A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them

Evangelist Daisy Douglas Barr, preaching temperance and abstinence, fell in with the Klan and its larger goals, using moral purity as a gateway to racial exclusion, and she had the clout and the audience to spread her message far and wide. Prohibition and racism were a perfect fit for the times when the prevailing stereotype of Black men was that, once filled with alcohol, they became “turbulent and dangerous and a menace to life” (54). Barr’s message of temperance aligned with Stephenson’s goal to recruit more women into the Klan, and he designated her “Imperial Empress” of the Klan’s female recruitment arm. She railed at Jews, who were behind the plot, she claimed, to “replace” white Protestants with an “inferior breed.” She urged women to join the “Queens of the Golden Mask.” Klanswomen promoted equality (albeit for white, Protestant women only), and they engaged in their own rituals—parades, picnics, and rallies—as well as patronizing only Klan-approved businesses.

Animus against Jews reaches a fever pitch. Stereotypes were trotted out with rhetorical fervor, Henry Ford placed an antisemitic tract inside every Model T (alongside the owner’s manual), and conspiracy theories about Jews “control[ing] the world” proliferated (60).