137 years ago today:

For decades after the Civil War, the Ku Klux Klan was the terrorist wing of the Democratic Party. Klansmen murdered hundreds of Republican activists and office- holders, including U.S. Representative James Hinds (R-Arkansas).

On this day in 1871, the Republican-controlled 42nd Congress passed and the Republican President, Ulysses Grant, signed into law the Ku Klux Klan Act. The law banned the KKK and other Democrat terrorist organizations. President Grant then deployed federal troops to crush a Klan uprising in South Carolina.

Eleven years later, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned most provisions of the Act. Though legalized, this original version of the Ku Klux Klan soon faded. Why? Because as Democrats regained control over southern state governments, they could oppress African-Americans openly, without need of sheets.

Thus, virtually every racist Jim Crow politician in the South, was in fact, a Democrat. Of course, most of this history is completely unknown to the average Democrat who's idea of history goes back all the way to... this morning when they got out of bed.