(2 of 2)
Meanwhile, down at the auto center, 50 Klansmen are suiting up, clumsily pulling robes and floppy hoods on over their street clothes. Imperial Wizard Bill Wilkinson, a stocky little man from Denham Springs, La., has arrived in his long gray Chrysler. He likes to tell people it once belonged to President Nixon, and he usually adds regretfully that it is not bulletproof. A shotgun leans against the front seat. Boasts Klansman Gene West of San Antonio: "We've got a whole arsenal of guns here today, all of them concealed."
The Number of KKK members, of course, is secret. No wonder. Most of these Klansmen are older men, and the Klan's recent attempts to pretend that it is a political lobby like any other have been a transparent failure. "Let's face it," Wilkinson later tells me privately. "We had a couple of million members in the '20s, but we haven't got anywhere near that now. We just want to get the same attention from the press that the blacks get."
Finally, 50 robed Klansmen set out for the courthouse, just as the United League is leaving it. Only a few minutes separate them, but it is enough to avoid a confrontation. "It's damned hot in here," one Klansman admits from under his hood. Many marching Klansmen are swinging clubs, and some are carrying Instamatics and snapping pictures of the people, black and white together, packed three deep on the sidewalks. The jewelry store down the street suddenly closes up as the Klansmen approach.
At the courthouse, Mississippi Grand Dragon Douglas Coen, a shipping executive from nearby Saucier, tells the crowd, "The Klan is here today, it was here yesterday, and it will be here tomorrow." Applause. "The Klan will be here forever!" Coen screams, and a few spectators hoot. Wilkinson takes the podium and is saying the KKK is basically a Christian organization when a white man yells, "You symbolize hatred! How can you call yourselves Christians?" Suddenly the crowd rolls forward as several Klansmen rush the heckler. The police grab him quickly. A local newspaperman is arrested too, for taking pictures of the arrest, and both prisoners are whisked off to jail.
The KKK evening rally starts at 7:30 in the auditorium at the edge of town. Police and Klansmen guard the entrance. A country band is playing old standbys (All My Trials, Heartaches by the Number), and every time they play Dixie everyone stands up. Klan ladies in robes are selling hot dogs and Pepsi. Sometimes they sell KKK Tee shirts ($5) and belt buckles ($6), but tonight they simply hand out the KKK gift catalogue ("We have 400 items").
At dark everyone goes outside, where a 25-ft. cross swathed in kerosene-soaked rags stands in a field. Rifle-toting Klansmen guard the perimeter. The others button up the face panels on their hoods. Wilkinson rehearses them, but they are awkward at the ritual. As they wave their arms, they look a bit like high school cheerleaders learning a pom-pom routine. Some cannot see too well through those eyeholes. Slowly they circle the cross, throwing torches at its foot. The flames race upward, and all salute by raising both arms, as if crucified.