FREE ESSAY ON KKK

KKK

The big responsibility of cleansing the United States of people that are different,
different being anyone who is not a white Aryan Christian, has been placed upon the Ku
Klux Klan. The Ku Klux Klan (KKK) takes it upon themselves to take part in ethnic
cleansing. The KKK will not speak out and come to agreements on peaceful terms. Instead,
they feel they must wreak havoc, and carnage to those who they feel need it. The Ku Klux
Klan began almost accidentally during the reconstruction period after the Civil War in
the South. The southern people had suffered greatly from the effects of the war. Many of
which had lost their homes, plantations, loved ones, and whatever possessions they might
have had. These people needed to escape from the troubles of everyday life and take
matters into their own hands and fix the problems. They needed to teach lessons to the
Republicans and people from the north trying to take over their way of life (commonly
called carpet baggers). They needed to teach the Negroes who their master was and who
their master would always be, by using whatever means necessary to make sure their point
of view was completely understood.
In 1865, six men from a small town in Tennessee decided to make a club to help release
the stresses of the times. The men were really poor and could not afford to make gowns or
great costumes for the group, so they decided to use linens. They wore the linens over
their backs and put pillowcases on their heads . They also draped the linens over their
horses. The Ku Klux Klan was ready to ride for the first time. In the beginning, the men
wanted to do nothing more than play pranks on people to put fear into those who fear
needed to be brought to, specifically the infesting African American population, and
carpetbaggers. They felt as though the South had turned into a place that was no longer
theirs. The slaves were now free (many of these men were slave owners) and carpetbaggers
were coming from the North to take advantage of the southern people . They saw the
opportunity to set the South back to what it had been. The Klan soon began to interrupt
political rallies of the carpetbaggers by the dozens. Showing off the power of the KKK.
People often fled the rallies out of fear. As their influence progressed they realized
the things they could do and the possibilities of the Klan. They would steal victims'
possessions, beat them and usually would kill them. These murders that took place were
known as lynchings. They would drag the person to the center of the town and hang them in
front of everyone." This method was very effective, people feared it would happen to
themselves if they had anything to do with the carpetbaggers or blacks. At the beginning
the cause was necessary because of the strict, and unfair policies of the republicans.
Things had became uneven in southern society yet again, uneven in favor of the African
American, and as time progressed so did the brutality of the KKK. The murder, the
killing, the lynching, the dragging across state lines were all common practices among
the KKK during the late 1850's and throughout the 1860's. The KKK started in Tenessee and
this was where the Klan expanded the most out of all the other souther states, and it is
was also the most violent chapter of the KKK. In 1868 was really when havoc began to
occur in the most brutal ways. Their sudden descent into terrorism is a product of the
group getting away from the control of the leadership. Much of the brutal activities of
the Klan were done without the knowledge of the leaders. The Klansmen must have enjoyed
their brutalities to go above and beyond the duty that was asked of them. Their were
several occasions were leaders would step in and try to restore order amongst their
fellow Klansmen. In June of 1868 the Grand Giant of Maury County, Tennessee secretly
reorganized his Klan to root out the disorderly members. On top, of the rooting out he
issued a public decree admitting the wrongs the Klan had committed and apologized for
their actions. He also included the fact that he had successfully rooted out all radical
members and had their disguises disposed of (Trelease 32). As time progressed the
speaking out of the Klan leadership did not help to keep order amongst the Klansmen.
Power is something that a man craves. He must have it, and once he has it if it was to be
taken away he would need to find a way to regain this power once again. The Klan acts
upon instinct once they find a victim to release their natural instinct upon. That is how
the horrors that were committed could be committed. Your average every day citizen has so
much anger, so much hatred just building up throughout his life that all this built up
anger is just waiting to come out. Once it is released it does not come out in a trickle
of hatred it comes like a tidal wave of pandora's box leaving a man. In Pulaski County,
Tennessee the Klan got out of hand as well. The Klan leadership wrote another official
Klan decree, telling of the disguised Klansmen committing hateful acts, and it reassured
that they would be brought to justice. The decree also spoke of not having intentions on
wanting to "harm the poor Africans (Trelease 33)." The decree was taken into account by
the out of control members, but not for long because things just reoccurred yet again.
Control cannot be had under the chaos the Klan creates. If a Grand Giant orders his
followers to attack and then to stop attacking his followers won't stop there they will
continue to do what they have done because they had that power over another man's life
and that becomes a craving. A craving, especially with the ability to fulfill the craving
will of course be fulfilled. 
The KKK took part in various outlets of scaring the Negroes of Tennessee during 1868.
These black men and women suffered for almost every crime imaginary or real. They were
punished for things such as rape to defending themselves, to the miniscule crime of
voting Republican. Even if a Negro was to defend himself more and more KKK members would
come to avenge their fellow Klansmen. The ratio of Negro to Klansmen was never equal they
always outweighed their enemy and always defeated them eventually. In these times Maury
County was the strongest, and model Klan. They have small groups that would travel during
the dark into several different neighborhoods. Then they would yell for their prey and
drag them out to administer proper punishment for the imaginary crimes put against them.
They would usually beat the victim several times with sticks. One such even in Columbia,
Tenessee during July took a Negro boy and garroted him to death, "and then tied a stone
around his neck and dumped the body into the Duck River (Trelease 28)." The Klan did all
this on the basis that they were restoring order and keeping the peace. They would attach
false claims to these victims and lynch them. The Klan would warn a victim by beating him
practically to death, and then if he did not change he would suffer worse. This occurred
to one such Negro named Henry Fitzpatrick, the Klan gave him two hundred lashes, and then
came back the next night and hanged him. The reason for their action was that he had set
barns on fire, yet there was no proof of the allegations. In one county the Klan seized
at least 400 men in just the month of February alone. The power of the Klan was great,
great enough to scare an entire black population of Tennessee, and beyond. A great number
of the Negroes left their counties to find a safer county, which in Tennessee was
Nashville in most cases. Nashville stood up to the Klan and they were ready to put them
in their place. A whole police force was mobilized to get rid of threats on various
occasion. There was a rare occurrence of KKK outbreaks in Nashville, the victims of the
Klan were safe here at least safer than they were previously. The Klan managed on average
at least one lynching every now and then in Nashville. A black man is never safe as long
as the Klan is around. 
Bibliography
Black, Don. http://www.stormfront.org/texts.html.
Davis, G. Lenwood. The Ku Klux Klan: a Bibliography. West Port, Connecticut. 
Green Wood Press, 1984.
Grann, David. "Firestarters: My Journey to Jasper Texas". The New Republic, July 
20, 1998 v219 n3-4 p16.
http://www.kkk.com/.
Johnson, D. Doria. "The Lynching of Anthony Crawford", 
http://ccharity.com/contributors/anthonycrawford.htm.
Ezekiel, S. Raphael. The Racist Mind: Portraits of American Neo-Nazis and 
Klansmen. New York, New York, Viking Co.