In prior posts, we have covered a variety of KKK views about what races are and where races come from, including what they believe to be God's intent.
Regardless of which of these various threads of thought, as Gustaf Forsell explains in his article -- Blood, Cross and Flag: The Influence of Race on Ku Klux Klan Theology in the 1920s --
“...the general goal for the Ku Klux Klan was to maintain the Founding Fathers’ religious and racial ideals as imagined in order to counteract the alleged defilement of American society. To do so, the Klan formulated six premises."
He lists them as these:
- The Republic was established by white men.
- It was established for white men.
- It should never fall into the hands of an ‘inferior’ race.
- Blacks must be kept outside of politics.
- Blacks ought to comprehend that Whites are the ones who rule in America.
- Purity of the white blood must be maintained.
"Two important Klan documents from each of these eras—Constitution and Laws of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan (1922) and Klansman’s Manual (1924)—establish that one of the fundaments of the Klan was ‘to maintain forever the God-given supremacy of the white race’."
Spirituality, Forsell tells us, was (is) the most important aspect of Klan thought. It "contributed to strengthen Klansmen’s ambitions to mobilize a vanguard of white, native-born, Protestant Americans, to make them follow Christ as the Klan’s ‘Criterion of Character’ and thereby to enhance the resurgence of American nation in accordance with the Founding Fathers’ alleged religious and racial ideals. Such a religious nationalist and racial exegetical positioning was reflected in the burning cross, a defining symbol for the Klan ever since."
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