U.S. Klans

The U.S. Klans, officially, the U.S. Klans, Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, Inc. was the dominant Ku Klux Klan in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The death of its leader in 1960, along with increased factionalism, splits and competition from other groups led to its decline by the mid-to-late 1960s.

The group was first organized in Atlanta, Georgia in September 1953 as the U.S. Klans of Georgia by Eldon Edwards. Initial membership was drawn from the remnants of Dr. Samuel Green's old Association of Georgia Klans. More members came to the group after the Supreme Court's so-called "Black Monday" decision mandating school desegregation. On October 24, 1955 the national group was chartered, with Samuel Green, Jr. as attorney and William Daniel and M. Wesley Morgan as incorporating officers. Edwards revised and copyrighted a new version of William Joseph Simmons's Kloran and claimed this as a "direct link" to the Klan of the 1920s. By 1959 the organization was at its peak with 15,000 members in nine or ten states, with the greatest concentration of members in Georgia, South Carolina, Alabama and Louisiana. A recruiting drive in March 1961 featured simultaneous cross burnings throughout the South. On September 29, 1956 the US Klans staged the largest KKK rally since World War II when it gathered nearly 3,000 people at Stone Mountain, Georgia. The crowd reportedly came in over 1,000 cars decked out in Klan insignia and bearing license plates from Georgia, South Carolina, Alabama, Louisiana, Virginia and Tennessee.

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