[INTRO] It’s the late 1850s and news that your brother has been lynched comes to you. In the 1800s into the early 1900s, lynching was one of the most common act of terrorism towards the colored community by the Ku Klux Klan. This secret fraternal organization has used lynching, rape, murder, and arson as a way to show their opposition towards the civil rights grants towards African-Americans. The Ku Klux Klan is classified as a hate group, and throughout their three summits in history forced blacks and other minorities to live in a fear that they did not deserve.
[WHAT IS THE KKK?] Being a white supremacist group, the KKK is notorious for their violent actions towards minorities and the LGBT community. The Ku Klux Klan was conceived during the Reconstruction Era, more specifically founded in 1866 as a social club in Pulaski by mainly confederate veterans; the group rapidly extended into almost every southern state by the 1870s. The name is said to be derived from the Greek word kuklos, which means “circle of friends.” The KKK became the root for white southern resistance to the Republican Party's Reconstruction Policies which aimed for equal rights for blacks. Klansmen have claimed that the group is peaceful and as writer Waldo E.
…show more content…
The Klan’s unique white robe and hood became more popular and was being mass produced. This allowed the Klan to tap into bigger markets and as the National Museum of American History notes, is now the Klan became “A powerful political force in both the North and the South.” Unfortunately for the KKK, this led to the “Anti-mask” laws which prohibited the use of hoods. The Klan’s activity continued to flow even through the slight setback and eventually in 1989, David Duke, one of the most well-known Klansman, created an organization known as the National Association for the Advancement of White People