The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1871-06-29

about who Junius was, or OF any other I'M
solved matter that has long occupied the at
tention of the world-why, there never was
more muddled question than that concerning
the Ku Klux. The conflicting statements as
to the existence or non-existence Of this mys-
terious body or myth confuse everybody
One day we hear of frightful deeds CON-
mitted by it, and the next the whole story is
exploded. One man swcars the secret Khan
covers the whole South and that no loyal
person is safe; and this man is regarded as q
respectable truthful citizen. Another, equally
respectable, and apparently as reliable, swears
the contrary, and says the Southern States are
as peaceable and law-abiding as the Northern.
Even the radical newspapers Of the North
differ on the subject. and some of them hold
views one day that they do not another. The
evidence taken by the Congressional Ku Klux
Investigating Committee is of the same con-
ficting character, and we have no doubt the
majority and minority reports of that COM
mittee will be just as conflicting.
Tho difficulty Of getting anything reliable
about the Ku Klux lies in the political condi-
ton of the South and the country generally and
in the schemes of politicians. For example,
our dispatches from Washington, published
yesterday, represent that memorial had been
sent to the President from sixty three persons
in Fayette county, Alabama, stating that the
condition of affairs in that section was such as
''to render the lives of loyal citizens wholly
insecure" that murders by the Ku Klux were
of common occurrence, and that the civil au-
thorities have been overawed and are utterly
powerless to execute the laws. We learn at the
same time that General Forrest, in his exami-
nation by the Congressional Committee, states
that if ever the Ku KluX organization existed in
Tennessee it certainly does not exist now.
Everything, he said, ''is as peaceful there
as in any other State, and the people are law
abiding and deprecate disturbances as much as
those living at the North" Then we learn by
a telegraphic despatch that number of citi-
zens of Mississippi are on trial before the
United States Court at Oxford, charged with
being members of Ku Klux organizations.
Now, it is evident that all or most of the
conflicting statements about the Ku Klux are
either manufactured or colored by political
partisans and for a political object. Our
special correspondents, who have been inves-
tigating the matter in every part of the South,
show that. Even the correspondents of the
heavy and light radical organs of this city
showed that the reports of Ku Klux organiza-
tons and depredations were greatly exagge-
rated, at the same time tina. these papers
were endeavoring, editorially, to frighten
the country with the spectre of Ku
Klux outrages. We have no doubt that
our correspondent, in his letter from
Georgia which was published yesterday,
gives the clue to most Of the monstrous things
reported of the Ku Klux. He found verita-
bic Ku Klux, one who confessed TO having
been o member of an organization of ten
young men. Their object was to brighten the
them from the Loyal League meetings.
Reprehensible as this was no actual violence,
it appears, was done to the negroes They
were simply frightened. ''The darkies, you
know, said this six-foot-four Ku Klux, care
very superstitious, and, firing at us so often
grew more and more terrified at the tall white
apparitions that would suddenly confront them
in the dark woods. You see am very tall
myself; we'll, two of us, with white sheets
thrown over us, would get on the side of the
road, and getting one on the shoulders of the
other squat as low down as possible. Then
when the negroes came along we would slowly
rise up, getting taller and taller, until the
negroes would swear we were Ku Klux
forty feet high" In this simple and anus
ing description of the tricks of few
reckless young Southerners, acting upon the
well-known superstitious fears Of the negroes,
we have the secret of nine-tenths of the re-
ported outrages and terrors of the Ku Klux;
and the radicals, particularly those of the
Southern carpet-bag stripe, are raising out
of these a spectre twice forty feet high to
scare the conservative people of the North
aud for political purposes.
The South is not different from other
countries. There is there as elsewhere
yes, as in the North--a rowdy and
ignorant class of society; but the whole
community, or the largest portion of it,
should not be put under the ban for the
misdeeds of few. We have dangerous
class in New York but shall the bulk of our
respectable citizens be condemned for the
crimes of the bad-for class that is common
in all communities? There is Ku Klux-
meaning by that the rowdy and knavish
element-in every part of the North, and even
in Puritancal New England. This class
existed in the South before the war, though
not so numerous then as now, and, perhaps,
there were fewer of that class then in
the South than in the North in proportion to
the population. Throughout certain sections
of the Southern States, particularly in the