- Right after the Civil War, the South was going through one of the biggest transformations in American history.

It was known as Reconstruction.

During this era, formerly enslaved people were building new lives, communities were changing, and the government was working to rebuild the nation.

But these changes outraged many white Southerners.

Out of this tension and anger, a dangerous group emerged, one that used fear, violence, and intimidation to try to stop progress and maintain white control.

This group was the Ku Klux Klan, one of the most violent organizations of the Reconstruction era.

(ominous music) (paper shuffling) The Ku Klux Klan, or KKK, first formed in Tennessee in 1865.

At the start, it looked like a simple social club for former Confederate soldiers.

The name Ku Klux came from a Greek word, meaning circle.

And Klan was a variation of the word clan, which refers to a group of people connected by shared interests or traits.

But the group quickly changed.

By 1867, as the federal government pushed Reconstruction forward and as formerly enslaved people gained the right to vote, the Klan transformed into a political and terrorist organization.

Its members included many Confederate veterans who were angry about the South's defeat and terrified of black political power.

Their actions stood in sharp contrast to the work of the Freedmen's Bureau, which aimed to support newly freed black people as they built new lives after the Civil War.

The Klan had two major goals, political power and white supremacy.

With political power, they wanted to defeat the Republican Party, the party that supported Reconstruction and keep Democrats, especially white Southern Democrats known as Redeemers, in control.

This meant preventing black men and white Republicans from voting or running for office.

And by promoting white supremacy, the Klan aimed to put African Americans at the bottom of society.

They believed white people should hold all of the power and used violence to enforce their racist beliefs.

To reach those goals, they spread terror.

Klan members rode at night, wearing long robes and masks hoping to scare people into silence.

But they didn't stop at instilling fear.

They used violence too.

They burned black schools and churches, attacked black families, threatened and sometimes murdered Republican leaders, surrounded polling places with armed men, and tried to destroy progress in black communities.

In Georgia, the violence was overwhelming.

Freedmen's Bureau agents documented over 330 cases of murder or attempted murder against freedmen in Georgia between January 1st and November 15th of 1868.

So did the Ku Klux Klan succeed in their goals?

Politically, yes.

The Klan played a major role in removing newly elected black legislators from Georgia's General Assembly and helped conservative Democrats take back control of the state by 1871.

One of Georgia's US senators and a member of the Bourbon Triumvirate, John B. Gordon, was widely believed to have been a Klan leader.

And the Klan did manage to promote white supremacy in some areas.

Socially, they used extreme violence against Freedmen, attacking schools, churches, and communities.

In response, many African Americans rebuilt burnt schools and churches and sometimes defended themselves against these attacks.

Still, the Klan remained a powerful force in Georgia during Reconstruction.

The white supremacy and racial segregation they supported became widespread across the state and much of the South for decades.

By the early 1870s, the federal government finally had enough.

Congress passed the Force Act of 1870 and the Civil Rights Act of 1871, also known as the Ku Klux Klan Act.

These laws allowed federal troops to arrest Klan members and break up the organization.

Many members fled or went underground.

And by the early 1870s, the first version of the Klan mostly faded away.

But the damage was done.

The Klan's terrorism helped end Reconstruction, including the Freedmen's Bureau, and allowed decades of segregation and racial violence to take root in the South.

This violence and intimidation also forced black Georgians away from the polls and out of public office, sharply reducing black political participation and representation in the Georgia General Assembly.

Even after the group dissolved, many white southerners celebrated the Klan as heroes who had saved the South from so-called black domination.

This myth helped inspire the second Ku Klux Klan formed in 1915 at Stone Mountain, Georgia.

This version would become a much larger and more public organization than the first.

The Ku Klux Klan was a violent terrorist organization that used fear and intimidation to try to stop black Americans and their allies from gaining political and social equality during Reconstruction.

While they succeeded in gaining political power and spreading white supremacy in some areas, they could not destroy the determination and resilience of the communities they attacked.

Their actions left a lasting impact on Georgia and the South, shaping decades of racial discrimination and violence.

(gentle music)