KKK Imperial Wizard Greets Killen as (Civil Rights Murders) Trial Unfolds

[Maddy McCall]

By Jerry Mitchell
[e-mail]

PHILADELPHIA (Mississippi) — When accused killer Edgar Ray Killen arrived Monday morning at the Neshoba County Courthouse, a well-wisher from out of town immediately greeted him.

"Anything I can do," said J.J. Harper of Cordele, Ga., imperial wizard of the American White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, who clasped Killen's fingers in a handshake as the 80-year-old defendant exited a white Mercury Grand Marquis.

snip/

In January, Harper requested permission to demonstrate on the courthouse lawn in support of Killen. At the time of the request, the Web site of the American White Knights showed a hanging post with three nooses holding the severed hands of African Americans. The post read "Murder in Mississippi," but the word "Murder" was crossed out in red with the word "Justice" written over it.

snip/

Harper was joined in the courtroom Monday by several others, one of them wearing the same Klan cross on his coat lapel. None of them would speak to reporters. Moments after a bailiff sat the Klan group next to an African American, the Klan group moved, only to have a black potential juror come and sit next to them. One of Killen's lawyers, James McIntyre of Jackson, didn't appreciate their presence. "I don't want them here," he said.

Much more at this link:
http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050614/NEWS010702/506140379/1002

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In a recent Zogby poll, 83% of Mississippians supported the re-prosecution of Killen for the murders of Goodman, Schwerner, and Chaney.

I hope these Klan assholes will go back to Georgia. Or, maybe they should stay--because they demonstrate to the jury just what Killen really is. :grr:

[RPM]

1. just 83%???

guh.

[AnnInLa]

2. It makes my skin crawl

to think the KKK shows itself so proudly and defiantly.

[salin]

4. arrogant and self-righteous in their hate

n/t

[TahitiNut]

3. Just another right-wing KKKristian group, KKKrucifix and all.

:eyes:

[Stockholm]

5. LOL

At one point, Gordon asked potential jurors to tell whether they were related to Killen. Three raised their hands.

One man with the same last name said he was a distant cousin.

"How distant?" the judge asked.

"I don't know," the man answered.

"Guess you missed the boat," the judge joked.

The judge dismissed all three relatives.

[Gman]

6. Call them what they really are

Right wing Republicans. The Klansmen are all right wing Republicans.

[theshadow]

8. Maybe, but....

.... the original Klan was formed by Democrats.

[Toots]

11. You have proof of that

You know who formed the klan and it's purpose? Granted many southern Democrats left the Democratic Party and joined the Republican Party during the civil rights debates of the sixties because the Republican Party was the right fit for them. Why was the Republican Part the right fit for them if Democrats owned the Klan?

[ret5hd]

12. they were dems because lincoln was a republican...

now they're republican because (hell, what a brain-fart. whats the name of the tx dem president in the '60's?) anyway, they're repugs now because he (whatever his name was) was a dem.

on edit: JOHNSON...remembered as soon as the pressure was off.

[Frances]

13. How many times did I hear people say that

Ike was the right man for president but that they couldn't vote for the Party of Lincoln?

Yes the Klan members voted against Republicans UNTIL Martin Luther King was befriended by Democrats. Then they switched to the Party of Nixon--and Reagan. Remember Reagan went to Mississippi and spoke kindly of the white people in the town where the 3 young civil rights workers were murdered.

[Conker]

17. So then Nixon, and Reagan were racists?

I don't understand Republicans and racism.Are they divided on the issue?The RNC quotes: "Abolishing slavery. Free speech. Women's suffrage. In today's stereotypes, none of these sounds like a typical Republican issue, yet they are stances the Republican Party, in opposition to the Democratic Party, adopted early on."Aren't most Republicans racist?

[Frances]

19. Abraham Lincoln was a Republican

From at least the end of the Civil War until Nixon, white Southerners were staunch Democrats (my hometown newspaper was The Clake County Democrat) because the Republicans were seen as pro-Negro (the word used in those days).

Then when John Kennedy was president, there were riots when blacks wanted to integrate the University of Mississippi and the University of Alabama. John Kennedy, as president of the U.S., had to see to it that the military allowed these blacks to enroll. He made some great speeches, which impressed me, a white college student, who had never known anything but segregation.

When Kennedy was killed, many whites in the South were pleased. There were looking for a political party that would reflect their racism. George Wallace was very popular with them, but then Wallace was shot and so severely injured that he was out of the running for president.

Lee Atwater, the Karl Rove of his day, made sure that the racists knew they would be welcome in the Republican party. Today white southerners with racist views are 99.99% Republican.

Both Lee Atwater and George Wallace repented of their racist exploitation. However, if they had their lives to live over, I think they would have done exactly the same thing. They were too caught up in wanting power. One difference between Wallace and Bush and his camp is that Wallace was a populist. He raised teacher salaries in Alabama back in 1963 and he instituted a community college system all across the state of Alabama.

[Conker]

20. Thank you for answering my question.

So today is it the opposite?Democrats are considered "Pro-Negro", and Republicans aren't?

[Frances]

21. Yes

The South is very complicated. Whites can be very cordial to African Americans and still believe that they shouldn't vote for the same politicians that African Americans vote for.

Poor whites vote against their own economic interests when they do so, but in exchange for voting for the white power structure (a 60s term), poor whites know that the white power structure will not confine poor whites to the very bottom of the social-economic ladder. That place is reserved for African Americans.

Lee Atwater and now Karl Rove have taken this idea and used it on a national scale. To an alarming degree, poor and working class whites support Bush because they know that he will guarantee them a higher place on the social ladder than the immigrants that are coming to this country.

[Conker]

24. That reminds me of the saying

that people always hate being dead last.

[Gman]

16. Bullshit!

That has nothing to do with Democrats today and you know it. That all ended 40 years ago when those nut case right wing Klan members jumped to the GOP where they were welcome and where they remain to this very day.

It is an indisputable FACT that these Klansmen are right wing Republicans.

Why are you parroting a freeper slur?

[TroglodyteScholar]

7. Don't send them back here, please...

I hope these Klan assholes will go back to Georgia. Or, maybe they should stay--because they demonstrate to the jury just what Killen really is. :grr:

Look, we don't want those assholes here either. Can't they just stay for the duration of the trial and then be floated off into the gulf? If we give them a good shove, they ought to end up in the middle of the ocean where they'll be pleased to find absolutely no colored folk.....

[bunkerbuster1]

14. Oh, please, send them to my Georgia 'burb

I know a fair number of folks who'd just love to give these Klan chickenshits a warm reception.

[montana_hazeleyes]

9. The klan

is a terrorist group. Period. Why aren't they treated as such? It's disgusting and sickening.

[tabasco]

10. If there is a hell, these assholes are going there.

They are living proof that we are not much evolved from other animals.

[0007]

18. WE claim superiority and yet nothing has changed in over 5000

years.

[damntexdem]

15. Maybe they'll come every day and sit in their robes ...

right in front of the jury.

[RalphReedsWreckedEm]

22. Who do you think that Killen voted for in 2004 for President?

Just asking....

Well?

[TroglodyteScholar]

23. Perhaps he wrote in David Duke? n/t