The Ku Klux Klan: A secret society organized in southern america after the civil war for the purpose of reasserting white supremacy by means of terrorism
After World War I the Ku Klux Klan became a very popular group. The group grew through out the decade, going from about 40,000 to around 8 million. These members consisted of poor and uneducated men, middleclass men, and also lawers and ministers. Though not allowed at first, women were allowed to join the Ku Klux Klan after 1927. Members were only allowed to be white, Anglo-Saxsons(name given to the descendents of the Germanic people who settled in Brittan during the 14th and 15th century),and Protents. Many people joined the klan willingly because they believed that the klan prompted a strong family life, decency, and patronism.
During this time the leader otherwise known as "Imperial Wizard", was Hiram W. Evans. Hiram was born on September 26, 188. He attended Vanderbilt University and studied to become a dentist, which he did.he worked as a dentist until the 1920s.Hiram had some stuggles leading the klan. One of theses was the internal struggle in the klan for power and money beween himself and William J. Simmons, who was the one who restarted the Ku Klux Klan after WWI. He also had a difficult time keeping control of the klan because of its rapid growth. The internal struggle and the klan's produced violence was being published in newspapers and damaging the klan's image of patronism.
Some of these violent acts were kidnapping women and raping them, castrating men, and murding people against theirbeliefs. Sometimes the klan murdered thousands of people from one group as a scare tactic. Usualy, these scare tactics worked and people would conform to their beliefs or flee the country. One example of this tactic working is the klan murdering thousands of republican voters resulting in many democratic voters in the next election. The klan also had power over the government itself.The klan got many of their own high ranking members into office, or politicians already in office were sympathetic of the klan's work. Because of this, the klan were rarely caught or convicted for their crimes.
The KKK also preformed gruesome lynchings,but not only of African Americans. The klan were also extremely hostile towards Jews, Roman Catholics, socialists, communists, and anybody they identifed as foreigners.The klan also opposed unions, especialy unions that allowed African Americans to join.The KKK supported the prohibition by burning saloonsand violently opposing bootleggers.
The Ku Klux Klan had one famous ritual were they burnt crosses in public. This was adopted from an ancient Scottish clan's burning of an x-shaped cross to muster forces for war. The KKK used this ritual as a form of intimidation, but as a symbol of Christian fellowship. This was a popular ritual for the KKK.
Despite all of the KKK's abuse on people from different nationalities, or religons, African Americans decided to fight back. The NAACP(National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People) tried to reduce the KKK's power by asking the state of Washington for new laws to help fight the KKK's violence. Despite the NAACP's efforts the state of Washington did not respond to them with much. That was because the government was overun with KKK members. Even though these atemps did not work the KKK did see it's downfall in 1926.
The reason for the downfall was because many members no longer wanted to be apart of the KKK because violence was what it was known for now.