Bernard Powers

There is no reason why these crimes can't be prosecuted in federal court, just like the civil rights violations.

You're beating people up and you're lynching people and you're doing all these crimes and you're doing it because you don't want these folks to belong to the Republican Party and you don't want them to vote.

They gave unbelievable testimony.

Yes, sir.

Jim Williams' wife, Rose, just describes in detail exactly what happened, how her husband was sort of found hiding underneath the floorboards, taken out.

Walked out into the woods and hung from a pine tree.

And this courtroom is just absolutely silent.

He became more and more and more militant as time went on.

By the time these trials took place, he was regarded as the most radical member of the cabinet.

He actually went up and gave a speech in Brooklyn.

He had gotten involved in a couple of cases against a big railroad.

And Grant loved businessmen.

He loved big railroad people and rich people.

So the feeling was, on Ackerman's part, that he had alienated, too many rich people had alienated the railroads and he had to leave.

Thaddeus Stevens, the Charles Sumners, Lincoln, he was gone.

They were gone.

Carrying this flag was an increasingly difficult labor.

The Klan, per se, pretty much folded its tents all across the South.

The Ku Klux Klan just disappeared.

All the Black senators and Black congressmen from the South were all gone.