Remnants of slavery and Jim Crow’s dark past still haunt Black Americans in 2026. And this couldn’t be anymore evident after Mississippi state officials recently stumbled across a slew of Ku Klux Klan (KKK) paraphernalia this week, Mississippi Today reported.
Suggested Reading
From KKK recruitment materials and decades-old propaganda to meeting notes, and ledgers, the Mississippi Department of Public Safety’s findings are both alarming and imperative to telling the full story of America. Now, The Root is taking a closer look into one of the most notorious terrorist organizations of all time.
Reconstruction as the Perfect Storm
At the end of the Civil War, the overall consensus was that the Confederacy needed to be punished. This resulted in strict Union military presence in the American south to control the ongoing fallout from the war.
At the same time, formerly enslaved Black Americans began to take control of their own lives. For the first time in history, this meant Black folks like Hiram Rhodes Revels, the nation’s first Black Senator, were elected to political office and began growing their own wealth.
Founded in Tennessee
The rapidly growing Black community presented several problems for supporters of the Confederacy still disgusted at the idea of the end of slavery, however.
The Ku Klux Klan was formed in Pulaski, Tenn. on Dec. 24, 1865, the same year the Civil War ended. According to PBS, the original intent of the organization was to be a social club for former Confederate soldiers… But soon, terror struck.
The First Instances of KKK Violence
The Klan’s devotion to white supremacy and putting a final stop to Reconstruction was championed by the KKK’s first Grand Wizard, former Confederate Lt. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest. It’s under his leadership that the KKK began terrorizing Black communities, setting new a precedent for violent lynchings and terrorizing Black americans, according to the FBI.
President Grant Steps in to Fight the Klan
By the time Ulysses S. Grant, the former Union general who notably insisted the Confederacy treat imprisoned Black soldiers the same as they do white soldiers stepped into the White House in 1869, the KKK had expanded its reach throughout the South. It’s under President Grant, who was also a slave owner, that the 15th Amendment solidifying Black men’s right to vote was passed in 1970. It’s also Grant who used federal power to crackdown on the KKK.
Congress Fails to Crush the KKK
Between 1870 and 1871, Congress passed a series of laws to counter KKK terrorism against Black people. These Enforcement Acts essentially banned all interference with Americans’ right to vote– no mater what they looked like. According to PBS, over 5,000 people were indicted under these laws although only about 1,000 were ever convicted.
Congress also passed the Ku Klux Klan Act in 1871, the Third Enforcement Act, but by 1882, the Supreme Court declared the act unconstitutional.
‘Birth of a Nation’ Revives the Klan
The 1915 film “The Birth of a Nation” is largely considered a turning point in the Klan’s operation. Based on a 1905 novel by Thomas Dixon Jr., the movie is filled with racist propaganda portraying Black people as heathens and rapists while positioning the KKK as the saving grace.
Civil rights leaders of the time tried to get the film banned, but after President Woodrow Wilson hosted a movie screening in the White House for the film, “The Birth of a Nation” was stamped in American history. It’s after the movie premiered that the KKK was fully revived.
A Second Generation of KKK
By the end of World War I, a new wave of the Klu Klux Klan had found a safe place in America. Unlike before, newer members of the KKK also targeted their violence toward Jews, Roman Catholics, all other immigrants as well as Black people. They were also more violent then before.
The Indiana KKK was the largest state branch of the Klan during the ’20s with members including the governor, over half of the state legislature and an estimated 30 percent of all white Indiana male residents, according to WRTV. Things took a turn, however, after the Klan’s Indiana Grand Dragon, David Stephenson, was found guilty of rape and murder in 1925.
Great Depression Impacts the Klan
The Great Depression of the 1930s resulted in a drastic decreased in the Klan’s membership ranks. The organization suspended operations in 1944 and disbanded two years later. But soon, the KKK would be revived once again in direct response the Civil Rights Movement, according to Loyola University Chicago School of Law.
KKK During the Civil Rights Movement
While Black Americans were fighting for equal rights, the KKK reemerged to terrorize and sabotage the Civil Rights Movement. The Klan was infamously responsible for the 1963 bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, which killed four Black girls, and the 1964 murders of civil rights workers James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner in Mississippi, according to the FBI.
President Lyndon Johnson Responds to the Violence
In 1965, then-President Lyndon Johnson publicly condemned the Klan during a speech while announcing four Klansmen were arrested for the murder of Viola Liuzzo, a white housewife murdered while driving activists back from the Selma march.
The lynching of Michael Donald
In 1981, a 19-year-old Black man, Michael Donald, was murdered and his body was hung from a tree. Klan member Henry Hays was convicted for the crime. Although a jury recommended he’d serve life without parole, a judge sentenced him to death, according to CNN. His 1997 execution marked the time since 1913 that a white person was put the death for a crime against a Black person.
Civil Lawsuit Crumbles the Alabama Klan
An all-white jury later awarded a $7 million settlement in response to Donald’s lynching. The million-dollar payout bankrupted the United Klans of America, one of the largest KKK factions in the country.
The Klan Today
While the Klan’s membership and presence has slowly declined over the years, there’s no question if the KKK is still active today. In 2016, the Anti-Defamation League and the Southern Poverty Law Center estimated anywhere from 3,000 to 6,000 members remain active.
Straight From
Sign up for our free daily newsletter.