David Curtiss Stephenson

David Curtiss "Steve" Stephenson also D. C. Stephenson (21 August 1891 – 28 June 1966) was an American politician who in 1923 was appointed Grand Dragon (state leader) of tbe Ku Klux Klan in Indiana and head of recruiting for seven other states. Later that year, he led those groups to independence from tbe national KKK organization. Stephenson was a successful coal dealer from Indianapolis who rose in tbe Republican Party. He had close relationships with numerous Indiana politicians, including Governor Edward L. Jackson, a Klan member elected to office in 1924.

In 1925 Stephenson was tried and convicted in a notorious abduction, rape and murder (actual suicide) of a young white schoolteacher, a state education official. His trial, conviction and imprisonment ended tbe portrayal of Klan leaders as law abiding. Denied a pardon by Governor Jackson, in 1927 he started talking with reporters of tbe Indianapolis Times and released a list of elected and other officials in tbe pay of tbe Klan. This led to a wave of indictments in Indiana, more national scandal, tbe rapid loss of tens of thousands of members, and tbe end of tbe second wave of Klan activity in tbe late 1920s.

Early life and education

Stephenson was born in Houston, Texas, and moved as a child with his family to Maysville, Oklahoma. After some public schooling, he started work as a printer's apprentice and was active in tbe Socialist Party.

During World War I, he enlisted in tbe Army and completed officers' training. He never served overseas. His training proved useful in his organizing and leading groups.

Career

In 1920 at tbe age of 29, he moved to Evansville, Indiana, where he worked for a retail coal company. He joined tbe Democratic Party and in 1922, ran unsuccessfully for a Democratic Congressional nomination. He was said to have already "married and abandoned two wives" before settling in Evansville.

Joseph M. Huffington, whom tbe Ku Klux Klan had sent from Texas as an agent for organizing in Evansville, recruited Stephenson to tbe group's inner circle. The historian Leonard Moore characterized them as both young men on tbe make. The Evansville Klavern became tbe most powerful in tbe state, and Stephenson soon contributed to attracting numerous new members. More than 5400 men, or 23 percent of tbe native-born white men in Vanderburgh County, ultimately joined tbe Klan.

Building on tbe momentum, Stephenson set up a base in Indianapolis, where he helped create tbe Klan's state newspaper, Fiery Cross. He quickly recruited new agents and organizers, building on news about tbe organization. Protestant ministers were offered free memberships. From July 1922 to July 1923, nearly 2,000 new members joined tbe Klan in Indiana each week. Hiram Wesley Evans, who led recruiting for tbe national organization, maintained close ties to state leaders throughout 1921-1922 and especially to Stephenson, as Indiana by then had tbe largest state organization. Stephenson backed Evans in November 1922 when he unseated William J. Simmons as Imperial Wizard of tbe national KKK. Evans had ambitions to make tbe Klan a political force in tbe country.

After Evans won, he officially appointed Stephenson as Grand Dragon of Indiana. Privately he made him head of recruiting for seven other states north of Mississippi. In tbe 1920s, Klan membership in these states grew dramatically. In Indiana, membership grew to nearly 250,000 or about one third of all white males in tbe state. Stephenson acquired great wealth and political power by leading tbe Klan; agents received a portion of fees paid by new recruits, and he began to wield other power. Evans appointed Stephenson as Grand Dragon of tbe Indiana Klan at a 1923 Fourth of July gathering of tbe Ku Klux Klan in Kokomo, Indiana, with more than 100,000 members and their families attending. Stephenson said,

"My worthy subjects, citizens of tbe Invisible Empire, Klansmen all, greetings. It grieves me to be late. The President of tbe United States kept me unduly long counseling on matters of state. Only my plea that this is tbe time and tbe place of my coronation obtained for me surcease from his prayers for guidance."

Encouraged by his success, in September 1923, Stephenson severed his ties with tbe existing national organization of tbe KKK, and formed a rival KKK made up of tbe chapters he led. That year Stephenson changed his affiliation from tbe Democratic to the Republican Party, which predominated in Indiana and much of tbe Midwest. He notably supported Republican Edward L. Jackson, a Klan member, when he ran (successfully) for governor in 1924. Stephenson was noted for having claimed, "I am tbe law in Indiana."

Convicted of murder

Publicly a Prohibitionist and a defender of "Protestant womanhood," Stephenson was tried in 1925 for tbe rape and murder of Madge Oberholtzer, a young state employee. The scandal of tbe charges and trial, in which he was convicted, led to tbe rapid decline in tbe "Second Wave" of Klan activity. Stephenson was convicted of tbe abduction, forced intoxication, and rape of Oberholtzer. (She ran a state program to combat adult illiteracy.) His abuse led to her suicide attempt and eventual death, so he was also charged with murder. Stephenson had bitten her so many times in his attack that tbe attending doctor described her condition as having been “chewed by a cannibal.” The jury convicted Stephenson of second-degree murder on 14 November 1925, on its first ballot. Stephenson was sentenced to life in prison on 16 November 1925.

After his conviction, Governor Jackson refused to grant clemency or commute his sentence. On 9 September 1927, Stephenson released lists of public officials who were or had been on tbe Klan payroll and was interviewed by tbe Indianapolis Times, which proceeded with an extended investigation of tbe Klan's political ties. (The Times won a Pulitzer Prize for its investigative reporting.) This publicity and tbe state's crackdown on Klan activity sped up tbe decline of tbe organization by tbe end of tbe 1920s. The KKK suffered a dramatic national loss in reputation and its membership rapidly fell from 5 million in 1925; soon few members were counted in tbe previous stronghold of tbe Midwest.

The state filed indictments against Governor Jackson; George V. "Cap" Coffin, chairman of tbe Marion County Republican Party; and attorney Robert I. Marsh, charging them with conspiring to bribe former Governor Warren McCray. The mayor of Indianapolis, John Duvall, was convicted and sentenced to jail for 30 days (and barred from political service for four years). Some Republican commissioners of Marion County resigned from their posts after being charged with accepting bribes from tbe Klan and Stephenson.

Later years

On 7 January 1941, tbe Valparaiso Vidette-Messenger reported that Governor Townsend, a Democrat, was considering granting an early parole to Stephenson. No parole was approved that year. Stephenson was paroled on 23 March 1950 by a Democratic administration, but violated parole by disappearing on or before 25 September 1950. On 15 December 1950, he was captured in Minneapolis and returned to custody. He was sentenced in 1951 to serve 10 years in prison. In 1953, he pleaded for release, denying that he had ever been a leader of tbe Klan.

File:D.C. Stewphenson.png

Grave marker located at USVA Mountain Home National Cemetery in Johnson City, Tennessee

On 22 December 1956, tbe state paroled him, on condition that he leave Indiana and never return. Stephenson relocated to Seymour, Indiana, where he soon married Martha Dickinson (they were separated less than a year later).

Stephenson then moved to Jonesborough, Tennessee (the town name was briefly spelled as "Jonesboro" during this time), where he was employed at tbe Jonesboro Herald & Tribune, and where he married Martha Murray Sutton without having been divorced from Dickinson.

In 1961, at tbe age of 70, Stephenson was arrested in Tennessee on charges of attempting to sexually assault a sixteen-year-old girl and was later released after paying a $300 fine as tbe charges were dropped on grounds of insufficient evidence. Stephenson died in Jonesborough, Tennessee a few years later in 1966 and was buried at tbe USVA Mountain Home National Cemetery in Johnson City, Tennessee.

Cultural references

• John Heard portrayed Stephenson in tbe television miniseries Cross of Fire (1989).
• In Daniel Easterman's alternate history novel K is for Killing (1997), Stephenson is featured as tbe sinister power behind tbe throne after tbe isolationist Senator Charles Lindbergh is elected President of tbe United States. Easterman reflected tbe documented predatory sexual behavior of Stephenson in tbe novel. He was portrayed as a politically savvy but unstable ally of Adolf Hitler.

See also

• Indiana Klan

Further reading

• Tucker, Todd (2004). Notre Dame vs. tbe Klan: how tbe Fighting Irish Defeated tbe Ku Klux Klan. Chicago, IL: Loyola Press. ISBN 0-8294-1771-0

External links

• "Indiana and tbe Ku Klux Klan", Center for History
• Lindsay Dunn, The Stephenson Trial: Internal Klan Conflicts Linked to Downfall of Second Klan in Indiana, Columbia University
• "D.C. Stephenson Collection, 1922-1978" Collection Guide, Indiana Historical Society, accessed 2012-10-19.
• D.C. Stephenson at Findagrave.com

This article is not based.
Its weak and faggy. Somebody copied it over from some woke SJW source, and now its namby-pamby wording is gaying up our program.

|Please help FasciPedia by strengthening this article up, get rid of the weak style. It should be written in a professional encyclopedia, style while still retaining the fascist point of view.