The American flag that the KKK carried represented the emblem of American nationalism and the willingness to die for the nation, which the KKK compared to Jesus’ burden of the cross. KKK member Reverend W.C. Wright argued that the American Flag “purchased by blood and suffering of American heroes articulated the price paid for American liberties.” The KKK tied the American flag with religious patriotism where they compared themselves and their work to protecting the American nation as Jesus protected humanity. The KKK believed that the red on the American flag represented the blood and sacrifice that American hero’s paid for American liberty, democracy, and free speech, the white on the flag represents the purity, intelligence, and citizenship …show more content…
William Simmons, who was the first imperial wizard of the KKK, made it his goal to preserve the superiority of the White race in America by thwarting Cosmopolitan movements that threatened American virtues like Communism, Socialism, and Anarchism, which “diverted the American way of thinking and would ultimately destroy American ideals with their subversive ideas.” Hiram Evans the second imperial wizard of the KKK wrote in The North American Review that “there is not a single colored stock that can claim equality with the white; much less supremacy.”, which demonstrates that the KKK believed that the ideals of pure Americanism and Protestantism were supreme to any other race and that these ideals must be protected. D.C. Stephenson who was the Grand Dragon of Indiana in 1923, took a militant style of American nationalism and argued that “we shall use any means necessary to intercept the radical movements brought by foreigners that will destroy Americanism and will tear down the nation as foreigners do not have allegiance to America or uphold similar ideas.” Stephenson illustrates that the ideology of American nationalism ingrained in the KKK justified the use of force and violence to stop immigrants from destroying American ideals like the tenants of Protestantism. The KKK believed that Americanism was bred by native White, Protestant Americans that was absorbed in homes, learned in schools, and breathed in the air of American principles where it was believed that Americans were born American and foreigners could not become Americans by being naturalized or assimilating. The nationalist ideology of the KKK had an