The placid town of Janesville, Wis. (est. pop. 52,000), never asked for a Ku Klux Klan rally. But the Klan considered the town, perched on the Rock River, ripe for recruits. So there in the middle of Rockport Park stood a massive burlap-wrapped, kerosene-soaked cross surrounded by Klansmen, and even a few Klanswomen, their robes billowing in the soft breeze. The loud twang of country music mixed with the angry chants of protesters jousting with police a few hundred yards away: "Death to the Klan!"
The Kluxers kept a wary eye as the demonstrators repeatedly charged the police line, only to...