THE END OF THE CIVIL WAR
On March 3, 1865, the Freeman’s Bureau was set up by Congress. This had as its objective the protection of freed slaves, and sought to weaken the traditional white power structure of the rebel states. They found new work for the former slaves, and provided them with better health and educational opportunities. In total, they spent 17 million dollars on improved welfare, schools and hospitals. President Andrew Johnson however, who claimed that these black slaves should be in ‘subordination’ and declared that he would live and die with these beliefs, sought to crush the capabilities of the Freeman’s Bureau. He rejected Congress’s pursuit of more powers for them, and also opposed the Civil Rights Bill which they proposed. This bill would have increased protection of the black people, and prevented unfair restrictions of their rights.
One year later however, in 1866, the number of Radical Republicans, who fought not only for the abolition of slavery but also supported complete equality for freed slaves, in Congress increased. This led to the passing of the Reconstruction Act which separated the south into districts, and allowed the freed black slaves to vote in the elections for leadership of them.
Against the backdrop of devastated towns and cities, ruined plantations and farms, and a destitute population now controlled by an occupation army, the perceived rise of the slaves was the breaking point for the white Southerners. The stage was set for the explosive arrival of the Ku Klux Klan.
The Ku Klux Klan tore across the war-ravaged South on a mission to intimidate and destroy the Reconstruction governments from the Carolinas to Arkansas. Their main targets were the blacks, and their main goal was to stop them from voting, holding office, or exercising their new, undeserved rights in any way. Also targeted however, were immigrants, and any white people who were standing up for, or sympathetic to, black rights.
The KKK frightened their targets by burning crosses within view of the victim’s home. If this had no effect, then they would attack – torturing, beating, and murdering. They justified this as an essential course of action in the name of white supremacy and to protect and keep the white race pure. The Klansmen dressed in white robes with pointed hoods which covered their faces, supposedly symbolising the ghosts of dead soldiers who had returned to avenge their defeat.
THE ORIGINS OF THE KU KLUX KLAN
A group of former Confederate army members established the original group in 1865, in Pulaski, Tennessee. Originally set up as more of a social club, there was nothing sinister about the first few gatherings of what the young men eventually decided to call the ‘Ku Klux Klan’. They chose the name from the Greek word ‘kuklos’ meaning ‘circle’, and the English word ‘clan’. They also decided to keep it a secret society, to make it more exciting. They gave the ranks of the society ridiculous names – Grand Cyclops, Grand Turk etc. – just to amuse themselves.
Any new members (or ‘Ghouls’ as they were called within the Klan) whom the group managed to recruit, were subjected to an initiation ceremony. This was a farcical procedure, involving the entrant being blindfolded, sworn in with silly oaths, and finally ‘crowned’. The members all went out on horseback, dressed in sheets, with masks covering their faces. These were the very silly, and innocent beginnings of something which was to become deadly serious.
EXPANSION OF THE KU KLUX KLAN
The group began to grow, and attracted more members from adjacent neighbourhoods. The cloaked excursions became more frequent and more sinister. They would arrive at the homes of black people late at night, and give them dark warnings of more visits if they did not keep a low profile. The blacks, with their new-found freedom, ignored these warnings, and soon the threats turned into actual violence. Although the blacks were the main target of these attacks, the Klan also turned on anyone who supported black rights, Northerners who had come south, or southern unionists.
In 1867, all members of the ever-increasing Ku Klux Klan were asked to send representatives to a convention, presided over by ‘Grand Wizard’ General Nathan Bedford Forrest (a brilliant general in the Civil War), held in Nashville. The main objective of the convention was to discuss the Klan’s response to, and encourage the opposition of, the Reconstruction effort to integrate the blacks and allow them voting rights. By now, the KKK had thousands of members all eager to further the cause and uphold white supremacy.
However, many new recruits felt uneasy about the group’s activities, as did the long-standing members who were seeing the changes within the structure of the Klan. They were unhappy about the higher level of brutality, and felt that the balance had shifted since the Klan’s beginnings. They were all fully supportive of the Klan’s cause and agreed with terrorizing and intimidating the blacks into submission, but could not agree with the nightly rampages, robberies, rapes and murders being committed in their name.
The Reconstruction governors soon realized that this was a problem they had to address urgently. They did not however, appreciate the size of the organization they were trying to suppress. Government spies who tried to infiltrate the group were murdered by the Klan, who had been tipped off by insiders in advance. The Klan were more prolific than anyone had imagined, and the secret nature of the organization made it almost impossible to penetrate. Unbeknown to those trying to crack down on the KKK, their own colleagues were often riding out, terrorizing the towns, with the masked night riders.
When federal control of the ex-Confederate states was retracted, the whites were able to regain control and re-introduce segregation anyway. Therefore in 1869, with the main objective achieved, Forrest dissolved the Klan as he too felt that it had become increasingly violent and had abandoned its original goals in the pursuit of sheer anarchy.
Further, when President Ulysses Grant, under pressure from the Radical Republicans to do something about the terror and violence perpetrated by the KKK, signed the Klan Act and Enforcement Act in 1871, it was believed that the KKK would disappear forever. The report by the Federal Grand Jury stated that:
There has existed since 1868, in many counties of the state, an organization known as the Ku Klux Klan, or Invisible Empire of the South, which embraces in its membership a large proportion of the white population of every profession and class. The Klan has a constitution and bylaws, which provides, among other things, that each member shall furnish himself with a pistol, a Ku Klux gown and a signal instrument. The operations of the Klan are executed in the night and are invariably directed against members of the Republican Party. The Klan is inflicting summary vengeance on the colored citizens of these citizens by breaking into their houses at the dead of night, dragging them from their beds, torturing them in the most inhuman manner, and in many instances murdering.
It made the KKK an illegal organization and allowed the use of force to quash any strains of the group and any activities it engaged in. This was phenomenally successful. The Klan was completely dissolved in South Carolina, and membership in other states reduced to virtually none. Although the Klan Act was eventually declared unconstitutional in 1882, it was too late for the organization to recover.
RE-EMERGENCE OF THE KU KLUX KLAN
But the KKK never completely died, and with the outbreak of World War I, it was set to re-emerge. William J. Simmons re-formed the group in 1915. He was a preacher, who had been greatly influenced by the Thomas Dixon book, The Ku Klux Klan, and the film subsequently made of the book, Birth of A Nation.