[Illustration: WILLIAM JOSEPH SIMMONS
Founder of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan and Emperor Invisible
Empire]
THE KLAN
UNMASKED
_by_
WILLIAM JOSEPH SIMMONS
_Founder of_
THE KNIGHTS OF THE KU KLUX KLAN
AND
EMPEROR OF THE INVISIBLE EMPIRE
PUBLISHED BY THE
Wm. E. THOMPSON PUBLISHING CO.
ATLANTA, GEORGIA.
COPYRIGHT, 1923
by
The Wm. E. Thompson
Publishing Company
Illustrations by J.A. Murdoch, Atlanta, Ga.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter Page
Foreword: Why I Write a Book 7
PART ONE
Organization and Methods
I. The Klan Yesterday and To-day 18
II. We Americans--A Vanishing People 26
III. Fraternalism of The Klan 38
IV. The Klanishness of The Klan 46
V. Is The Klan Anti-Semitic? 55
VI. Is The Klan Anti-Catholic? 64
VII. The Terminology of The Klan 79
VIII. Symbolism of The Klan 87
IX. The Rendezvous 97
PART TWO
The Fading Hope of Democracy
X. Democracy as a Social System is on Trial 103
XI. Our Cities a Menace to Democracy 113
XII. The Failure of Democracy in Central and
Eastern Europe 119
XIII. Foreign Outposts in The United States 126
XIV. The Racial Limitations of Democracy 139
XV. The American Negro as Ward of The Nation 147
XVI. We Americans are a Peculiar People 161
XVII. Giantism--The National Disease of America 174
XVIII. Drifting 184
PART THREE
A Salvaging Policy for Americanism
XIX. "The Federal Union--It Must be Preserved" 198
XX. Our Country's Part Among the Nations 212
XXI. We English-Speaking People Must Stand
Together 219
XXII. The Nemesis of Immigration 230
XXIII. The Problem of Restricting The Suffrage 248
XXIV. National Solidarity Through Education 260
XXV. The Conservation of The American Home 274
XXVI. A Final Word 284
WHY I WRITE A BOOK
Various representatives of the press, as well as many of my colleagues
in the organization of which I have the honor to be the Founder and
head, have repeatedly asked me to make a public statement, descriptive
of our organization. It was anticipated in certain quarters that we
should at once make specific reply to the embittered attacks upon
the Klan. Although abundant space in the press was placed at our
disposal for this purpose, we did not take advantage of the offer.
It is no part of the policy of the Klan to enter into heated public
controversies--even in self-defense. We felt all along that a clear and
simple statement of facts concerning the form of our organization,
its methods and ultimate purposes, while perhaps due the public, was
not due the instigators of the attacks upon us. We are not as yet aware
of the exact source of these attacks. Yet, I may say, the membership of
the Klan universally welcomed it, realizing that sooner or later the
Klan must be under fire. Whether or not we are enemies of our country
and of freedom we are quite willing to leave for the public to decide.
Meanwhile, the direct effect of these attacks upon the Klan will
not be without interest. Our ranks have been rendered more firm and
steady. The public has been rather amused than affected seriously by
the reams of villification which were heaped upon the Klan. It now
remains for us to tell what the Ku Klux Klan really is, how it came
into existence, and what it purposes to do through the organized power
of its membership.
We have been outrightly accused of maintaining secrecy in the conduct
of our organization. We ask, in rejoinder, for how long has it
been a crime or a misdemeanor in the United States for a fraternal
organization to employ secrecy in the conduct of its affairs? We have,
literally, hundreds of secret organizations in this country. The fact
that a number of persons draw themselves together in an organization
for mutual aid, for mutual confidences, and for mutual effort, implies
that they have something in common which they do not wish to share
fully with the public. So has every family and almost every business.
Then, too, the element of secrecy no doubt develops the interest of
the membership, adding to the charm as well as to the value of their
fellowship. Concerning this feature of our organization, I feel assured
that we might appeal to the common sense and fairness which Americans
are always and everywhere ready enough to show. No one expects the
Masonic fraternity or the Knights of Columbus,--to mention two large,
well-known and respected fraternal organizations in this country,--to
exhibit all their forms of salutation and other formalities to the
public. We simply claim the same rights and privileges which other
fraternal organizations share, both under the law and in the esteem of
the public mind.
New organizations and movements usually draw the fire of the
uninformed. People are inclined to be suspicious of that which they do
not understand. When Masonry first assumed its larger importance in
America it was the object of attacks so bitter that some of the members
were placed in danger of their lives. An Anti-Masonic party, nearly
a hundred years ago, acquired material importance and sent several
members to Congress. Just preceding the War Between the States, the
Know-Nothing, or Anti-Catholic party ran through its brief but stormy
career. This party was caused by the fact that the Catholic Church was
growing in certain parts of the country where it had hitherto been
almost unknown. When we Klansmen reflect upon these historical facts we
are much consoled. It remains only to say, in this connection, that we
bear our recent detractors not the slightest ill will whatever. They do
not understand us. That is all.
We confess that the Ku Klux Klan has been organized in order to help in
the accomplishment of a great task. Neither the magnitude of this task
nor its vital importance to the future of our country are yet widely
realized. Our American citizenship is usually earnest and active with
regard to the discharge of its more simple duties. With reference to
larger social problems, however, problems which sometimes assume the
form of great national dangers, our country is often enough soundly
asleep. The Ku Klux Klan proposes to wake the sleeper and make him at
least sit up, look around, and ask the time of day.
Whether or not we are enabled to accomplish all that we have set out
to do remains for the future to decide. But I may say that the growth
of the Klan and the universal spirit and activity of its membership
indicate pretty clearly that neither our hopes nor our efforts, thus
far, have been in vain. The Klan is growing in the North and West
more rapidly than in the South. It has been carefully and permanently
grounded in nearly every large city. It will eventually spread to
every town, hamlet and country cross-roads. With our six years of
organized effort and our present status in mind, we may be pardoned for
saying that we feel that there must be some need for an organization
which has, in so short a time, shown such phenomenal strength. The
Klan exists because it satisfies a most vital need in our national
public life. Our opponents have tried to indicate that our position and
purposes are purely negative. Nothing is farther from the truth. Any
candid, logical and patriotic mind which will reflect upon this and the
following chapters of this book can not be our enemy.
In order to first clear the way of the trivialities which have been
placed there to clog our footsteps, I wish in this foreword to state
most positively certain facts with reference to our organization.
The Ku Klux Klan has not been organized or conducted in opposition
to any religion or religious sect, or against the members of any
race or language group, either within or without the borders of our
country. Upon this point let no doubt be left in the mind of any
American. It has been falsely stated that we are fanning the flames
of hatred against the Negro race. Exactly the opposite is the truth.
To our fellow citizens of the Jewish or the Roman Catholic faith, and
to other groups too numerous to mention, we enter a flat denial to
all those pure fabrications which have seemingly given them so much
alarm. It is, indeed, quite true that our membership is restricted. It
includes only citizens of the white race. So does the membership of the
Clan-na-Gael and of B'rith Israel. If it may be truthfully said that
our membership is also restricted to Christians and to Protestants,
this is due purely to the fact that certain deductions may be made
from certain paragraphs in our Constitution and By-Laws. We have not
yet ceased wondering why attacks should be made upon us in the public
press on that score. The membership of the Knights of Columbus is,
I believe, restricted to members of the Roman Catholic Church. Is
there anything especially dangerous or wrong about that? I should
not say so. Catholic Churchmen have both a legal right and a moral
right to organize and conduct a fraternal order by and for themselves
alone. Moreover, the Knights of Columbus as an organization, and in
the personnel of its individual members, would be well within their
rights in demanding that they be saved from slander, villification
and unjust attacks of every sort, because of the restriction of their
membership to those of one faith. Since the end of the war various
German organizations, such as fraternal orders, singing societies,
etc., have begun to re-establish themselves. These organizations are
fully protected by the law and their members do not lack the esteem of
their English-speaking fellow citizens. Hence, I would most candidly
ask--and would that my voice could be heard throughout the length and
breadth of the land--since when has it become a crime for a body of
American-born, English-speaking, white citizens to organize themselves
into a fraternal order? What has happened in our country which seems
to bring our particular racial and social group so much into disrepute?
Since the House of Representatives in Washington has investigated us,
why is not a resolution presented asking the House to investigate
other institutions of a similar nature? However that may be, since we
have been duly investigated, and the investigation has ended without
the slightest accusation or criticism, so far as we know, on the
part of the House Committee, we would now ask our accusers, in their
turn, to be candid enough to do one of two things. They must either
present further facts to substantiate their accusations or retract the
accusations.
We repeat most emphatically--The members of the Ku Klux Klan, as
individuals or as Klansmen, are not the enemies of the Negro. We are
the best friends the Negro has, here or anywhere. Our organization
makes opposition to no religious sect or creed, as such. Our order
is based squarely upon the Constitution and laws of our country. We
hope never to be unmindful of the basic fact that both the Federal
and State Constitutions guarantee freedom of religious belief and
practice. We invite our fellow citizens of every faith to join us in
the protection of so valuable and sacred a right. Every statement made
at any time that we would deny this right to others than ourselves is
an absolute and unmitigated falsehood. In conclusion, let me emphasize
that the Ku Klux Klan conducts its activities not only within the
law, but in active support of the law. Our general organization would
not tolerate for a moment any illegal act on the part of any of our
local organizations. The Klan has not been formed to express little
hatreds but to study crucial problems and aid in the execution of large
national policies.
I might add a further word. We take pride in the fact that our
national and local organizations have conducted themselves, generally,
within the bounds of the strictest discipline. Perhaps it has been
because of the ease with which crimes might be committed and our
local organization unjustly blamed therefor that we have suffered
from a certain sort of criticism and attack from the uninformed and
the misinformed. We are now taking steps to make the Klan perfectly
secure against such criminal misuse of its name and regalia. Suffice
it to say here that we take the keenest pride in our record, and in
challenging our opponents and detractors to present the facts which
their allegations demand, we ask of them in the most kindly spirit. We
take much for granted. We can not be misunderstood for long. We know
that many of those who unknowingly oppose us to-day will be our best
friends, in many cases, indeed, our ardent companions of to-morrow.
CHAPTER I
The Klan Yesterday and To-day
In many questions, from all sources, I have been asked as to how the
Klan of the Sixties was related to the Klan of to-day. The original
Ku Klux Klan sprang from the urgent necessities of the Reconstruction
period. At the close of the War Between the States, the South was
prostrated and devastation was spread from the Potomac to the Rio
Grande. Following hard upon the collapse of the Southern Confederacy,
hordes of bad white men, generally termed "Carpet-Baggers" and
"Scalawags", came into the South to prey upon the prostrated people
of that section and to fatten on the ruins of war. This crowd of
men had been loyal to neither the Union nor the Confederacy, and,
in most instances, traitors to both. The tremendous upheaval had
thrown them from obscurity into publicity. They availed themselves
of the conditions that obtained to establish themselves and utilized
the recently emancipated race of slaves to further their ends.
Negroes everywhere were organized and taught to hate the white people
of the Southern states. Under martial law they controlled all the
elections that were held in the South. From these was elevated to
our legislatures and courts an alien race, untaught, unskilled and
incapable of government. White men in the South who had borne arms
in defense of the Confederacy had the hostility of the so-called
Union League directed against them. Their property was invaded, their
homes were menaced and in many instances the white women of the South
became the prey of Negroes who had been inflamed by the teachings of
"Carpet-Baggers" and "Scalawags." The evident purpose was to establish
for all time the supremacy of the Negro over our Anglo-Saxon people and
civilization.
[Illustration: LT. GEN. NATHAN BEDFORD FORREST
The Grand Wizard of the Original Ku Klux Klan.]
To meet this condition and arrest this menace, the Ku Klux Klan sprang
into existence. The white man's civilization that had been thousands
of years in the building was imperilled. The blood of the white man
ran like lightning. Tremendous forces leaped from the ashes of defeat
and drove like the whirlwind throughout the land. Civilization sounded
the note of wild alarm. An empire covering half a continent took form
in an hour and more than a half million men were mobilized in a single
day in defense of the white man, his home, his civilization and his
freedom--against the rise and assaults of an inferior race, many of
which within the century, had been cannibals, and some of which were
still speaking the jargon of the jungles of Africa.
In the formation of the original Ku Klux Klan there was no thought
or purpose in the mind of the white men of the South which made for
the suppression of the misguided Negroes by violence. Wise men they
were who founded the Invisible Empire and directed the movements of
its citizenry. They knew the superstition of the Negro. Interwoven in
the Negro's life, religious, social, industrial, was the fantastic
belief in the supernatural and the grotesque. To him the ghost was
very real and not at all unusual in appearance. In all their folk tales
there was a weird intermingling of ghostliness. Rather than intercept
by violence the movement of the Negro toward supremacy in the South
under the leadership of vicious white men, the Ku Klux Klan devoted
itself to thwarting the movement by overawing the Negro through his
superstitions. Had this plan not been adopted, the Negro would have
been largely exterminated.
This organization of the original Ku Klux Klan made a most thrilling
chapter in the history of the Anglo-Saxon civilization in America.
It has never been written. The organization has been maligned,
misrepresented, and misunderstood for more than fifty years. The
Congress of the United States instituted an investigation of the Klan
that totaled forty-six volumes in reports and findings, but not in a
solitary instance was an outrage or an atrocity in the South fastened
upon the organization. The supremacy of the white man was established,
the purity of the Anglo-Saxon race was maintained, and both races,
white and black, settled down side by side in peace and contentment to
work out their essentially different destinies.
The present Klan is a memorial to the original organization, the story
of whose valor has never been told, and the value of whose activities
to the American nation has never been appreciated. In a sense it is
the reincarnation among the sons of the spirit of the fathers. It is a
flaming torch of the genius and mission of the Anglo-Saxon committed
to the hands of the children which the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan are
again holding aloft.
The name of the old Klan has been taken by the new as a heritage. The
regalia and insignia of the old have been adopted by the new as a
mantle of one worthy generation might fall upon the shoulders of its
successor. Beyond this point the connection and similarity between
the two organizations do not extend. The ritual is not identical. The
purpose of each organization, while having a common impulsion, is
not the same in extent. The old Klan never intended to reach beyond
the horizon of the Southland. The present Klan has purposed the
supremacy of our heritage of ideals throughout the nation. There is
no intention on the part of the present Klan to intimidate or overawe
by spectral, ghostly garb, or to accomplish its aim by demonstrations
of force or acts of violence, or by a supergovernment under disguise,
or by moving in the darkness of the night. But there is a purpose
underlying the entire organization and pulsing in every fiber of its
being, to maintain Anglo-Saxon civilization on the American continent
from submergence due to the encroachment and invasion of alien people
of whatever clime or color. There was not in the old organization a
solitary motive except to save the civilization of the white man that
had been wrung out of the thousands of years of his struggle upward.
There is not a single motive actuating the new Klan except to save the
heritage which the fathers have left for us in the present to transmit
to the generation yet to come.
A moment's reflection will indicate how natural it is to see the new
Klan take form first in the South. With us the issue and the conflict
is an old one. Instinctively we scent dangers which our brethren
in other sections of the country are apt, as yet, to ignore. For
centuries we have been forced to deal, in one form or another, with a
problem which always seemed to us and still appears to some of us to
be insoluble. I mean the race problem. Yet in this, as in all else,
our kinship with our fellow citizens of the North was made evident by
an outstanding fact of Reconstruction days. The original Ku Klux Klan
was almost as strong in the Union army, maintaining martial law in
the defeated states, as among the men who wore the gray and went down
to glorious defeat. Had it not been for the active and sympathetic
co-operation of large numbers of the Union forces, the achievements
of the Ku Klux Klan in the Reconstruction period could not have been
accomplished. The time has now come, once more, to bring to our whole
country a sense of this great issue. And this issue, the causes of this
crisis, has broadened and deepened to a degree which threatens the
complete destruction of our civilization.