organization and the Alabama Knights of the Ku Klux Klan headed by Robert Shelton to merge the two organizations. It should be recalled that Shelton, prior to incorporating the Alabama Knights, had served as grand dragon for the Alabama Realm of U.S. Klans. His. dismissal by Eldon Edwards not only involved Shelton's failure to report klan funds but also his failure to control the increased violence of the Alabama contingent of the U.S. Klans. A meeting in Indian Springs, Ga., on July 8, 1961, brought together Shelton and other representatives of the Alabama Knights, Craig and other officials of the Georgia-based UKA, and a smattering of officials from various splinter klan groups in other sections of the South. It was agreed at this conference to merge the Alabama Knights with the UKA. A small number of klansmen from South Carolina, North Carolina, and other Southern States also entered the UKA as a result of this meeting. Robert Shelton emerged as the new imperial wizard of the United Klans of America and Calvin Craig remained grand dragon for Georgia. From that day, this organization gradually expanded into the largest and most powerful klan in existence in the United States. Using a white supremacy slogan and exploiting sentiment against integration, civil rights measures, and increasing drives for Negro equality, the United Klans of America established State organizations in the following 19 States: Committee investigation established that the bulk of UKA membership and activity is confined to the States which comprised the old Confederacy. Those realms outside this region have remained small in size and relatively ineffective. There is also evidence that some members have been recruited by the UKA in other Northern and Western States not officially designated as realms. Michigan is an example 5 UKA membership climbed steadily after July 1961, except for a brief decline from October 1965 to March 1966, due mainly to public hearings into ku klux klan activity by this committee. Since that time, however, there has been a substantial increase in UKA membership. It may be attributed for the most part to increased organizational activity, especially in North Carolina and Virginia where the growth rate is disturbingly great, and to strong reaction to riots and racial unrest which the klan leadership has been most adept at exploiting for its own ends in various sections of the South. INTERNAL ORGANIZATION From July 8, 1961, until the conclusion of the committee's hearings in February 1966, the headquarters of the UKA was located at 401 Alston Building, Tuscaloosa, Ala. Thereafter, the headquarters was 5 See p. 36 of this chapter for further reference to recruitment by the United Klans in Michigan. transferred to Shelton's residence in Tuscaloosa. All realm (State) headquarters and other klan subdivisions are governed by the imperial wizard (national chairman or president) from this location. The United Klans of America, like most of the other presently operating klans, has an organizational structure modeled in most respects upon the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan formed by William Simmons in 1915. The "invisible empire" of the UKA is geographically coextensive with the United States-although the UKA by no means is in operation in every State. A realm, largest subdivision of the invisible empire, consists of a State. A "province," into which realms are subdivided, consists of a congressional district within a State. A klanton embraces the jurisdiction of a klavern, which is the local chapter and smallest unit of the invisible empire. 6 At the top of the hierarchy of officials in the invisible empire is the imperial wizard, who is assisted by a cabinet (kloncilium) of 15 imperial officers known as genii. The UKA constitution recognizes the supremacy of the imperial wizard only in administrative matters. The genii and biennial conventions known as klonvokations are supposed to have a role in governing the order. In practice, the imperial wizard exercises absolute power. His edicts are followed without deviation in all echelons of the invisible empire. Although the constitution provides for a regular convening of klonvokations, none has been held since 1964 because the imperial wizard has not seen fit to summon such a meeting. A kleagle or organizer is an appointed official whose duty is to recruit members on a regional basis. He is appointed by the imperial wizard who by virtue of office also holds the title of supreme kleagle. A realm is commanded by a grand dragon and a cabinet of nine hydras. A province is headed by a great titan with the assistance of seven furies. Each local klavern is headed by an exalted cyclops as chief officer, aided by 12 terrors. These terrors are 7 klaliff (vice president); klokard (lecturer or teacher); kludd (chaplain); kligrapp (secretary); klabee (treasurer); kladd (conductor); klarogo (inner guard); klexter (outer guard); klokan (investigator), who serves on the klokann committee (a three-man board of investigators and auditors); night hawk (custodian of the fiery cross, which he carries in all ceremonies and public exhibitions, and custodian of applicants immediately prior to their initiation). Some of Simmons' nomenclature has become outmoded. For example, he had designated a local unit as being a klan and its meeting place as a klavern. These designations still appear in the UKA constitution, even though klansmen today generally refer to the smallest subdivision of their organization as a klavern. The constitutions of the White Knights in Mississippi and the Original Knights in Louisiana reflect the modern usage. So will this report. The nomenclature for the officers assisting the exalted cyclops is also used for officials assisting the imperial wizard. To distinguish them from klavern officers, imperial is added to the title; e.g.. imperial klaliff, imperial klokard. The same offices, with the exception of the klokann committee, appear on the State level. They are distinguished by the addition of grand to the title (grand klaliff, grand klokard, etc.). Klaverns vary considerably in numerical strength. Some have only a handful of members, while a few have as many as 200. The constitution of the UKA 8 states that before a klavern is chartered by the imperial wizard there must be 25 or more members. Committee investigation has determined that in many cases the United Klans waived this requirement and issued charters to groups of four or five persons, in hopes that the membership would grow. In fact, most klaverns of the United Klans of America were found to have less than 25 active members even though they showed a "book membership" of many times that figure. Many of them, furthermore, had been in existence for a long period of time. Klavern meetings are closed to all except members and visiting klansmen. There is wide variety in the meeting places. Klansmenhave met in private homes, clubhouses, stores, barns, old farmsheds, and garages. Any room can be used so long as it is supplied with an altar on which lies a Bible opened at Romans 12, an American flag, an unsheathed sword, and a container of water. (Further details are available in the section dealing with klan ritual.) The Imperial Wizard issued guidelines for the most effective operation of local klaverns in the printed manual, "The Klan In Action." The document informed klavern officers that the success of the klan's policies depended upon the performance of klavern committees. The manual listed 22 subjects with which klavern committees should concern themselves. While some committees were to deal with purely internal matters such as the budget and grievances, others had functions which experience shows tend to pit klansmen against the forces of law and order in local communities. An intelligence committee, for example, was supposed to gather information regarding "enemies within and without" the klan. Membership of this committee was to be kept secret from others in the klavern. A propaganda committee was to maintain a watch on means of disseminating information or opinion in the community (the press, radio and public speakers, for example). The committee was to report on any form of "propaganda" adverse to the klan or the principles it espoused. The functions of a public schools committee included investigating and making reports on public school officials and teachers. The United Klans, beginning in the summer of 1961 and continuing through 1963, conducted an intensive recruiting drive aimed ultimately at bringing the entire klan movement under the leadership of the UKA. This drive by the UKA to lure the members of other klans into its fold has met with considerable success. The United Klans has shown an organizational ability superior to that of other klan groups in the South, and for this reason has been able to attract many members from diverse klan groups and to reactivate many others formerly active in the klan movement. Robert Shelton and organizers such as Calvin Craig, Robert Scoggin, of South Carolina, and J. Robertson Jones, of North Carolina, in their public promotional endeavors, increasingly tried to blur the traditional image of the klans as a band of violent, fanatical night riders and to emphasize the klan's role as one of political activists who alone could somehow stop Negro attempts at desegregation and equality. Actual recruiting practices, however, demonstrated that the Reproduced as an exhibit in the appendix, p. 181. UKA was accepting fanatical and violence-prone elements into its fold. As the Negro drive for desegregation in the South manifested itself in a growing number of marches, demonstrations, and sit-ins, the klan's organizational drive picked up momentum in some areas of the South. Rallies became more frequent, new members were enrolled, as Shelton traveled extensively through the South propagandizing and recruiting for the klan. His grand dragons were doing the same in their respective States. By late 1963, Shelton's UKA had become the dominant klan organization in North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Alabama, and Georgia, and was making inroads into the klan movements in Florida, Louisiana, and Texas. During the latter part of 1963, the UKA had an estimated 8,000 to 9,000 active members. In the following year, the klans seized on a new issue, just as they had done in the period following the Supreme Court ruling in behalf of school desegregation in 1954. This issue was the Civil Rights Act of 1964, particularly that section of the bill dealing with public accommodations. Portraying the proposed passage of this bill as the beginning of the extinction of the white race and the start of Negro domination in the South, the UKA was able to attract considerable attention to itself and register substantial gains. The committee found evidence of only two imperial klonvokations since the formation of the UKA in 1961. One klonvokation was held on February 8 and 9, 1964, and the other on September 5 and 6, 1964. Both were held in a hotel in Birmingham, Ala., and both were represented to the hotel management as conventions of the Alabama Rescue Service. The officers elected at these klonvokations were as follows: To the best of the committee's knowledge, there has been no imperial klonvokation subsequent to September 1964. There have been three known changes in the above-listed imperial officers. In the summer of 1965, Melvin Sexton, a next-door neighbor of Shelton's, was appointed by Shelton to the post of imperial kligrapp (secretary). W. O. Perkins, the former kligrapp, took over Frederick Smith's position as imperial klabee (treasurer), also without benefit of formal election. Imperial Wizard Shelton publicly announced in the spring of 1967 that he had banished George Dorsett, the imperial kludd (chaplain), from the United Klans organization. ALABAMA REALM OF THE UKA Having brought the existing klaverns of the Alabama Knights into the newly formed UKA, Imperial Wizard Shelton possessed a func tioning organization in Alabama as early as July 1961. Committee investigation revealed that the strength of the Alabama Realm was less than one might expect in a State housing the national klan headquarters and three of the imperial officers. The realm never approached the peak memberships registered in Mississippi, North Carolina and Georgia. It ranked fifth in the number of klaverns which the committee found had been organized within the various realms in the period 1964-1966. Since the founding of the United Klans, there have been four successive grand dragons in the Realm of Alabama. Hubert A. Page served in that capacity until March 1964. He was succeeded by Robert Creel, whose tenure as grand dragon lasted until the first of January 1966, according to his own testimony before the committee. At that time, William Brassell was elected to succeed Creel. Since the close of the committee hearings in February 1966, a fourth individual has been elevated to that office. He is James Spears, of Decatur, Ala., who was elected at a State klonvokation at Linden, Ala., on June 19, 1966. Committee investigation into the concentration of membership and the number of klaverns in the United Klans Realm of Alabama established the existence of at least 40 different klaverns in the realm at one time or another in the period 1964-66. The klaverns are listed on page 149 of this report. From material in the committee's files, it seems evident that the number of klaverns in Alabama greatly increased between March 1965 and the end of 1966. Prior to March 1965, it is believed that the Realm of Alabama had less than a dozen active klaverns. As of January 1967, there were approximately 1,200 members of the United Klans in the State of Alabama. GEORGIA REALM OF THE UKA Since the inception of the United Klans of America in the State of Georgia in February 1961, leadership of its Georgia Realm has always rested in the hands of Grand Dragon Calvin Craig. As in the case of Alabama, the Realm of Georgia was at birth endowed with a framework of klaverns and klansmen taken over from the U.S. Klans, Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. At the time the UKA was formed, the membership of the U.S. Klans was probably in the neighborhood of 500 active members. Calvin Craig recruited into the UKA fold approximately 97 percent of those members and upon that foundation went on to build the Georgia organization into one of the largest UKA realms of the present day. Membership increases in the State of Georgia can be best explained by the organizational abilities of the grand dragon. Craig is particularly fond of turning up at civil rights demonstrations and sit-ins, increasing racial tensions and utilizing resultant publicity to attract new recruits into his organization. The Realm of Georgia showed a moderate surge in activity and membership during the period prior to the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, when Craig and his Georgia organizers were exploiting that issue to the maximum advantage. Like Shelton, Craig sometimes tries to give the klan an air of respectability by shunning the hood and robe The committee was unable to locate Page for the purpose of serving a subpena. |