Capital journal. (Salem, Or.) 1919-1980, 1922-10-18

|KluXerS
In Umatilla County
Campaign to
Control
Organization Of
Republican Party
and Dictate

By Harry N. Grain.

W1lIe 1uIee AiScIeu JdCh
Goodwin was first to launch the Ku
Kluxers on their boycott game in
Pendleton and Umatilla county
he cannot claim the credit for all
of this kind Of 100 per cent
Americanism" that has been prac-
ticed since the entrance of the
klan into that section of the state
Boycotts have been the rule rather
than the exception in Pendleton
for the past year.
The Tribune, which I have al
ready said was the bitterest en-
emy of the nightshirt brigade in
Umatilla county, has been on the
Man's blacklist for more than a
year. The ink was hardly dry on
the first editions of that newspa-
per in which the khan was attack
ed before threats began to pour
into the office from all sources.
AnonamOus telephone calls, de-
nouncing the editor as the cham
pion of the Catholics and a hire
ling Of Rome, were almost an
hourly occurrence in the Tribune
office for days. Several large ad-
vertising accounts of firms that
had already been Ku Kluxed, and
several smaller ones were with
drawn from the paper and, as If
by a single act, the subscriptions
of all of the klansmen were can
celled. The loss in total circula-
tlon, however, was negligible. For
each lost subscriber the Tribune's S
circulation records showed an in
crease of one in the street and
news stands sales. The Kluxers
started to buy their papers on the
street corner or at the cigar
stands,
BY Christmas Of last year the
boycott on the Tribune had set
Tied down into a siege, with the
Kan concentrating its fire on mer-
cnants who had refused to join tue
movement to silence the paper.
lhreats of boycott were made and
IN some instances carried into eff
lect against merchants who per-
sisted in advertising in the Tri-
pune' The methods used to line
W one baker, who always had
peen an advertiser in the paper
snu who flatly refused to be a
party to the boycott even after pc
lug threatened by the klansmen, is
pul one OF dozen instances of the
used by the Kluxers.
Mnen the refusal of the Individual
aalsmen to patronize his shop
nau lalled to force him into line
sae ' hoo Koos sought to reach him
another channel. Traf-
~ !. offlcer Turner, member of
'as ~ state traffic ssquad and a
Al,Snsman, was sent to interview
" ieast three different grocery
'uen' carrying to them the kIan's
'sguest that they all call upon the
'aAer IN question and demand that
y cease advertising in the Tri-
'ule Or lose their business. 1t is
= Oe said to the credit of these
'u'ee : merchants that they refused
y Oecome parties to. the conspir-
u Pendleton the boycott was
- ,1'u LOT every conceivable purpose
! 'ne klan; to force men to join,
= eompel employers to hire help
y by the khan, to destroy
I. and to force compliance
~. ~ Whatever whim might find
~, nv with the leaders of the Ku
80 4 organization. 1t is safe TO
,sssrt o, that fully as many men
S,nea y, the khan by reason of i'm
i,' meg or expressed threats as af-
,ol' a.ea themselves with the order
,o.n "l'nin a year Pendleton has
v,,S e a community of factions
.loau merchants doing business
md klan and anti-klan lines,
w. W. me same condition prevails in
'on, ,,s Pilot Rock, Athena and
'ounty. towns IN tne
WI, Enters into Politics.
.n the opening of the pri-
NSSANlDQed Or pooro U7;,.LA