Ku Klux Klan

====End of the first Klan====
Klan leader Nathan Bedford Forrest boasted that the Klan was a nationwide organization of 550,000 men and that he could muster 40,000 Klansmen within five days' notice. However, the Klan had no membership rosters, no chapters, and no local officers, so it was difficult for observers to judge its membership.<ref>''The New York Times''. "N. B. Forrest". September 3, 1868.</ref> It had created a sensation by the dramatic nature of its masked forays and because of its many murders.

In 1870, a federal grand jury determined that the Klan was a "[[terrorist]] organization"{{sfn|Trelease|1995}} and issued hundreds of indictments for crimes of violence and terrorism. Klan members were prosecuted, and many fled from areas that were under federal government jurisdiction, particularly in South Carolina.{{sfn|Trelease|1995}} Many people not formally inducted into the Klan had used the Klan's costume to hide their identities when carrying out independent acts of violence. Forrest called for the Klan to disband in 1869, arguing that it was "being perverted from its original honorable and patriotic purposes, becoming injurious instead of subservient to the public peace".<ref>Quotes from {{harvnb|Wade|1987|p=59}}</ref> Historian [[Stanley Horn]] argues that "generally speaking, the Klan's end was more in the form of spotty, slow, and gradual disintegration than a formal and decisive disbandment".{{sfn|Horn|1939|p=360}} A Georgia-based reporter wrote in 1870: "A true statement of the case is not that the Ku Klux are an organized band of licensed criminals, but that men who commit crimes call themselves Ku Klux".{{sfn|Horn|1939|p=362}}

[[File:NCG-WilliamHolden.jpg|thumb|upright|Gov. [[William Woods Holden|William Holden]] of North Carolina]]
In many states, officials were reluctant to use Black militia against the Klan out of fear that racial tensions would be raised.<ref name="jimcrow-stories">{{cite web |url=https://www.pbs.org/wnet/jimcrow/stories_events_enforce.html |title=The Rise and Fall of Jim Crow – The Enforcement Acts (1870–1871) |author=Wormser, Richard |publisher=[[Public Broadcasting Service]] |access-date=February 27, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160228064916/http://www.pbs.org/wnet/jimcrow/stories_events_enforce.html |archive-date=February 28, 2016 |url-status=live  }}</ref> Republican [[governor of North Carolina]] [[William Woods Holden]] [[Kirk–Holden war|called out the militia against]] the Klan in 1870, adding to his unpopularity. This and extensive violence and fraud at the polls caused the Republicans to lose their majority in the state legislature. Disaffection with Holden's actions contributed to white Democratic legislators impeaching him and removing him from office, but their reasons for doing so were numerous.{{sfn|Wade|1987|p=85}}

Klan operations ended in South Carolina{{sfn|Wade|1987|p=102}} and gradually withered away throughout the rest of the South. Attorney General [[Amos Tappan Ackerman]] led the prosecutions.<ref>{{harvnb|Wade|1987|p=109}}, writes that by 1874, "For many, the lapse of the enforcement acts was justified since their reason for being—the Ku-Klux Klan—had been effectively smashed as a result of the dramatic showdown in South Carolina".</ref>

Foner argues that:

{{blockquote|By 1872, the federal government's evident willingness to bring its legal and coercive authority to bear had broken the Klan's back and produced a dramatic decline in violence throughout the South. So ended the Reconstruction career of the Ku Klux Klan.{{sfn|Foner|1988|pp=458–459}}}}

New groups of insurgents emerged in the mid-1870s, local paramilitary organizations such as the [[White League]], [[Red Shirts (Southern United States)|Red Shirts]], saber clubs, and rifle clubs, that intimidated and murdered Black political leaders.{{sfn|Wade|1987|pp=109–110}} The White League and Red Shirts were distinguished by their willingness to cultivate publicity, working directly to overturn Republican officeholders and regain control of politics.

In 1882, the Supreme Court ruled in ''[[United States v. Harris]]'' that the Klan Act was partially [[Constitutionality|unconstitutional]]. It ruled that Congress's power under the [[Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution|Fourteenth Amendment]] did not include the right to regulate against private conspiracies. It recommended that persons who had been victimized should seek relief in state courts, which were entirely unsympathetic to such appeals.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/jbalkin/opeds/historylesson1.pdf |title=History Lesson |author=Balkin, Jack M. |year=2002 |publisher=[[Yale University]] |access-date=February 27, 2016  |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304054220/http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/jbalkin/opeds/historylesson1.pdf |archive-date=March 4, 2016}}</ref>

Klan costumes, also called "[[Ku Klux Klan regalia and insignia|regalia]]", disappeared from use by the early 1870s,{{sfn|Wade|1987|p=109}} after Grand Wizard Forrest called for their destruction as part of disbanding the Klan. The Klan was broken as an organization by 1872.<ref>[https://www.pbs.org/wnet/jimcrow/stories_events_enforce.html "The Rise and Fall of Jim Crow: The Enforcement Acts, 1870–1871"], Public Broadcast Service {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171019161432/https://www.pbs.org/wnet/jimcrow/stories_events_enforce.html |date=October 19, 2017}}. Retrieved April 5, 2008.</ref>