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NBC Radio – Ned Brooks Commentary – March 30, 1965 – Gordon Skene Sound Collection –
In his commentary for NBC Radio on March 30, 1965, Ned Brooks disclosed the House Un-American Activities Commission on Capitol Hill was scheduled to begin an investigation of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK), which President Johnson referred to as “a hooded society of bigots”. The investigation was sparked by recent violence directed at Civil Rights workers in the South including church bombings, lynchings and drive-by killings.
Robert Shelton, Imperial Wizard of the group denied any wrong-doing, but investigators alleged it was the actions of various splinter groups called “knock-off squads or Holy Terrors” responsible for the wave of shocking crimes committed by these highly secret “action groups” within the Klan. Shelton denied such groups existed and purportedly welcomed the investigation. In the past it was the responsibility of these investigations to concentrate on Communist activity. Not only was the Klan being subjected to this investigation, but also The Black Muslims, The American Nazi Party and The Minutemen.A Republican Congressman from Alabama took to the floor of Congress earlier in the day to call for an expansion of the hearings to also include various African-American Civil Rights groups, mentioning by name CORE (Congress Of Racial Equality), The Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and the NAACP. James Martin (R-Alabama) alleged that in the past he has pointed out Communist infiltration of some of these Civil Rights groups, He went on to say “we are against lynching and mob rule and killing, whether inspired by cowardly riders in the night or pious hypocrites agitating in the public streets”. However, preliminary investigations pointed to highly secret groups within the Klan, responsible for this wave of heinous crimes.
The investigation would be getting underway and was expected to take several weeks, if not months to come to conclusions.
Here is that report from Ned Brooks on March 30, 1965.
