klan remains absent; however there are periodically national efforts to consolidate Klan power and influence across the country. Structure in this grass roots movement lacks the authority to govern individual Klaverns, leaving renegade members at a loss for guidance and accountability. This deficiency greatly reduces the efficiency of Klan fundraising and rally organizing influence. Due to the secret nature of Klan membership, official KKK member totals are not accessible for the public record. Klan leaders also keep their official membership numbers concealed from the Internal Revenue Service to avoid taxes on members’ dues. Klan membership totals are difficult to determine accurately, primarily because the sources repeatedly inflate their membership numbers to exaggerate the power and influence of the movement.

The titles of Klan positions and events are among the only recorded doctrine of the organization. The Klan has high-flown titles with mystic alliterative appeals, such as “Klud” and “Klokard” (Mecklin, 223). The KKK is intentionally organized as a unit for military action, divided into individual local autonomous units, or “Klaverns.” The Imperial Wizard, elected by the Grand Dragons, acts as a dictator, able to order action without wasting time convening with councils. Klan institutional hierarchy permits the sudden concentrated use of all available strength which is only possible with despotism. “The military feature runs all through our plan of operation, and the autocratic form of government lies in the fact of the authority and power vested in our Imperial Wizard” (Frost, 185). The Grand Dragon does exercise unrestrained policy making power, but this is only limited to the Klaverns directly under his control. Since the Klan does not distribute much needed monetary aid to individual chapters, the local chapters do not feel inclined to obey the imperial decrees of the Grand Dragon. A secret, masked society, composed of autonomous units, dedicated to the use of force, operating in unsettled times, has proved impossible to control (Chalmers, 19). Klan members were business and political leaders ranging from the sheriff to the governor, living their night life in secret while claiming to carry out their actions in the name of the Christian God. Since the Klan rode under the cover of darkness, robes, and hoods, Klan authorities could not credibly discipline members for unacceptable behavior. The local dens proved uncontrollable and continued to operate for private as well as political ends (Chalmers, 2). Although leaders set up a centralized, hierarchical organization for the purposes of better coordination and control, their success was limited.

IV. History

The Klan was born during the restless days after the Civil War, when hard times hit the South and the social order was turned upside down. In April of 1867, representatives met in Nashville in the first official Klavern meeting. This initial summit stressed unity of purpose, concert of action, proper limits, and authority to the prudent. The weak, innocent, defenseless, and oppressed white Southerners had to be protected. General Nathan Bedford Forest, a former Confederate war leader, was elected the first Grand Wizard (Chalmers, 9). The name comes from the Greek word “kuklos,” meaning circle (Kennedy, 55). The “Klan” aspect of the name is derived from the Scottish clans who sent riders out with fiery crosses to summon their members.

Violence was not the standard at the outset, but Klan methods soon changed. As a secret, nocturnal organization which operated during lawless times, the Klan soon turned into a vigilante force. To restore social order meant returning the Negro to the field, provided that he wouldn’t do too well there. The proper ordering of Southern society also included returning the Confederate prewar leaders to their former seats of power. Those who felt differently would simply have to go. The Klan sought political, social, and economic power in the ruins left by invading armies and Reconstruction governments. Where intimidation was not sufficient, violence was swiftly used. The Klan raided “offending” solitary cabins and invaded towns, preferably at night, but in the daytime where necessary. Using fear tactics enforced with threats of bodily harm, the death toll of Negroes and Republicans ran close to a thousand (Chalmers, 2).

Although it first caught on in the Southeast, where Georgia was its citadel and Atlanta its holy city, the Klan was a national phenomenon. Klansmen Robert Coughland described the initial appeal and subsequent success of the Klan: “It first appealed to the ignorant, the slightly unbalanced and the venal; but by the time the enlightened elements realized the danger it was already on top of them” (Tucker, 1). Klan violence as far afield as California was as brutal as anywhere in the South, where at one point around the turn of the century the police and best citizens turned out to watch an evening of torture in a local ball park (Chalmers, 3). In thousand of communities the Klan lived as a mystery and a presence, and as a disruptive and eventually a self-destructive force. At the 1924 Democratic National Convention the Klan was almost as much an issue as picking the presidential candidate. A year later, the Klan paraded down Pennsylvania Avenue with over forty thousand strong in the nation’s capital (Sims, 4).

And yet, by the beginning of the great Depession, the Klan’s power and glory were almost gone. The KKK’s core principles were not responsible for the fall, but rather its ignorant and destructive members. If the Klan had selected its member more carefully and grown more slowly it might have found a more respectable and permanent place in America. Because of its lack of control of its members, its fundamental program and tactics made it unrespectable in many circles. Eventually it was the combination of violence, politics, and exploitive leadership which destroyed the power of the Invisible Empire. The leaders of the Klan were focused on financial gain, and they ruled irrationally and dictatorially in this pursuit. The fight over spoils wrecked the organization in nearly every state and practically every community.

The very dynamics of the Klan dictated violence and intense racism, which initially brought respect and members, but eventually created revulsion. The peaceful members realized the evil nature of the Klan. Terror went too far as the extremists ranted too loudly and the leaders were too immoral. The affluent and civic-minded soon saw the Klan as a divisive force in the community. When the Klan became defiant to the law in Washington, the national and state attorney general became increasingly watchful. As a self-appointed police organization, the Klan regarded itself as the enforcer not the breaker of laws. The FBI and the IRS also prosecuted Klan offenders, stripping them of their claim to instill law and order. Below the Mason-Dixon line, state officials and local communities pressed it further with denunciations, anti-mask laws, and grand jury investigations, even though trial juries were still reluctant to convict (Chalmers, 6). Nevertheless, despite general societal disapproval, newspaper attacks, survelliance by the FBI, shortage of funds, and general lack of leadership, the Klan still boasts that it will survive and flourish in the future.

VI. Representative Examples of Argumentation

The truth or value in this system is defended by asserting the threats to social stability posed by groups it labeled racial, religious, or ethnic aliens, claiming that the benefits of full American status belong only to natural-born white Protestant Christian citizens. Their aim was to restore law and order for a government that often times exhibited incompetence and corruption. The Klan members convinced themselves that they were riding to prevent future social problems, rather than to punish past actions. Numerous accounts of Klan life have been published detailing life within the organization, all with varying levels of credibility. The Klan continuously publishes statistics illustrating how Jews, Negroes, and Catholics allegedly control American industries for their own ends. They report on the diseases and violence within the homosexual community, hoping to prove their sinful lifestyles are destructive and evil to America’s white youth. The system comes into conflict without end, both within Klan chapters and with almost every member of American society. Individual devotion to the cause is the primary system of knowledge empowered by the Klan. The level of racism and anti-Semitism vary with every member, causing innumerable explanations defending the Klan system of knowledge.

Annotated Bibliography

I. Primary Sources

Thompson, Jerry. My Life in the Klan. New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1982.

This is a narrative book written by a newspaper reporter who infiltrated the Ku Klux Klan in the 1980’s. He was born in Eastern Tennessee and was immediately welcomed into the Klan. He displays a healthy streak of skepticism and is not easily deceived. Although he reveals no textual evidence of Klan ideology, his first-hand account of life inside the Invisible Empire in nonetheless groundbreaking. Thompson went in with the intent to extract information, therefore his entries are detailed and relevant. I used this book extensively throughout my research. Thompson depiction of Klan life is extremely useful, but at times he focuses too much on his personal feelings towards the lifestyle.

II. Secondary Sources

I read over a number of the sources listed below, but only cited the few that I described in further detail. There is a sufficient amount of historical information in Leyburn Library to write an extensive research paper on the Klan, however their Klan studies on behavior and ideology are limited.

Chalmers, David Mark. Hooded Americanism: The First Century of the Ku Klux Klan,

1865-1965. New York: Doubleday Publishers, 1965.

This book examines the Klan in almost every state that Klan activity has been reported in. It was very useful in supporting the assertion that the KKK was born in the South, but was not restricted to the South. I read this book and cited it numerous times in my paper.

Dixon, Thomas. The Clansmen: An Historic Romance of the Ku Klux Klan. New York:

Grosset and Dunlap, 1905.

I used this book primarily because it attempted to develop the true story of the “Ku Klux Klan Conspiracy.” The facts Dixon presents are revalent, but again he pursues unneeded personal feelings and accounts. I read over some areas on doctrine and behavior, but on the whole I did find it exceedingly useful.

Frost, Stanley. The Challenge of the Klan. New York: AMS Press, 1969.

This is an extremely informative and useful book in any study the KKK. It is an impartial discussion on Klan idea logy and practice. It comes very close to sympathizing with the Klan, but always maintains an unbiased viewpoint.

Gibson, James L. “Homosexuals and the Ku Klux Klan: A Contextual Analysis of

Political Tolerance.” The Western Political Quarterly 40 (1987): 427-448.

This article is extremely informative concerning the propaganda put out by the Klan against homosexuals. It presents primary doctrines and statistics to contradict Klan teachings, but does not progress further into dealings with other Klan target areas.

Johnson, Guy B. “A Sociological Interpretation of the New Ku Klux Klan.” Journal of

Social Forces 1 (1923): 440-445.

This article explores the view of the Klan as perceived by the average non-Klansmen American. It investigates why the Klan initially thought they were protecting American citizens, but how eventually they were marginalized by mainstream society.

Mecklin, John Moffatt. The Ku Klux Klan: A Study of the American Mind. New York:

Russell and Russell, 1924.

This book was written by a doctor in 1924 and examines the physiological factors involved in individual Klan membership. It was useful in my research in determining why a white Southern male would feel the need to protect his interests by joining the Klan.

McClean, Nancy. Behind the Mask of Chivalry: The Making of the Second Ku Klux

Klan. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994.

This book is relevant in historical research of the Klan. It does not focus on Klan dogma or philosophy, but simply on the institutional structures set up to attempt to govern the secret organization.

Sims, Patsy. The Klan. Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1969.

This is a very useful, all-encompassing book describing the Klan in many different parts of the country. In particular, it does a case study of the White Knights of Mississippi and a very useful profile of David Duke. This book was vital to my research and was cited in the paper.

Tourgee, Albion Winegar. The Invisible Empire. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State

University Press, 1989.

This book was published at LSU and written during the second coming of the Klan. It provides substantial material on the rise, scope, and purpose of the Klan. I read over some relevant chapters but did not directly cite any material from this book.

Trelease, Allen W. White Terror: The Ku Klux Klan Conspiracy and Southern

Reconstruction. New York: Harper and Row Publishers, 1971.

This book is very useful because it examines the origins of the formation of the KKK. It begins with discussing the policies of Reconstruction, which directly lead to the founding of the Klan.

Tucker, Richard K. The Dragon and the Cross: The Rise and Fall of the Ku Klux Klan in

Middle America. Hamden: Archon Books, 1991.

This is an informative book on the rise and fall of the Klan, but it focuses too much on the Evansville contingency of the movement. Indiana was a very important headquarters for Klan activity, but this book focuses too much on one specific case. It was useful in gaining information on early activities, but overall its effectiveness was limited.