Posted on 11/13/2002 11:14:51 AM PST by stainlessbanner
BILOXI - A group of Confederate re-enactors plans to demonstrate against the Ku Klux Klan if the Klan marches through Biloxi on Nov. 30.
Michael D. Kelley, colonel of the 37th Texas Cavalry re-enactors, said Confederate organizations should take a stand against racist groups using Confederate symbols. The re-enactors plan to hold signs opposing the KKK and furl their flags at the approach of any white-robed Klansmen.
"When the Klan comes around, we will turn our backs and drop our flags to show our disapproval," Kelley said.
The KKK has received a permit to march along city sidewalks, but Kelley's group has not. Kelley, who lives in Pascagoula, said he plans to contact city officials to see if his group is required to obtain a permit.
Kelley said he does not consider the KKK to be a Southern organization.
Jeff Davis of Gainesville, Ga., who said he is a "collateral descendant" of the only president of the Confederate States of America, plans to participate in the counterdemonstration. Davis said his great-great-grandfather was Jefferson Davis's first cousin.
"I have been more and more concerned that the symbols of the Confederacy and our ancestors are being totally annihilated by people such as the KKK," Davis said. "When I was notified they were going to be rallying and marching in Biloxi, which is kind of a hallowed place for Jefferson Davis, I said it's time for us to draw a line in the sand and take back our symbols - not in a belligerent way, but in a very civil way - from besmirching the names of our ancestors and to separate the true descendants from the Confederacy from this bunch of rabble-rousers and racists."
Davis is commander of the President Jefferson Davis Chapter of the Military Order of the Stars and Bars and a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, 27th Georgia Regiment, he said.
But John French, a spokesman for the local regiment of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, said its members will sit out any counterdemonstration.
"Regardless of what your signs say, you're part of the problem," French said. "You lend credence to those things. The best way to keep people like (the Klan) away is to ignore them."
Is he a cross-dresser too?
Okay, okay, I know Varina didn't mean to dress J.D. up in women's clothing.......
Walt
I think the Re-enators are going to star in "Predator III" with Danny Glover.
Walt
You know that when those Klansmen shot those five people in Greensborough in 1979, they were carrying the same flag as the CSA re-enactors.
Walt
The military history is fascinating, even if the political history stinks.
Get it now?
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AB out.
He makes it sound like the CSA Jeff Davis did some fooling around.
I'm glad to see some non-racist people stand up for the stars and bars.
GreensBORO.
What about THESE Klansmen, Wlat?
KKK rally, unknown date
Early KKK poster.
Ohio, 1924.
Virginia, 1925.
D.C., 1926.
Long Island, New York, date unknown.
D.C. again, 1952.
Wow! This one's in color; must be recent!
(BTW- what a crowd they have, huh?)
Klan initiation. Where *is* that Confederate flag, hmmm?
Check the sign out.
LOL!!!!
Is that a Canadian flag? What's the deal with that? I didn't know those freaks were international...
Once the Klan was a big, powerful, dangerous movement. One might even call them terrorists. They actually controlled politics in some states and not just is the south either. That was in the 1920's and early 1930's.
In those years the flag they usually waved was the Stars and Stripes. Which proves nothing about me and mine displaying it.
Ku Klux Klan rally in Indiana in the 1920's
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