Ku Klux Klan And African Americans

The Ku Klux Klan, known as the KKK, has been one of the most feared groups in America since the end of the civil war during post-war reconstruction.. The civil war was not just about the rights of the black man, but it was a very important part. People in the north mostly believed the black person was due the same liberties insured by the U.S. Constitution. The 14th Amendment of the constitution gave equal protection to former slaves. However people in the south saw the black man as inferior and a slave needed to work on the plantation. This led to continued unrest after the war. Some felt the black man and those that supported his cause needed to be stopped. They wanted to control the black population. The Klan also would torture white people who were sympathetic to the blacks and their situation.

The Ku Klux Klan was founded in 1865 and was made to resist the Reconstruction of the Civil War. They believed whites were racially superior to blacks and held this belief fiercely. Raiding African American homes, lynching innocents, and burning down African American farms. With rises and falls of members, the Ku Klux Klan always was apart of US history after the Civil War. They

The Ku Klux Klan flourished in the South at the beginning of the Reconstruction succeeding the Civil War. There remained numerous ex-Confederates that were still strongly opposed to the Reconstruction and sought to preserve white supremacy in the South. Directly after the Civil War the government in the South was weak and vulnerable. The Ku Klux Klan leveraged this and used violence and threats to try to reestablish white supremacy. They were most successful in playing upon fears and superstitions. They not only brought terror to the black communities but they also targeted carpetbaggers and scalawags. They used these threats and fears in effectively keeping the blacks away from the polls so that the ex-Confederates could gain back political control in the

Supreme Justice Thurgood Marshall once stated that “the Ku Klux Klan never dies. They just stop wearing sheets because sheets cost too much” (Biography Staff, 2017). With the birth of America in 1776 and the Klan emerging in 1866, the not-so-invisible empire has claimed a place in America’s history. During the centuries, three summits have risen and declined, each wave becoming more open about their appearance than the last, proving to a point, that Thurgood Marshall’s quote is correct. The Ku Klux Klan, also known as the ‘KKK’ or the ‘Klan’, is a native-born hate group and according to the FBI’s definition of domestic terrorism, stating “the unlawful use, or threatened use, of force or violence…within the United

The Ku Klux Klan was a secret terrorist organization that was created by six well educated Confederate veterans in Pulaski, Tennessee in the December of 1865. Their main objective was to restore white supremacy through acts of violence such as murder, against both Black and White Republicans. The KKK had eventually spread to every southern state, and Klansmen would often terrorize republicans regardless of their race. Members of the KKK believed that African Americans were inferior to Whites and did not believe that Blacks deserved equal rights. Although the rebel groups were outlawed and made illegal, many of them remained in existence and appeared after the reconstruction had ended. This proved the Reconstruction to be ineffective as many Southerners were still fighting against the government and opposed them. In addition, African Americans were still deprived of their rights by these

This turn to violence was how the first Ku Klux Klan rose. The Klan was formed by six ex-Confederate Veterans in Pulaski, Tennessee, this organization started off small but began absorbing most of the other anti-Reconstruction groups in the south, like the Men of Justice, the Pale Faces, the Constitutional Union Guards, the White Brotherhood, and the Order of the White Rose (Infoplease.com). The Ku Klux Klan was created in fear of an insurrection by the ex-slaves, now the freedmen. The most recognized founder of the Klan was Nathan Bedford Forrest. Their white robes and masks are supposed to be a representation of ex-Confederate soldiers who died during the civil war. One of the Klan’s biggest goal was keeping the freedmen away from the voting polls to assure the success of ex-Confederates in gaining back their political control in many states. In 1871, President Grant took an aim at the Klan for their interference in black suffrage but by this time the support for Reconstruction was beginning to diminish because racism was still very much alive in both the north and the south. As time progressed the Democrats regained control of the House of Representatives. The democrats waged a campaign of violence to take control of Mississippi to which President Grant responded with a refusal of federal troop intervention which ended support of the Reconstruction era. In the election of 1876, Republican, Rutherford B. Haynes, reached a compromise with

Forever. 170). The Klan were white southerners who were organized and committed to the breaking down of Reconstruction. By methods of brutality, “the Klan during Reconstruction offers the most extensive example of homegrown terrorism in American history” (Foner. Forever. 171). The Ku Klux Klan as well as other groups killed or tormented black politicians or threatened the blacks who voted in elections. The Klan strongly disagreed with the northern idea that slaves should become part of the government. The Historian Kenneth M. Stampp states, “for their [the North] supreme offense was not corruption but attempting to organize the Negroes for political action” (Stampp. Era. 159). This corresponds with Foner’s idea that the South was not open to the idea of change but more so consumed with the idea of recreating a society similar to one of the past. However, the goal of white power groups was not just politics. The Klan wanted to restore the hierarchy once controlling the South. Foner observes that, “the organization took on the function of the antebellum slave patrols: making sure that blacks did not violate the rules and etiquette of white supremacy” (Foner. Forever. 172). Like the power the southern whites formerly held over the slave population, the Ku Klux Klan wanted to control the African American population still living in the South. They did not want the freedmen to become integrated into their society because they saw them as lesser people. By suppressing and

Since the end of slavery, African Americans have been able to live their lives as they wished. The KKK (Klu Klux Klan) took away some of that freedom by killing and terrorizing African Americans. By 1924, the KKK gained more membership due to the belief that if African Americans had rights, they would take the white man’s job.

Southern americans showed extreme contempt for African Americans even after the end of the civil war. They believed that blacks were uncivilized and unworthy of american citizenship and voting rights. This distain for blacks became a learned behavior and continued into the 20th century. Beginning as early as 1865 a group of called the Ku Klux Klan sought out african americans and killed and tortured them in horrible ways. By 1870, the Ku Klux Klan had branches in nearly every southern state, the groups main object being an underground campaign of violence against Republican leaders and voters in an effort to change the laws of Radical Reconstruction and restore white supremacy in the South.(J.M. Bryant "Ku Klux Klan in the Reconstruction Era.") The KKK’s tactics of political terrorism were effective and set fear in the hearts of many. Black churches and schools were burned, citizens attacked, and people who refused proper submission were beaten and killed. This was a terrible time in American history and truly shows southern whites contempt for emancipation of their slaves, and the extremes circumstances whites would go to express that animosity.

Frustrated confederate soldiers made their way back home after losing the war that they had been fighting for four years. These men formed vigilante groups, attacking black people. While soldiers did this, wealthier men who had avoided fighting in the war formed agricultural and police clubs for the same purpose; both groups soon took shape and evolved into one large group, known as the Ku Klux Klan and Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest became the first leader, known as the Grand Wizard. The name Ku Klux Klan is derived from the Greek word, Kyklos, meaning circle. The Ku Klux Klan, often shortened to the KKK, was founded in Tennessee in 1866 and grew to be one of the most feared terrorist groups in the United States, before dying off in 1869, but later being revived in 1915 (History.com Staff). The Ku Klux Klan negatively impacted the Reconstruction period through terror, intimidating Republican voters, and killing Republican officials.

After the civil war, political changes affected African American lives significantly. African Americans were freed of slavery by the 13th amendment and the 14th amendment guaranteed their citizenship, “Everyone born or naturalized in the US were granted citizenship and were equal under the law” (Doc 1). After about 250 years of slavery, African Americans were finally free of slavery (Johnson, 2000). Though they were free, they had nowhere to go and no money to spend, “They were sent away empty-handed, without money, without friends, and without a foot of land to stand upon” (Doc 2). Former owners used their power to place limitations on emancipation. The former slaves had to end up working for their former masters and borrowing land/money from them. As many people disagreed with the decision of the 13th amendment, many hate groups started to appear. Most commonly known group was the KKK founded Tennessee, 1865 ("Ku Klux Klan," n.d.). They took it upon themselves to hurt African Americans in various ways, “People have been driven

The Ku Klux Klan has massively reduced by 1927. While it peaked from having over 3 million members in 1925, it had no more than several hundred thousand in 1927. Night riding of the Klan led to at least 50 people getting flogged during a two year period. Outcries of the populace of Georgia and the Carolinas brought arrests and convictions of the Klan. Therefore, the Klan was forced to retreat. The Klan endured other handicap when local Klan in the North chapters began to develop ties with American Nazis, which Southern Klansmen greatly opposed. But, the southern Klansmen was powerless to stop this coalition.

The Ku Klux Klan is a homegrown terrorist organization responsible for countless murders of African Americans throughout the south as well as projecting white supremacy by terrorizing opposing. At the end of Reconstruction, the KKK and White Leagues (opposition to the Union Leagues, made up of southern whites and members of the KKK) helped elect the Democratic party to power through repressive measures on the black citizens in the south. This era of states rights began with the help of terrorist groups who worked to deny the right to vote to black citizens. The KKK also used terror to keep control

In the year 1866, KKK was formed as a social group in Tennessee; and KKK name came from the Greek word Kuklos meaning circle. The military reconstruction Acts in March 1867 and the prospect of freedmen voting in the South resulted in the Klan group into becoming a political organization. Furthermore, Nathan Bedford Forrest was a former Confederate general that served as the Grand Wizard; and the overall leader of the Klan. Then again, he played an essential role in organizing new KKK that spread around during early 1868. In 1868 to the early 1870s, Ku Kluz Klan functioned as a loosely organized group of political and social terrorists; their goals were to political defeat republican party, and to maintain the absolute white supremacy in response to the southern blacks that newly gained civil and political rights after

The KKK was a Christian organisation formed in Pulaski, Tennessee on December the 24th, 1865. The name ‘Ku Klux Klan’ is derived from the Greek word ‘kylos’, meaning ‘circle,’ and the Scottish–Gaelic word of ‘clan’ - for the sake of alliteration. The 19th-century clan established to reverse the post-civil war laws which elevated the rights of the African-American population and to prevent the abolishment of slavery. The original KKK group reached its peak between 1868 and 1870, having introduced the first extreme aspects of racism and discrimination following the introduction of laws after the war.