Where did the millions of KKK members of the 1920s go?

by 2gramsbythebeach
QuickSpore

I can talk about the Klan in Colorado, drawing primarily from Robert Alan Goldberg's Hooded Empire: The Ku Klux Klan in Colorado. I don't know how well this applies to the Klan as a whole.

In Colorado the Klan more or less exploded into existence. In 1920 it was all but non existent. By 1925 it controlled both state legislative houses, the governorship, Denver's Mayor's office, and had seats on the State Supreme Court. In a state where the total population was around 900,000 the Klan boasted 200,000 adult members. One single Denver picnic event brought out over 100,000 attendees.

But contemporary records show that people didn't really see it like we do today. Instead it was seen to be of the type of mutual benefit organization as the Elks or the Masons. Instead of fezzes, or aprons and secret handshakes they had hoods and parties in the desert with cross burnings. Although nominally "Protestant" they even allowed Catholics and Jews to join, something that wouldn't have happened in the Deep South. It was definitely a conservative and nativist movement, but far much less so than in the Deep South. It represented "middle class values" not virulent hatred. There were members that had that hatred. There were threats of violence. But that seemed to only involve a core group numbering in hundreds.

That said KKK in Colorado sponsored no lynchings. Much of the literature was racially oriented, but in the overwhelmingly white state it wasn't all that relevant. Of course groups like the Denver Boulé, a black support group, would strongly disagree with what I just said, and I don't mean to dismiss the racism they did suffer. But it was more in the vein of legal covenants restricting black home ownership to certain neighborhoods like Five Points, not murder. There's also no reason to think that the vast majority of members supported the more extreme actions.

The whole thing crashed down almost as quickly as it exploded up. In other areas of the country, and among a core group of leaders it absolutely did stand for virulent hatred. As reports came in from other parts of the country, people saw a very different Klan than the local brand. Then a series of corruption scandals hit involving klan leadership , including a tax evasion scandal against John Galen Locke, the local Grand Dragon. Locke and governor Clarence Morley both ended up in prison. While the vast majority of members moved on to groups like the Elks or Masons.

Ultimately the Klan didn't accomplish much in Colorado despite nominally having massive support. They weren't able to overturn the state civil rights protections. Proposed laws like the firing of all Catholics and Jews from the University of Colorado died in committees. Simply put, they never really had the support their nominal numbers should have given them.

swiftmickey

Could you be more specific? Do you mean like what happened to the millions of people who used to belong the Klan after the organization faded?

cme1223

I can speak for the state of Kansas. In response to an influx of German and Irish Immigrants, to Kansas the Klan grew rapidly. They also opposed modernism and urbanism and took a strong hold in rural towns. While the Kansas branch of the Klan never had comparable numbers to southern states, in 1922 it had about 40,000 members, 6000 of which lived in Wichita, the biggest city in Kansas at the time. The Klan in Kansas would regularly intimidate African Americans and other groups they despised. They went as far as Kidnapping a Catholic priest who spoke out against the Klan and whipped him. To my knowledge, no lynchings by the Klan occurred in Kansas.

Neither the Republican Party or the Democratic party openly challenged the Klan in the state legislature in the early 1920s. In fact a significant proportion of the legislature were Klan members. However, after the KKK began winning city elections in the city of Emporia, famed newspaper editor William Allen White, ran for governor in 1924 on a platform that included strong opposition to the Klan. White called them "an organization of cowards" and called them an example "of the tyrannies of men in masses". White had a strong showing for the election but did not win. However, his election campaign brought awareness to the issue of KKK activities within the state. On February 28, 1927, after a lengthy legal trial between the state and representatives of the Klan, the Ku Klux Klan was legally ousted from Kansas. This ended overt activities by the Klan in the 1920s in the state of Kansas.
Sources:

Craig Miner's Kansas the History of the Sunflower State
Virgil Dean's John Brown to Bob Dole Movers and Shakers in Kansas History