http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A26485-2002Mar1
On the business about Byrd's brief Klan membership, Mr. Jackson again quoted the story: "The fact is that he was a Kleagle, or organizer, for the Klan during World War II and wrote as late as 1946 to Dr. Samuel Green of Atlanta, Imperial Grand Wizard of the Klan, recommending a friend as a Kleagle and urging promotion of the Klan throughout the nation."
Mr. Jackson said the story also reported that in 1946, Byrd wrote to Imperial Wizard Green: "The Klan is needed today as never before and I am anxious to see its rebirth here in West Virginia."
As for "youthful indiscretion," Mr. Jackson observed that in 1946, Robert Byrd was 29 years old. American Taliban John Walker Lindh, he pointed out, is 20.
Byrd knew what he was doing, said Mr. Jackson. In 1945, a year earlier, Byrd wrote to Mississippi's virulent segregationist Sen. Theodore Bilbo that he would never serve in an integrated Army. "Rather I should die a thousand times, and see Old Glory trampled in the dirt never to rise again, than to see this beloved land of ours become degraded by race mongrels, a throwback to the blackest specimen from the wilds," Byrd wrote. Confronted with the letter in 1999, Byrd said he didn't recall writing it, but he said, "I will not dispute the quote, though I consider it deplorable."
Thanks for the post. Yep...Byrd really is the "Conscience of the Senate"...if one is referring to the Roman Senate in its final days of amoral debauchery.