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Martha Marshall woke at 3am to someone shouting “Nigger!” outside her house. Then a firebomb crashed through the window, and everything was on fire! Outside was a “Join the Klan” sign. Two months later, the entire house was burned down.
But this wasn’t Jim Crow days, and the Marshalls weren’t being driven out of the neighborhood by just any KKK members. It was 1985. And these were cops.
Operating well into the 1980s, this Klan group had about 40 constituents, more than half of them police officers. They called themselves the “Confederate Officers' Patriot Squad,” or COPS.
Their reasons for joining the Klan?
“Not anti-Black … pro-white!” Was the slogan for some. “[We’re] against reverse discrimination,” said others.
For them, it was simple. They believed being in the KKK didn’t mean they couldn’t also be devoted, successful policemen. Turns out … they were right.
Policing, in itself, is rooted in white supremacy. And this history is often a lot more recent than you might think. In fact, a couple of stragglers from COPS only left the force in 2021.
Just as devout KKK members were allowed to "protect and serve" into the 80s, cops are still hiding out in white supremacist group chats, murdering our loved ones, and getting off scot free. When we all know this to be true, we’ll have no choice but to fight for a better system.