Read Ten Dollars to Hate The Texas Man Who Fought the Klan Sam Rayburn Series on Rural Life sponsored by Texas AM UniversityCommerce Patricia Bernstein 9781623497187 Books

Product details Series Sam Rayburn Series on Rural Life, sponsored by Texas A&M University-Commerce (Book 23) Paperback 384 pages Publisher Texas A&M University Press; Reprint edition (November 2, 2018) Language English ISBN-10 1623497183

Ten Dollars to Hate The Texas Man Who Fought the Klan Sam Rayburn Series on Rural Life sponsored by Texas AM UniversityCommerce Patricia Bernstein 9781623497187 Books Reviews

• Patricia Bernstein, in "Ten Dollars to Hate," performs a valuable public service in recounting the resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s and the courageous reaction of Texas prosecutor (later Texas governor) Dan Moody against it. Her synthesis of Klan history is a reminder of how "nice" folks can be demagogued and intimidated into attacks on innocent minorities. Her recalling Moody's resistance reassures us that wiser, braver -- nicer -- folks can prevent poisonous groups from imposing their warped views on society at large. But they have to stand up and do it. Patricia is a treasured friend of mine, a dogged researcher, a talented writer and a passionate, remarkably energetic advocate for justice. She is an expert on the Klan. Her previous works include "The First Waco Horror," an account of a horrific 1916 Waco lynching. (The title spins off a second Waco horror, the Branch Davidian tragedy.) As Patricia recounts, the events described in "Ten Dollars" and "First Horror" happen when America loses its way in struggling toward freedom and justice for all, a struggle that continues today. Her passion shows in the adjectives she attaches to crimes that speak for themselves -- heinous, hideous and savage. She also helps us remember that hate is multi-dimensional. It is not a cancer of the right-wing alone. It can be found on the left, too, and "enlightened" Americans need to guard against contempt for the "less enlightened," an attitude that is itself a form of hate and fed the rise of Donald Trump. Patricia demonstrates her own respect for the need to educate the unaware by retelling these stories.
• This book is a true-crime, adventure narrative of a youthful, courageous Texas District Attorney who takes on a sinister and politically powerful, multi-state gang-- the second Ku Klux Klan. Reading this engaging saga, you are tempted to wonder who will play Dan Moody in the Steven Spielberg movie?
  
  With methodical, well-footnoted accuracy, author Patricia Bernstein produces a vivid portrait of a real hero who fights and defeats Goliath and his gang. Perhaps, more importantly, Bernstein paints a political-cultural diorama of Texas and America in the early 20th century explaining how bias, fear and hatred can become so virulent and ubiquitous. She explains how this second incarnation of the KKK was far more broadly focused than an anti-Negro or anti-Catholic group of bullies. The author also shows how the Klan actually operated as an opportunistic movement capable of hating and targeting anyone who displeased it.
  
  This book is also fascinating because it presents a nuanced context from which other political heroes arise. There is a poignant vignette of a courageous twenty-seven- year-old, first-time member of the Texas House from deep East Texas who delivers fiery orations against the Imperial Wizard and his representatives and introduces legislation to criminalize law enforcement officers who conspired with the Klan. Young John William Wright Patman would go on to become nationally prominent as the dean of the U.S. House of Representatives and Chair of its powerful Banking and Currency Committee.
  
  Young Wright Patman was joined in his opposition to the Klan by his deskmate in the Texas House, Sam Ealy Johnson. In his Hill County district, many German Americans and Mexican Americans were vilified and intimidated by the Klan. Sam’s son, Lyndon became President of the United States and was responsible for the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965.
  
  LBJ proudly explained in 1965 “My father fought them [the Klan] many long years ago in Texas and I have fought them all my life because I know their loyalty is not to the United State of America but instead to a hooded society of bigots.”
  
  The protagonist hero, Dan Moody, goes on to become the youngest Attorney General in the history of Texas and later its Governor. Perhaps the blockbuster movie should end here. The rest of Patricia Bernstein’s book is a rich and detailed chronicle of the rough and tumble of Texas politics including colorful figures such as Ma and Pa Ferguson and “Pappy” Lee (Pass the Biscuits) O’Daniel and the Hillbilly Boys.
  
  This story of the anti-corruption, crime fighter ends with irony. Dan Moody becomes the attorney for Coke Stevenson in his legal battle contesting the election of “landslide” Lyndon Johnson who wins the 1948 U.S. Senate seat in Texas by 87 votes. Moody focuses on the now infamous Box 13 in Alice, Texas and the influence of George Parr, “The Duke of Duval.” The case ends in an injunction hearing in the chambers of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black.
  
  Lyndon Johnson is represented by five lawyers, including Abe Fortas; Coke Stevenson is represented by one, Dan Moody. Justice Black orders the injunction lifted, LBJ won and the rest is history.
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  This review was originally written for the Journal of the Texas Supreme Court Historical Society.
• With this book, Patricia Bernstein has given us a sweeping, meticulously researched and gripping account of the second reign of terror of the Ku Klux Klan in America, and particularly in Texas, in the early 1920s. (The first came in the aftermath of the Civil War.) She focuses her story on the charismatic, fearless Dan Moody, a young prosecutor in Williamson County who doggedly fought, and eventually conquered, the seemingly all-powerful, above-the-law Klan, securing the first ever conviction and imprisonment of Klansmen for the savage beating of a young travelling salesman in 1923. Decency, and the rule of law, had finally prevailed, and the Klan melted quickly into the shadows. The 29-year-old Moody was hailed as a hero, and in short order became the attorney general of Texas and then, at 33, its youngest governor. But, as Bernstein reminds us, and as our current political and social climate illustrates all too starkly, “the lingering tragedy of the Klan…. is that just as the Klan did not introduce violence and bigotry into American life, the demise of the bloated Klan of the of the twenties did not eradicate these aspects of American society, either.”
• Excellent, excellent book.
• Another fascinating book by Patricia Bernstein. Who would have thought Rice University would have a Klan picture in its yearbooks under Clubs?
• Terrifying, but quite readable.
• There is SO MUCH to love about this book. As a Native Texan, I was fascinated AND horrified that these are places I know. The characters were extraordinarily brave and so normal at the same time. What a story!
  However, I gave it 3 stars due to the pace. The first half of the book is dedicated almost solely to the history of the 2nd rising of the Klan, and it is honestly on incredibly BRUTAL story after another. I had to put it away for a little while and come back to it later. It’s tough to take. The tide of all the violence and hate doesn’t kick it until about midway through the book.
  Is it worth it to read through to the end? Yes! But do I see how the pacing and the initial focus could make people give up? Yes.
• A drag. Like characters but not the besr