White Knights of The Ku Klux Klan
Bowers, along with many other southern whites, was highly disturbed by and deeply feared the "civil rights movement" that was undoing the persecution of African-Americans. He perceived the new civil rights legislation and forced integration as threats to the "Southern way of life."
Bowers perceived the original Ku Klux Klan as being too passive. On February 15, 1964, at a meeting in Brookhaven, Mississippi, he convinced about 200 members of the original Knights to defect and join a highly secret Klan, to be called the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, that would not hesitate to use violence to achieve its goals. He became the group's "imperial wizard" (supreme leader).
Bowers adopted a strict code of secrecy with the purpose of preserving white supremacy in the South.
Read more about this topic: Samuel Bowers
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