Wikipedia talk:Featured article removal candidates/Ku Klux Klan

Moved from the main FARC:

Sources edit

You can compare the old 2005 version with the new one by looking at the sources used; no a single recent scholarly study of any of the Klans! As for the Frank case -- he was lynched two years before the 2nd Klan was founded. it had no connection to the KKK and to put it in typifies the problem of the oldd version. The 2nd Klan had few members before 1921-- 8 full years and a World War later.


The more recent scholarship looks at the Klan within the context of its role in the nativist/anti-immigrant period of the post WW1 period. How do you explain the picture of thousands of Klan members marching in Washington in the 1920's in American History survey books to students who figured the Klan went out of style with the Civil War? It's there because of the recent scholarship that identifies the Klan as a 'legitimate' response to the concerns of many Americans that the country was being overrun with foreigners who weren't thoroughly 'Americanized' and who harbored political, social and cultural ideas dangerous to the status quo. The scholarship should be recognized as valuable, and maintained in the article. Jmorello

I'd also like to suggest that the prescript be briefly summarized in a way which doesn't detract from the key points of this discussion. By the way, are we all on the same page about the existence of a 2nd Klan? Jmorello

Poor quality Sources for old version edit

The main source used was Horn's laudatory book praising the 1st KKK. Several bio's of Truman (why he never joined);

References edit
  • Axelrod, Alan. The International Encyclopedia of Secret Societies & Fraternal Orders, New York: Facts on FIle, 1997.
  • Dray, Philip. At the Hands of Persons Unknown: The Lynching of Black America, New York: Random House, 2002.
  • Hamby, Alonzo L. Man of the People: A Life of Harry S. Truman, New York: Oxford University Press, 1995.
  • Horn, Stanley F. Invisible Empire: The Story of the Ku Klux Klan, 1866-1871, Patterson Smith Publishing Corporation: Montclair, NJ, 1939.
Horn, born in 1889, was a Southern historian who was sympathetic to the first Klan, which, in a 1976 oral interview [1], he was careful to distinguish from the later "spurious Ku Klux organization which was in ill-repute—and, of course, had no connection whatsoever with the Klan of Reconstruction days."
  • Ingalls, Robert P. Hoods: The Story of the Ku Klux Klan, New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1979.
  • Levitt, Stephen D. and Stephen J. Dubner. Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything. New York: William Morrow (2005).
  • McCullough, David. Truman. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992.
  • Newton, Michael, and Judy Ann Newton. The Ku Klux Klan: An Encyclopedia. New York & London: Garland Publishing, 1991.
  • Steinberg. Man From Missouri. New York: Van Rees Press, 1962.
  • Thompson, Jerry. My Life in the Klan, Rutledge Hill Press, Inc., 513 Third Avenue South, Nashville, Tennessee 37210. Originally published in 1982 by G.P. Putnam's Sons, ISBN 0399126953.
  • Truman, Margaret. Harry S. Truman. New York: William Morrow and Co. (1973).
  • Wade, Wyn Craig. The Fiery Cross: The Ku Klux Klan in America. New York: Simon and Schuster (1987).
An unsympathetic account of both Klans, with a dedication to "my Kentucky grandmother ... a fierce and steadfast Radical Republican from the wane of Reconstruction until her death nearly a century later."

Sources for new version edit

General edit
  • Newton, Michael, and Judy Ann Newton. The Ku Klux Klan: An Encyclopedia. Garland Publishing, 1991.
  • Chalmers, David Mark. Hooded Americanism: The History of the Ku Klux Klan. (Durham: Duke UP 3rd edition 1987).
  • Wade, Wyn Craig. The Fiery Cross: The Ku Klux Klan in America. New York: Simon and Schuster (1987). An unsympathetic account.
First Klan edit
  • Edward John Harcourt; "Who Were the Pale Faces? New Perspectives on the Tennessee Ku Klux" Civil War History. Volume: 51. Issue: 1. (2005). pp: 23+.
  • Horn, Stanley F. Invisible Empire: The Story of the Ku Klux Klan, 1866-1871, Patterson Smith Publishing Corporation: Montclair, NJ, 1939, a sympathetic portrait based on oral histories
  • Christopher Long, "Ku Klux Klan" in Texas" (2005) covers 1866-1990
  • Parsons, Elaine Frantz, "Midnight Rangers: Costume and Performance in the Reconstruction-Era Ku Klux Klan." The Journal of American History 92.3 (2005): 811-36
  • Trelease, Allen W. White Terror: The Ku Klux Klan Conspiracy and Southern Reconstruction (Harper and Row, 1971).
  • Lou Falkner Williams. The Great South Carolina Ku Klux Klan Trials, 1871-1872 (2004)
Second Klan edit
Later Klans edit
  • Chalmers, David Mark. Backfire: How the Ku Klux Klan Helped the Civil Rights Movement." (Rowman & Littlefield: 2003).
  • Nelson, Jack. Terror in the Night: The Klan’s Campaign Against the Jews. (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1993).]]
  • Rose; Douglas D. The Emergence of David Duke and the Politics of Race (University of North Carolina Press. 1992).
  • Thompson, Jerry. My Life in the Klan, (G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1982), ISBN 0399126953.

Rjensen 02:13, 25 March 2006 (UTC)Reply

  • Instead of splitting this discussion, let's continue this on the article's talk page. Some of your info is correct. SOme of it, though, is incredibly POV. However, I believe the differences between all of us are not as great as may appear. Let's work together and bring this article back to a FA level.--Alabamaboy 14:36, 25 March 2006 (UTC)Reply
    • Are any other editors who've expressed opinions here going to take part in the discussions about the article at Talk:Ku Klux Klan?--Alabamaboy 13:28, 26 March 2006 (UTC)Reply