No, they did right by just driving off the trouble makers. Had any white been killed during this, they would have all been hung.
Sorry, but I disagree.
"Here's how, they pull a knife, you pull a gun. He sends one of yours to the hospital, you send on of his to the morgue!"
I agree. Or blacks would have been singled out for terminal retaliation. Or the matter would have been misrepresented to cause more whites into sympathy for the Klan. Or whatever.
What they did served the purpose and left them on a higher moral ground than who they opposed.