Ku Klux Klan dreams of rising again 150 years after founding

(AP) — Born in the ashes of the smoldering South after the Civil War, the Ku Klux Klan died and was reborn before losing the fight against civil rights in the 1960s.

Klan members still gather by the dozens under starry Southern skies to set fire to crosses in the dead of night, and KKK leaflets have shown up in suburban neighborhoods from the Deep South to the Northeast in recent months.

Leaders from several different Klan groups all said they have rules against violence aside from self-defense, and even opponents agree the KKK has toned itself down after a string of members went to prison years after the fact for deadly arson attacks, beatings, bombings and shootings.

The Rise and Fall of the Civil Rights-Era Ku Klux Klan, notes that while the Klan generally doesn't openly advocate violence, I do think we have the sort of 'other' model of violence, which is creating a culture that supports the commission of violence in the name of these ideas.

So-called "traditional" Klan groups avoid public displays and practice rituals dating back a century; others post web videos dedicated to preaching against racial diversity and warning of a coming "white genocide."

Members gather in meeting rooms to discuss strategies that include electing Klan members to local political offices and recruiting new blood through the internet.

The Anti-Defamation League, the Jewish protection group that monitors Klan activity, describes Barker's Loyal White Knights as the most active Klan group today, but estimates it has no more than 200 members total.

Formed just months after the end of the Civil War by six former Confederate officers in Pulaski, Tennessee, the Klan originally seemed more like a college fraternity with ceremonial robes and odd titles for its officers.

Klan members were convicted of using murder as a weapon against equality in states including Mississippi and Alabama, where one Klansman remains imprisoned for planting the bomb that killed four black girls in a Birmingham church in 1963.

In an odd twist, Donald's mother wound up with the title to the Klan's headquarters near Tuscaloosa, Alabama, because the group didn't have the money to pay the $7 million judgment awarded in the SPLC suit.

The current hot-button issue for Klan members — fighting immigration and closing U.S. borders — is one of the most talked-about topics in the presidential election.