1. There isn't ambiguity over the reason the EP was issued. Your current allowance for my explanation is in stark contrast to your initial comment, which was an incredulous "what?"
2. I'm somewhat familar with Jim Crow laws, not just what I've read, but from personal accounts, considering they aren't exactly ancient history.
3. Your prior comment made no sense, which is that Lincoln was being pursuaded to pass the 13th Amendment to avoid war. He came into office after the South seceded, meaning an Amendment would have had no effect on the South. His desire for the Amendment came much later, well after he changed the basis of the war to be to end slavery.
https://constitutioncenter.org/blog

Your histrionics over what you perceive to be inaccurate recitations of historical facts subtracts from this discussion. If I've got something wrong, educate me and offer me a cite. That's the point of this place.

Lincoln was being pursuaded to pass the 13th Amendment to avoid war. — Hanover

During the days after Lincoln's election, the south began to secede. The experienced Republicans around Lincoln asked him to give a speech advocating an amendment that would permanently protect slavery in the south.

They did this to avoid war. Lincoln gave a speech but did not mention this proposal. Instead he said that in spirit he was with the abolitionists, which was as inflammatory a statement as he could make.

I mentioned this in response to your suggestion that everyone on the planet except the south wanted to free the slaves.

If I've got something wrong, educate me and offer me a cite. — Hanover

It's not like we pretty much on the same level of knowledge about it and we're nitpicking some detail. You're ignorant of large swaths of it.

In regard to Jim Crow, I'm realizing something. Every time the issue of white supremacy comes up, I think of how they violently took over the south in the 1890s. You're a Republican, but you dont know about that. So when a Democrat expresses concern about American nazis, you think they're just being ridiculous.

You see how we would totally fail to understand one another?

And this: since his campaign, a lot of Trump's themes have been almost identical to the messages of white supremacists in the 1890s: the concentration on bringing back greatness, and the preoccupation with crimes committed by latinos. Did you know that?

And don't skip ahead of me. I'm not saying that Nazism is about to erupt in the US. I'm just asking if you knew why an informed person would be concerned about the rhetoric coming from Trump.

The experienced Republicans around Lincoln asked him to give a speech advocating an amendment that would permanently protect slavery in the south. — frank

We talked past each other here. I asked why he'd advocate for the 13th Amendment (prohibiting slavery) prior to the war, which is what I thought you said.

You're ignorant of large swaths of it. — frank

A wasteful and inaccurate comment.

In regard to Jim Crow, I'm realizing something. Every time the issue of white supremacy comes up, I think of how they violently took over the south in the 1890s. You're a Republican, but you dont know about that. So when a Democrat expresses concern about American nazis, you think they're just being ridiculous. — frank

You make it sound like the Jim Crow era ushered in racism. The same hate existed prior to Reconstruction. Blacks were slaves previously, and there were racist laws immediately after the war (black codes) which resulted in stricter reconstructionist policies. The backlash was to the Reconstructionist policies.

The Klan was founded in 1866 and was controlling legislatures by 1870. https://www.history.com/topics/ku-klux-klan . Your account seems to be that the South fully embraced Reconstruction until a few rabble rousers disrupted it. It was more like the same hate existed before and after Appomattox but was only temporarily stifled by Reconstruction.

No idea what you're talking about with regard to American Nazis. I'm opposed to Nazis in all forms.

Jim Crow was a result of an event that started in the 1890s. How do you live in Atlanta and you don't know what happened? You're oblivious to the history of your own home. — frank

"Jim Crow law, in U.S. history, any of the laws that enforced racial segregation in the South between the end of Reconstruction in 1877 and the beginning of the civil rights movement in the 1950s." https://www.britannica.com/event/Jim-Crow-law

And this: since his campaign, a lot of Trump's themes have been almost identical to the messages of white supremacists in the 1890s: the concentration on bringing back greatness, and the preoccupation with crimes committed by latinos. Did you know that? — frank

Trump wants to regulate immigration, not force Mexicans to the back of buses.

The Klan was founded in 1866 and was controlling legislatures by 1870. https://www.history.com/topics/ku-klux-klan . Your account seems to be that the South fully embraced Reconstruction until a few rabble rousers disrupted it. — Hanover

The Klan was not active in the 1890s when white supremacists violently took over the Southeast. Black votership in the south was 40-70% prior and 3% post. It became illegal for blacks and whites to eat at the same restaurants or work side by side (which they had been doing previously).

Blacks were making progress in establishing businesses, accumulating wealth, discovering some degree of influence through politics, etc. All that came to an end in the 1890s.

And as I said, the message of the white supremacists who accomplished all this was very similar to Trump's. I don't think anybody thinks that clown is capable of such a revolution. It's how successful he was at courting that type of crowd that's concerning.

But it's ok. If it happened again, there wouldn't be anything you could do about it. So carry on. :)

The Klan was not active in the 1890s when white supremacists violently took over the Southeast. Black votership in the south was 40-70% prior and 3% post. It became illegal for blacks and whites to eat at the same restaurants or work side by side (which they had been doing previously).

Blacks were making progress in establishing businesses, accumulating wealth, discovering some degree of influence through politics, etc. All that came to an end in the 1890s. — frank

From the Wiki article on the Klan:

"In the April 1868 Georgia gubernatorial election, Columbia County cast 1,222 votes for Republican Rufus Bullock. By the November presidential election, Klan intimidation led to suppression of the Republican vote and only one person voted for Ulysses S. Grant.[67]"

"During 1867-69 the Klan murdered Republicans and outspoken freedmen in the south, including Arkansas Congressman James M. Hinds."

This and the prior cite make the obvious clear:

"Though Congress passed legislation designed to curb Klan terrorism, the organization saw its primary goal–the reestablishment of white supremacy–fulfilled through Democratic victories in state legislatures across the South in the 1870s."
There was white racism before the war. Reconstruction reduced it. The backlash over those policies reestablished it. Your timeline of events is entirely wrong and your suggestion that a band of racists appeared and upset an otherwise progressive population is wrong. What happened was that the federal government was incapable of regulating the conduct of the prior southern power brokers and they therefore could not enforce their policies long term.

Yes. The events you're talking about inspired northern Republicans to come down and secure the rights guaranteed by the 14th Amendment. They were successful enough that, as I said, black votership became high, blacks were starting businesses and accumulating wealth. Blacks and whites did associate in and out of the workplace.

That all changed in the 1890s. I wish I could give you the title of a good history, but the course I took on it mostly involved primary sources. If you look, you will find, though.

@frank @Hanover Just moved your civil war comments here for now (not sure if you want to make it a new discussion). Interesting stuff, but pretty far from the original topic of the other discussion.

Yes. The events you're talking about inspired northern Republicans to come down and secure the rights guaranteed by the 14th Amendment. They were successful enough that, as I said, black votership became high, blacks were starting businesses and accumulating wealth. Blacks and whites did associate in and out of the workplace. — frank

No, it was not those events that sparked Republicans to come to the South to secure the rights guaranteed by the 14th Amendment. They had already come to the South. That period was known as Reconstruction and it went from 1863 to 1877, meaning it began immediately following the war.

"The Reconstruction era was the period from 1863 (the Presidential Proclamation of December 8, 1863) to 1877. In the context of the American history, the term has two applications: the first applies to the complete history of the entire country from 1865 to 1877 following the American Civil War; the second, to the attempted transformation of the 11 ex-Confederate states from 1863 to 1877, as directed by Congress. Reconstruction ended the remnants of Confederate nationalism and of slavery, making the newly free slaves citizens with civil rights apparently guaranteed by three new Constitutional amendments. Three visions of Civil War memory appeared during Reconstruction: the reconciliationist vision, which was rooted in coping with the death and devastation the war had brought; the white supremacist vision, which included terror and violence; and the emancipationist vision, which sought full freedom, citizenship, and Constitutional equality for African Americans.[2]

Presidents Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson both took moderate positions designed to bring the South back into the Union as quickly as possible, while Radical Republicans in Congress sought stronger measures to upgrade the rights of African Americans, including the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, while curtailing the rights of former Confederates, such as through the provisions of the Wade–Davis Bill. Johnson, a former Tennessee Senator and former slave owner, followed a lenient policy toward ex-Confederates. Lincoln’s last speeches show that he was leaning toward supporting the enfranchisement of all freedmen, whereas Johnson was opposed to this.[3]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reconstruction_era

That all changed in the 1890s. I wish I could give you the title of a good history, but the course I took on it mostly involved primary sources. If you look, you will find, though. — frank

You've never cited a single source for any of your posts and you continually refer to the 1890s for the proposition that the South changed courses then. It simply didn't happen that way. There were black code laws (predecessors to Jim Crow laws) immediately following the war and the Klan came to power very soon thereafter ( well before the 1890s).

The narrative you're trying to create simply did not occur. What I'm understanding you're trying to say is that the South was a thriving and open multi-cultural place until some Trump like character invaded and turned it into a racist nightmare.

What actually happened is that the South had firm roots in English classism and elitism since colonial times, with there being no more important distinction than being white. The entire culture and economy was based upon white supremacy. When Lincoln won the election, the South realized that it's way of life was in serious jeopardy, so they seceded. That then resulted in a war where it looked like the South was ready to fight to the last man standing in order to preserve their system of white supremacy. The South lost the war. The North then instituted reconstruction policies to bring the South back into the union and it embittered the southerners to no end, especially with regard to attempts to make blacks equals. Reconstruction resulted in some temporary gains for blacks, but they were very tenuous and the backlash was brutal and it began immediately, not in 1890. Finally the North left the South to its own devices and it wasn't actually until 1964 when real federal legislation was passed and enforced guaranteeing real rights to black people. That period (the Civil Rights era) was a period of great turbulence, where again there was southern resistance to the African American rights. Again, there weren't just a few rabble rousers out there stirring up an otherwise gentle, loving population. The culture was steeped in white supremacy. I just see no correlation between what happened in the South (organically grown racism over 100s of years to support an economic and social system) and Trump, a single individual who has extreme views on immigration policy.

Your cautionary tale of "you better be careful with Trump or else we might one day have another uprising like we did in the 1890s" simply does not logically follow.

I'm trying to think about how best to spend your time and mine. I'm not interested in writing a paper about white supremacy in the 1890s. I doubt you'd want to read it if I did. This cite is one example of the type of thing that started happening all over the southeast in the 1890s:

In 1875, the last Union forces left Mississippi, Reconstruction ended, and state Democrats began an ongoing campaign to restore and maintain white supremacist rule. Black Mississippians, whose citizenship and voting rights had been established by the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, were now without proximate federal protection and wholly vulnerable to discrimination. When Mississippi convened delegates to create a new state constitution in 1890, disenfranchising the black electorate was a primary goal.

Elected delegates were the only Mississippians authorized to attend and participate in the constitutional convention that would create the state’s new governing document. During the summer of 1890, F.M.B. “Marsh” Cook, a white Republican and former candidate for Congress, campaigned for a delegate position out of Jasper County. An advocate of civil rights for the country’s new black citizens, Cook vowed that he would use his position as delegate to oppose all attempts to create a state constitution that limited black voting rights. Cook also encouraged the local black community to organize against the creation of discriminatory constitutional provisions.

Cook’s political views were not popular among some whites in the community and he received threats. On the afternoon of July 25, 1890, one day after giving a speech regarding the upcoming convention, Cook was found dead near Mount Zion Baptist Church. He had been dead for several hours, fatally struck by fifteen rounds of buckshot. No one was arrested or tried for the killing, and after Cook’s death, local Democrats alleged he was a dangerous man who had been inciting local blacks against whites. The 1890 Mississippi constitutional convention moved forward, and resulted in a state constitution that established literacy tests and poll taxes that effectively disenfranchised nearly all of the state’s black electorate. — History of Racial Injustice

Why did it happen? In short, it was an eruption of white frustration over the grinding poverty that afflicted the south. Prior to the 90s, waves of demagogues would enter government promising to bring relief. Populist politicians made these promises later bragging that they had no intention of creating change in the south. White supremacists took advantage of the rise in crime during the economic depression of the 1890s to identify blacks as the reason whites were so downtrodden. They took control, sometimes violently

see here

to disenfranchise blacks, and enforce segregation laws that had either not previously existed or had not been enforced. I'm sorry, but a few wikipedia articles won't give you the information you need. You need to actually read a history of the era.

Your cautionary tale of "you better be careful with Trump or else we might one day have another uprising like we did in the 1890s" simply does not logically follow. — Hanover

People who know the history of the south will react differently to an increase in the volume of the white supremacist voice. How could I know you didn't understand the pervasive similarities between the rise of white supremacists in the 1890s and the rise of Nazism in Germany in the 30s?

Now that I know, I understand your nonchalance a little better. That's all I was saying.

Is it really that important which year? It seems to me there was good progress prior to 1890 possibly 1870 and that got overturned either starting in 1870 and/or culminating in 1890.

Is it really that important which year? It seems to me there was good progress prior to 1890 possibly 1870 and that got overturned either starting in 1870 and/or culminating in 1890. — Benkei

Yes. For the sake of understanding American history we need to be clear on some terms. Archie Bunker is an American TV character who exhibits ignorant racism. Maybe he's following his community, maybe he channels some of his frustration and aggression into bigotry, but he has no organized ideology.

David Duke, on the other hand, is white supremacist. The profile is a highly intelligent individual with a very clear and organized perspective. He believes that white people are in danger. Their culture is disintegrating because of exposure to non-whites. The important thing to note here is that David Duke is right. Just as the genetic blend of blacks and whites creates a latte colored person, the blend of black and white culture creates something new. Turn on a radio anywhere in the world, and you're likely to be listening to one of the outcomes of this blending. This change is something white supremacist foresaw prior to the Civil War. They continued to preach alarm regarding it, but they had limited success in getting anyone to pay attention. The KKK was not originally white supremacist per se. Their original aim to was control the new population of free people who were literally wandering the roads all over the south after the war. But white supremacists were there biding their time.

It wasn't until the 1890s that they finally had widespread success in taking over state governments in the south. That's what the concentration on segregation was all about: white supremacist doctrine, not Archie Bunker racism. The similarity to the Nazi take-over is that they were talking to a highly frustrated population. They promised a return to a glorious past. Their solution involved stirring up fear of blacks by pointing to black crime (which had increased during the depression).

Sound familiar?

white culture — frank

Very nice point re Archie and David Duke! I've highlighted 'white culture" out of a vague hope you can add some clarity as to just what that is, because beyond certain obvious attitudes (roughly: we are the best, thereby the entitled, with variations) I do not know what white culture is. (Being white, I can affirm my ignorance with some authority!)

Vague hope because perhaps it isn't itself a positive culture so much as a reaction to other cultures, even as it absorbs aspects of those encountered - thus "vague" in itself. I suspect that "white culture" is a homuncular growth on the cultures of people whose whiteness or near whiteness was in fact incidental to who and what they were.

The significance of the year is that it contradicts Frank's narrative that Reconstruction was effective but some Trump-like instigators appeared and set things back. What really happened is that the racism, hate, and views on white supremacy never abated, but were stifled temporarily and incompletely due to the presence of federal troups. Once they left, the white supremacy behavior that had existed for 100s of years continued forward unchecked.

It wasn't until the 1890s that they finally had widespread success in taking over state governments in the south. — frank

"Though Congress passed legislation designed to curb Klan terrorism, the organization saw its primary goal–the reestablishment of white supremacy–fulfilled through Democratic victories in state legislatures across the South in the 1870s. ...


By 1870, the Ku Klux Klan had branches in nearly every southern state. Even at its height, the Klan did not boast a well-organized structure or clear leadership. Local Klan members–often wearing masks and dressed in the organization’s signature long white robes and hoods–usually carried out their attacks at night, acting on their own but in support of the common goals of defeating Radical Reconstruction and restoring white supremacy in the South. Klan activity flourished particularly in the regions of the South where blacks were a minority or a small majority of the population, and was relatively limited in others. Among the most notorious zones of Klan activity was South Carolina, where in January 1871 500 masked men attacked the Union county jail and lynched eight black prisoners."

https://www.history.com/topics/ku-klux-klan

the white supremacy behavior — Hanover

This particular formulation begs the question of meaning. The question could be, does the ordinary belief of many folks then, that white people were in some way superior to Africans, have anything to do with modern white supremacism.

With respect to the ordinary antebellum belief in the inferiority of Africans, you could reasonably lump Nathan Forrest and Abraham Lincoln - and probably a lot of abolitionists - together, although if a continuum, Forrest would be at one end Lincoln and the some abolitionists waay over at the other. For most it wasn't a question of inferiority/superiority; their collective ignorance allowed them to take that for granted. The question went to rights - a whole other question.

I've highlighted 'white culture" out of a vague hope you can add some clarity as to just what that is, — tim wood

Per white supremacists? I think they're talking about all of European history.

Yes. I guess I downplayed white supremacy between 1865 and 1890 because I was focusing more on the dramatic change in black votership and the violent enforcement of segregation laws that started then. I think what most people are talking about when they mention Jim Crow is actually stuff that started in the 1890s.

You, on the other hand, haven't admitted any of the multitude of errors you've made since we started this conversation. :meh:

I'm guessing that as a result of overuse by liberals of the term "Nazi" to refer to Republicans, you have a cognitive filter on the word. So as I try to explain to you that some of what Trump is doing is reminiscent of Nazi tactics and echoes white supremacist voices in American history, I get filtered out. True?

Yes. I guess I downplayed white supremacy between 1865 and 1890 because I was focusing more on the dramatic change in black votership and the violent enforcement of segregation laws that started then. I think what most people are talking about when they mention Jim Crow is actually stuff that started in the 1890s. — frank

I don't know why you insist upon this incorrect recitation of history to make your strained point that Trump is a racist agitator like what existed in the Reconstruction South. The South was overtly racist prior to and after the war. They treated blacks as chattel. They fought to the last breath to save their racist institution and then they endured the North's efforts to protect the newly freed blacks only try to reinstitute white supremacy after the North left. There were Jim Crow type laws immediately after the Civil War (1865 and 1866) and the abuses surely escalated after the North stopped supervising the South's progress. The South didn't need prodding to be racist. They already were. In fact, politicians that favored black's rights were subject to abuse and even murder at the hands of the citizens. All of this is to say that Jim Crow was not the result of select racist agitators, but was just a continuation of the racism that existed in the South for literally hundred of years.

You, on the other hand, haven't admitted any of the multitude of errors you've made since we started this conversation. :meh: — frank

And this would be relevant if the purpose of this conversation was one upsmanship.

I'm guessing that as a result of overuse by liberals of the term "Nazi" to refer to Republicans, you have a cognitive filter on the word. So as I try to explain to you that some of what Trump is doing is reminiscent of Nazi tactics and echoes white supremacist voices in American history, I get filtered out. True? — frank

I don't filter it out. I just appreciate it as offensive hyperbole. No one really believes that Trump is preparing gas chambers, and those who use the term "Nazi" to refer to Trump really don't appreciate how offensive that is to those who find the abuses wrought by the Nazis incomparable.

There was racism in the south. Racism doesn't magically take over state governments for you. White supremacists accomplished that violently in the 1890s during which time laws were created to disenfranchise blacks.

If we examine the way white supremacists took over southern governments, we'll find that they did actively seek to attract white followers and threatened any whites who didn't accept their new rules. They appealed to whites who were frustrated and basically in a state of slavery called share-cropping. They made much of the rise in black crime that had accompanied the depression. They promised to make the south great again.

Trump is just a moderately retarded demagogue who probably instinctively adopted the same approach used by white supremacists and Nazis. It's the degree to which that approach was successful that's disturbing.

3. Your prior comment made no sense, which is that Lincoln was being pursuaded to pass the 13th Amendment to avoid war. He came into office after the South seceded, meaning an Amendment would have had no effect on the South. His desire for the Amendment came much later, well after he changed the basis of the war to be to end slavery. — Hanover

To my knowledge, Lincoln didn't originally advocate for the complete abolition of slavery but only opposed its extension into new territories. During the Lincoln-Douglas debates in 1858 in front of a Northern audience in Illinois, for instance, Douglas pressed him on this issue and repeatedly tried to corner him into admitting he was an abolitionist.

Lincoln always affirmed the superiority of whites, even if one suspects this went against what he truly believed. That sort of insincere pandering to popular anti-black sentiment was apparently necessary in order to win even the Republican nomination. So prejudice against blacks was not confined to the South.

Interesting conversation though. Wish I knew more about Reconstruction, Jim Crow, the Klan, etc. I'm open to book suggestions if anyone has one.

I'm finding it hard to follow this conversation, but racism, including explicit racist language, codified racial oppression, and even forms of 'soft racism' (e.g. uplift suasion) has existed within this country well before its very founding. When old forms of codified racism were deemed unconstitutional, they metamorphosed in novel forms of racism cloaked in subtler policies and language to obfuscate their oppressive intent. Trump, like many Americans, is a product of a socio-cultural environment that has been steeped in 400 years of vitriolic racism. One product of this environment was another American, Madison Grant, who wrote a 'scientific' racist book about race hierarchies, which heavily influenced Adolf Hitler when he wrote Mein Kampf. It can't be denied that there is a direct intellectual link between American racism and the racial tenants of Nazism, and Trump's language of immigrants "invading" and "infesting" our country, that they are "rapists", how he continually blurs the line between an average immigrants and members of M-13 (whose membership size pales in comparison with other extant gangs in America), or his deletrious zero-tolerance policy of separating families, is directly from the Nazi racial playbook, which in turn was influenced by American racism. Full circle.

Trump, like many Americans, is a product of a socio-cultural environment that has been steeped in 400 years of vitriolic racism — Maw

I disagree. We simply wouldn't be where, what, and who we are now if racism was as deeply ingrained in us as you and Hanover argue.

Hanover has argued that the white supremacist take-over of the 1890s was nothing more than a re-emergence of native racism. It was more than that. The south had been economically and psychically ailing prior to this event in much the same way Germany was ailing after its WW1 defeat.

Nazis used the frustration and disorientation of the German society to launch themselves into power. They played on the fears of Germans and their longing for a return to health and stability. The same thing happened to the southeast. Meanwhile the north turned its back in exactly the same way Europe turned away from Germany when it most needed help.

It's incorrect to view either event as simply an emergence of native vileness. Both were cases of social pathology.

I disagree. We simply wouldn't be where, what, and who we are now if racism was as deeply ingrained in us as you and Hanover argue. — frank

But what is this based on? How do you know what we (speculatively) would be otherwise? This history of racism in America is well established by scholars, from the 17th century to the modern age.

But what is this based on? How do you know what we (speculatively) would be otherwise? This history of racism in America is well established by scholars, from the 17th century to the modern age. — Maw

White supremacists react with foreboding to the prospect of the kinds of changes in physical appearance and culture that inevitably follow racial blending. They're ultra-materialists in this sense.

A non-white supremacist is not fearful of those changes and possibly even welcomes them. To a white supremacist, this means welcoming death. We make much of the racism of white supremacists, but they think of non-racist white people as being just as dangerous.

Real white supremacists are rare. Regular bigots are much more common. They reflect the world around them. They learn to channel fear and frustration toward the object of bigotry. Since their racism isn't an organized system of beliefs, they can shed it fairly easily.

All the bigot needs is to glimpse the humanity of the black person, the Jew, the Muslim, the Latino, the whatever, and love will take it from there.

Umm ok?

Hanover has argued that the white supremacist take-over of the 1890s was nothing more than a re-emergence of native racism. It was more than that. The south had been economically and psychically ailing prior to this event in much the same way Germany was ailing after its WW1 defeat. — frank

The Southern economy was dependent upon slavery. But for the slaves, the great wealth in the plantation south wouldn't exist and they'd suffer the same abject poverty of the Appalachian south. The southerners knew that and that's why they fought so hard to keep slavery. They were fighting to preserve their way of life. Unlike the Nazis who scapegoated Jews for their economic failures, the South wanted to preserve their slave class to maintain their wealth. Part of that system required they consider blacks subhuman, something that didn't end with the end of slavery.

"There was great wealth in the South, but it was primarily tied up in the slave economy. In 1860, the economic value of slaves in the United States exceeded the invested value of all of the nation's railroads, factories, and banks combined. On the eve of the Civil War, cotton prices were at an all-time high. The Confederate leaders were confident that the importance of cotton on the world market, particularly in England and France, would provide the South with the diplomatic and military assistance they needed for victory."

https://www.nps.gov/resources/story.htm%3Fid%3D251
and
"If the Confederacy had been a separate nation, it would have ranked as the fourth richest in the world at the start of the Civil War. The slave economy had been very good to American prosperity. By the start of the war, the South was producing 75 percent of the world’s cotton and creating more millionaires per capita in the Mississippi River valley than anywhere in the nation. Slaves represented Southern planters’ most significant investment—and the bulk of their wealth."

https://www.nps.gov/resources/story.htm%3Fid%3D251

Ah yes. The KKK.

Democrat senator Robert Byrd founded a KKK chapter. In very recent times Hillary Clinton revealed how Byrd was an inspirational mentor of hers.