There’s a 1920s Klan pamphlet, The Menace of Modern Immigration, that is worth recalling in the lead-up to the current presidential election. Written by H.W. Evans, the second Imperial Wizard of the second incarnation of the Klan, the cover features a dragon with horns, fangs, and sharp claws vomiting people, instead of fire. A steady stream of immigrants, dressed in supposedly ethnic fashion, flows out of its jaws.
Evans wrote that America was founded by white Protestant patriots “with an inherent, kindred reverence for rightly established institutions.” Immigrants, he sounded the alarm again and again, would destroy everything that white Protestant men held dear: America, religion, traditional norms of femininity, masculinity, and patriotism. For the Klan, immigrants proved dangerous because they could change not only the demographics, but also the culture of America. If the nation were to remain white and Protestant, immigration could not be allowed. Much of what the Klan feared was the demise of the power and privilege of white Christian men.
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