Tag: stetson kennedy

Redacted History: Tax Privacy and the KKK

By Sam Brunson

Tax Lien by Nick Youngson, CC BY-SA 3.0, Alpha Stock Images, Original image at The Blue Diamond Gallery.

A year and a half ago, I learned that in the 1940s, the IRS revoked the Ku Klux Klan’s tax exemption and sued it for almost $700,000 in back taxes. Two years later, the IRS filed a tax lien against the KKK’s assets. While that may not have been the death blow to the 1920s iteration of the KKK, it was certainly part of the death blow.

I’ve since learned a lot more about the whole story, including how the KKK could claim exemption in the first place. I’ve read dozens of contemporary (and retrospective) newspaper articles about the revocation. Heck, I’ve read through a couple Stetson Kennedy archives. I’m dying to write an article about this piece of history.

There’s only one problem: I don’t know why the KKK lost its exemption.

Continue reading “Redacted History: Tax Privacy and the KKK” →

The IRS vs. the KKK

By Sam Brunson

My family’s summer vacation has already given me two posts (here and here), and it still promises a couple more, including this one.

As we drove across Alabama, we stopped by the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. The BCRI is, in large part, a museum of the civil rights movement; it is not only interesting and informative, but it is deeply powerful and affecting to see how white Americans (mis)treated African Americans, what motivated civil rights activists, and what they faced in their activism.

I didn’t go in looking for taxes, but the Institute handed them to me anyway: Continue reading “The IRS vs. the KKK” →