Is it true that The KK Klan was established to protect peaceful citizens from criminals?

Answer 1

Like innocent peaceful black men from deranged white lynch mobs?

Answer 2

No. The KKK was established as the Ghosts of the Knights of the Confederacy. That is why they wear white sheets, so as to resemble ghosts, and why they draped their horses in sheets as well.

The KKK was established after the Civil War as a response of southern Democrats to stop the actions of Northern Republicans. With the freeing of blacks, and their participation in the democratic process, blacks were elected to political offices, as were "carpet baggers". The KKK actively stopped people from voting for Republican candidates, as it was and remains today, a terrorist organization.

In response to increasing violence, Grant ordered federal troops into the south, and they declared martial law where ever they went. When they caught a member of the KKK, they were tried before a military tribunal, and shot or hanged. This forced the Klan underground, where it continues to operate as a militant wing of the Democrat party.

Answer 3

And clearly they've made great strides. Nothing preserves the peace better than a lynch mob! You mean to protect white people from a race they brutalized and (rightfully) feared because of the anger THEY caused?

How can the klan's existance be justified in this day and age? It doesn't make sense! Our worst enemy is our own lack of knowlege and the standards of mediocrity set forth for the upcoming generations.

Answer 4

Is this a serious question?

The KKK is nothing more than a terrorist organization. It's kind of like Hezbollah saying their primary purpose is charity. They do charity programs too, but that doesn't change the fact that they're a bunch of psycho, murdering terrorists.

Now that I think of it, the analogy fits perfectly! Hezbollah is a socially accepted organization in the Middle East, like the KKK was in the south. They're racist -- they hate Jews. Their local government and law enforcement looks the other way when they commit horrendous crimes, because they fear retalliation.

Wow, if that's just a coincidence, I'll eat my hat!

Answer 5

I see we have a bunch of ignorant people posting on this question!

The KKK was started to a gentleman's club for confederate officers. Afterwords when the word got around the club existed, the enlisted men and volunteers wanted in. This was resisted by the officers at first, but as sentiments swelled the enlisted men and volunteers were allowed to join.

Then as meetings when on and the enlisted men got drunk together many times, the violence started. The officers tried get the enlisted men under control, and were thrown out the club they had started. The violence went from bad to worse as the enlisted men grew more bold, until the KKK is horrible organization it is today.

It's history you should learn some, you wouldn't look so stupid by posting such ignorant erroneous things as are on here.

Answer 6

They were formed for two purposes. Ineffective police protection for shop keepers from local thugs caused them to form as a vigilante group. They also didn't like the Irish moving in and taking jobs or opening up shops. So they'd protect those they liked from thugs but they'd also run the Irish out of town.

Now of course they are all about hate and evil.

Answer 7

That was their stated intension when they started out from a fear of freed slaves. It quickly became a group who pactices hate and murder. They were not a group of peaceful citizens when they put on thier bedsheets and acted as a mob just a bunch of murderers. This type of organization needs to be suppressed.

Answer 8

Yes, it was actually started to protect people(all people) in very rural communities where there was no true law enforcement. Unfortunately like so many other groups started with good intentions, it took on a whole new level and changed into a monster. Just proof that good intentions in human beings often turn into bad by our lust for power and greed.

Answer 9

absolutely not! the KKK is no better than Adolf Hitler. they are in search for purity in the white race. any other race is considered to be the enemy. though the KKK tormented the black race more than any other ethnic diversity, they believe that whites are supreme hence the spin off groups such as White Supremacy. the have a lot to lesson.

Answer 10

Yes

Answer 11

Yeah, protectors of the peace:

From 1866 to 1867, the Klan began breaking up black prayer meetings and invading black homes at night to steal firearms. Some of these activities may have been modeled on previous Tennessee vigilante groups such as the Yellow Jackets and Redcaps.

In an 1867 meeting in Nashville an effort was made to create a hierarchical organization with local chapters reporting to county leaders, counties reporting to districts, districts reporting to states, and states reporting to a national headquarters. The proposals, in a document called the "Prescript," were written by George Gordon, a former Confederate brigadier general. The Prescript included inspirational language about the goals of the Klan along with a list of questions to be asked of applicants for membership, which confirmed the focus on resisting Reconstruction and the Republican Party. The applicant was to be asked whether he was a Republican, a Union Army veteran, or a member of the Loyal League; whether he was "opposed to ***** equality both social and political;" and whether he was in favor of "a white man's government," "maintaining the constitutional rights of the South," "the reenfranchisement and emancipation of the white men of the South, and the restitution of the Southern people to all their rights," and "the inalienable right of self-preservation of the people against the exercise of arbitrary and unlicensed power."

Despite the work that came out of the 1867 meeting, the Prescript was never accepted by any of the local units. They continued to operate autonomously, and there never were county, district or state headquarters.

According to one oral report, Gordon went to former slave trader and Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest in Memphis and told him about the new organization, to which Forrest replied, "That's a good thing; that's a damn good thing. We can use that to keep the ******* in their place." A few weeks later, Forrest was selected as Grand Wizard, the Klan's national leader. In later interviews, however, Forrest denied the leadership role and stated that he never had any effective control over the Klan cells.


Activities
The Klan sought to control the political and social status of the freed slaves. Specifically, it attempted to curb black education, economic advancement, voting rights, and the right to bear arms. However, the Klan's focus was not limited to African Americans; Southern Republicans also became the target of vicious intimidation tactics. The violence achieved its purpose. For example, in the April 1868 Georgia gubernatorial election, Columbia County cast 1,222 votes for Republican Rufus Bullock, but in the November presidential election, the county cast only one vote for Republican candidate Ulysses Grant.

Klan intimidation was often targeted at schoolteachers and operatives of the federal Freedmen's Bureau. Black members of the Loyal Leagues were also the frequent targets of Klan raids. In a typical episode in Mississippi, according to the Congressional inquiry

One of these teachers (Miss Allen of Illinois), whose school was at Cotton Gin Port in Monroe County, was visited ... between one and two o'clock at night in March, 1871, by about fifty men mounted and disguised. Each man wore a long white robe and his face was covered by a loose mask with scarlet stripes. She was ordered to get up and dress which she did at once and then admitted to her room the captain and lieutenant who in addition to the usual disguise had long horns on their heads and a sort of device in front. The lieutenant had a pistol in his hand and he and the captain sat down while eight or ten men stood inside the door and the porch was full. They treated her "gentlemanly and quietly" but complained of the heavy school-tax, said she must stop teaching and go away and warned her that they never gave a second notice. She heeded the warning and left the county.

In other violence, Klansmen killed more than 150 African Americans in a single county in Florida, and hundreds more in other counties.

An 1868 proclamation by Gordon demonstrates several of the issues surrounding the Klan's violent activities.

Many blacks were veterans of the Union Army, and were armed. From the beginning, one of the original Klan's strongest focuses was on confiscating firearms from blacks. In the proclamation, Gordon warned that the Klan had been "fired into three times," and that if the blacks "make war upon us they must abide by the awful retribution that will follow."
Gordon also stated that the Klan was a peaceful organization. Such claims were common ways for the Klan to attempt to protect itself from prosecution. However, a federal grand jury in 1869 determined that the Klan was a "terrorist organization." Hundreds of indictments for crimes of violence and terrorism were issued. Klan members were prosecuted, and many fled jurisdiction, particularly in South Carolina.
Gordon warned that some people had been carrying out violent acts in the name of the Klan. It was true that many people who had not been formally inducted into the Klan found the Klan's uniform to be a convenient way to hide their identities when carrying out acts of violence. However, it was also convenient for the higher levels of the organization to disclaim responsibility for such acts, and the secretive, decentralized nature of the Klan made membership fuzzy rather than clear-cut. In many ways the Klan was a military force serving the interests of the Democratic party, the planter class, and those who desired the restoration of white supremacy.