Shortly after The Leopard’s Spots appeared, Dixon began to research the second novel of a proposed trilogy in which he hoped to tell the “true” story of Reconstruction. In the process of sifting through vast numbers of books and pamphlets, he found time to write another novel on a very different theme. The One Woman, published in 1903, was in essence an anti-socialist polemic. It deals with the career of Frank Gordon, a minister with socialist sympathies who hopes to create a new, independent church. A wealthy young woman, Kate Ransom, encourages his ambition with a gift of one million dollars. Gordon later divorces his wife and marries Kate. But having undermined the family (which Dixon regarded as a crucial bulwark of civilization), they are not left to enjoy their “shared wealth” for very long. Gordon’s best friend, Mark Overman, falls in love with Kate and wins her. When she leaves him, Gordon kills Overman. He is twice sentenced to death for murder but finally reprieved by the governor of New York, coincidentally a former boyfriend of Gordon’s first wife. Despite—or perhaps because of—the fact that it was criticized as being of “doubtful propriety,” The One Woman sold almost as well as The Leopard’s Spots.63
In 1905, Dixon published a third novel—his second dealing with the Reconstruction period—under the title The Clansman: An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan. Although the book is the first Dixon novel not to have a preacher as a main character, many of the other characters are clearly derived from The Leopard’s Spots. Everett Lowell becomes Austin Stoneman and Lowell’s daughter, Helen, becomes Elsie Stoneman. Lowell’s protégé, George Harris, is transformed into Stoneman’s protégé, Silas Lynch. Flora is now Marion Lenoir and will be sexually pursued not by Dick but by Gus. Major Stuart Dameron, John Durham, and Charles Gaston have all been combined into the single character of Ben Cameron. The faithful souls are no longer Nelse and Eva, but Mammy and Jake. Because much of the story will revolve around the two families, the Camerons and the Stonemans, additional characters include Ben Cameron’s parents, Dr. and Mrs. Richard Cameron, and his sister, Margaret, together with Elsie Stoneman’s brother, Phil.
Book I of The Clansman begins in a Washington hospital. Elsie Stoneman is playing the banjo and singing to wounded soldiers when she is interrupted by news of the ending of the Civil War. One of the wounded soldiers is Ben Cameron, a young Confederate colonel captured at Petersburg. Phil Stoneman, who had been with the Union army there, has earlier written to his sister describing Cameron’s heroism and asking her to look after him.64 Although Cameron is recovering from his wounds, Elsie is told by the doctor that he has been condemned to be hung as a guerrilla. Colonel Cameron’s mother arrives at the hospital and on being notified of the threat to her son’s life, she and Elsie determine to seek a pardon from President Lincoln. Even though Lincoln agrees to spare Ben Cameron’s life, Secretary of War Stanton refuses to implement the order, emphasizing that there is political pressure from Austin Stoneman, Elsie’s father and leader of the House of Representatives, for Cameron’s swift execution. The president insists on having his way and prepares the pardon. At this point, Austin Stoneman arrives at the White House and he and Lincoln have a long argument over the treatment of the former Confederate states. Stoneman demands that they be treated as “conquered provinces,” with rebels exiled and disfranchised and blacks given the vote. Lincoln, by contrast, insists that he will show clemency to the defeated South, argues that it will not be possible for whites and blacks to live together permanently on terms of political and social equality, and supports the colonization or expulsion of all blacks from America as his ultimate solution to the race question.65 Elsie, leaving the White House, delivers the pardon to Ben Cameron’s mother and sister, Margaret, whom she finds at the hospital. Later that day, Elsie and her brother Phil call upon the Camerons, and Phil is immediately impressed with Margaret Cameron. He invites her to join him and Elsie at Ford’s Theatre that evening. All three, therefore, are present when President Lincoln is assassinated. Lincoln’s death provokes cries for vengeance and many Southerners are arrested. One of them is Ben Cameron’s father, Richard, who, having once given medical treatment to Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederacy, is charged with complicity in Lincoln’s murder and placed in jail in Washington.66
Book II starts with the aftermath of the assassination. The main focus of political power in the nation has now shifted to Stoneman’s Washington home, presided over by his mulatto housekeeper, Lydia Brown. At a dinner with his two principal assistants, Colonel Howle and Silas Lynch, a mulatto protégé, Stoneman discusses what is to become of the South now that Lincoln is no more.67 To safeguard the future of both the Republican Party and the nation itself, he asserts, it will be necessary to confiscate the land of former Confederates and divide it between blacks and loyal Unionists. Howle and Lynch are sent off on a secret mission to the South. Meanwhile, under pressure from Secretary of War Stanton, a military court finds several suspects guilty of complicity in Lincoln’s assassination and they are executed. Mrs. Cameron, worried the same fate may be in store for her husband, pleads with Elsie to ask her father to use his influence with Andrew Johnson, the new president, to let her visit Dr. Cameron in jail. Stoneman accedes to the request of his daughter, whom he adores, and President Johnson agrees to see Mrs. Cameron. Though reluctant at first, the president finally allows her to see her husband. While Dr. Cameron is convinced that he is destined to be executed, he makes light of his situation to his wife and persuades her to return home to South Carolina, where there are many people in need of help. Two weeks after Mrs. Cameron and Margaret leave, Ben is finally discharged from hospital. During his convalescence, his relationship with Elsie grows steadily. When they go for a sail on the river together, he pays court to her but at the same time explains that slavery was the fault of the North as well as the South and points to the earlier existence of antislavery sentiment in the South. He then tells Elsie that he loves her, and she confesses that she returns his love. Subsequently, the two lovers attend the first meeting of Congress since the Civil War and watch it refuse to seat the newly elected representatives from the South. Austin Stoneman then successfully moves the appointment of a Congressional Committee on Reconstruction to take over the government of the “conquered provinces” of the South. Elsie makes it plain to Ben, who almost despite himself has been impressed by Stoneman’s performance, that she loves her father and is not prepared to marry without his approval.68
The next few chapters deal primarily with the duel between Andrew Johnson, Lincoln’s successor as president, and Stoneman. Johnson vetoes the first bill attempting to give the suffrage to Southern blacks, and since black suffrage is unpopular in the North, Stoneman is unable to find the two-thirds majority in Congress necessary to override the presidential veto. He consequently launches a publicity campaign about the “barbarism” of Southerners, and in the following elections, the North sends many new radicals to support his policies. To weaken the president, Stoneman introduces a bill that will take away his power to remove cabinet officers. Although the bill is an attempt to protect the position of Stanton, the radical secretary of war, it is also carefully designed to provide the grounds for Johnson’s impeachment and removal from office if he violates it. Stoneman now reintroduces his black suffrage bill. When he finds that he is one vote short of being able to pass the bill over Johnson’s veto, he is so furious that he decides to expel sufficient Democrats from the House and Senate to give the Republicans a clear two-thirds majority. With this done, Stoneman is finally able to pass the acts to protect Stanton, give blacks the vote, and impose military Reconstruction on the South. When Johnson attempts a futile veto of the Reconstruction bill, Stoneman introduces a bill for his impeachment. Meanwhile, Elsie Stoneman and Ben Cameron are growing steadily closer, though Elsie is disturbed by what her father is trying to do to the white people of the South and dreads the day when he and Ben will come into conflict with each other. Phil Stoneman is also critical of Austin Stoneman’s Southern policies, suspicious of the influence
of Lydia Brown. His father, however, perceiving Johnson’s removal as vital to his plan to give confiscated land to Southern blacks, presses on with the impeachment and trial of the president. So great is the strain, however, that Stoneman’s health collapses and he is obliged to remain in bed. Though he rallies for one final appeal to the senators trying Johnson, the radicals fail by one vote to convict the president. In the aftermath of the trial, Stanton resigns as Secretary of War and Dr. Cameron is at last released from prison. He and Ben return to their home in Piedmont, South Carolina. Partly because he needs a warmer climate for the sake of his health and partly to further his plans for the South, Stoneman also decides to move to Piedmont.69
At the beginning of Book III, the scene changes from Washington to Piedmont.70 Elsie and Phil Stoneman, together with their father, rent the cottage of Jeannie Lenoir and her fifteen-year-old daughter, Marion (Ben Cameron’s childhood sweetheart). Both the Lenoirs and Camerons are suffering from the tax placed by Congress on cotton on top of the disastrous economic consequences of the war. Elsie hears Silas Lynch telling Gus, a former slave of the Camerons, that he should no longer be ordered around by any white man. Lynch then reports to Stoneman that his strategy of encouraging blacks to join the Union League, and thus controlling them, is going according to plan. When Lynch (who plainly admires Elsie) leaves, she finds her father has had a stroke. Phil, now in love with Margaret Cameron, is frustrated by the amount of time she spends with a young local minister. He himself spends time talking with Dr. Cameron, whom he is surprised to discover uses hypnosis in his practice. He also sympathizes with Dr. Cameron’s view of the sufferings now being experienced by Southern whites. Ben Cameron comes home, finds Gus loitering outside it, and orders him to move away. When Gus insolently refuses, Ben strikes him with a wooden paling. Ben is arrested and taken to the state capital, Columbia. Phil follows to try to secure his release, but instead discovers a plot to frame his friend for murder and succeeds in rescuing him. Dr. Cameron writes an article in the local paper condemning Ben’s arrest but is then himself arrested by the local military commander; he is led in chains down the main street of Piedmont and past the old slave-quarters. To avoid heedless friction before the state elections, however, he is quickly released.
When the elections take place, a combination of white disfranchisement, intimidation of loyal black voters such as Jake, and ballot-stuffing lead to a Republican triumph. The new radical state constitution is approved, the legislature has a large black majority, and Silas Lynch is elected lieutenant-governor. In the aftermath of the election, bills are introduced into the legislature to put into force the radical program, including permitting the intermarriage of whites and blacks. Meanwhile, Austin Stoneman recovers from his stroke. Although his political views have not changed, he has grown to adore young Marion Lenoir, and on discovering that the Lenoirs’ farm is about to be sold, he buys it from them at a generous price. Marion and her mother move back into their home, but during the first night after their return, Gus and three other blacks break into the house and rape Marion. To hide the shame of what has happened, and at Marion’s urging, she and her mother commit suicide by jumping off a cliff.71
When the bodies are found, Dr. Cameron examines them and—peering with a microscope—claims to be able to see the image of Gus still printed on the mother’s retina. Gus is apprehended by members of the Ku Klux Klan and taken to the cave that has become the rendezvous for the Piedmont branch of the organization. In front of the other Klansmen, Dr. Cameron hypnotizes Gus and makes him relive the crime. The local Grand Dragon (Ben Cameron) then steps forward and orders that Gus be executed and his body left on the lawn of Lieutenant-Governor Silas Lynch’s house. He also summons the Klans from adjoining counties to join him in revolt against black rule. The discovery of Gus’s body, with the letters “K.K.K.” written in red on a paper attached to his chest, is the first public evidence that the Klan exists in Piedmont. It is followed, shortly afterward, by the Grand Dragon’s order to the black militia to surrender their weapons. Stoneman now asks Phil to break off all ties with the Camerons, who are the main suspects in Gus’s murder, but Phil refuses to do so. He is more successful with Elsie, who promises to give up Ben if she finds he is responsible for an ultimatum telling Stoneman to leave. Ben meets Elsie wearing his Klansman’s uniform, and though she realizes how much this demonstrates his trust in her, she threatens never to see him again if the Klan commits another crime.72
That night, according to Ben’s instructions, Klansmen disarm all blacks in the county. Ben leads a Klan attack on the black armory in Piedmont. After ten minutes, the black militia surrenders and all but three men are permitted to go home. These three, who were with Gus in his assault on the Lenoirs’ home, are shot. The Klansmen in other South Carolina counties soon also disarm blacks and the Union League starts to collapse. Stoneman, seeing his plans for the South falling in ruins, resolves in revenge to hang Ben Cameron. Since no one else can be found to do so, he determines (over Elsie’s protests) to conduct the prosecution himself. No witnesses can be found, however, and he is obliged to discharge Ben when he (finally) appears. Stoneman then sends a telegram to the White House, and the new president, Ulysses S. Grant, declares the South Carolina counties in a state of insurrection and imposes martial law. Thus encouraged, black insolence revives. When two black troopers insult Margaret Cameron, however, Phil Stoneman shoots one of them dead. Ben succeeds in getting Phil out of town but is then himself arrested for the murder, quickly tried, and sentenced to death. Phil races to the jail where he is held and, changing clothes with Ben, takes his place. Ben sends Margaret, his sister, to explain the situation to Stoneman and the two set off in a race to prevent Phil’s execution. Yet it is the Klan that finally rescues Phil, not his father. At midnight of that day, Ben and Elsie see the fiery crosses burning across the mountains to celebrate the elections in which the Southern states have been “redeemed” from black rule and white civilization finally saved.73
The Clansman as a Play
The Clansman was even more successful as a novel than The Leopard’s Spots and The One Woman. The book had a number of critics, but within a relatively short time, it had sold more than a million copies.74 This “immediate and tremendous popularity” encouraged Dixon to adapt his novel into a play. Raymond Cook, Dixon’s biographer, suggests that he had already decided to have a second attempt at theatrical success before the publication of The Clansman, and that the favorable reception of the novel provided him with the solution on how to do so.75 Dixon was aware that far more people had seen Uncle Tom’s Cabin as a play than had read it as a novel, and part and parcel of his cultural war with the earlier novel was his determination to do for his own work what others had done for Mrs. Stowe’s.76 Aided by a course on dramatic technique in the spring of 1905, he completed the play and sent it off to theatrical agent Alice Kauser in New York. Crosby Gaige, a member of Kauser’s staff, read the play, liked it, and submitted it to George H. Brennan, a former newspaperman who had just set himself up as a theatrical producer. Brennan invited Dixon to New York and together the two established a new corporation, the Southern Amusement Company, to produce the play. Much to Brennan’s surprise, Dixon bought a half interest in the play.77
Dixon’s first play includes elements from both his earlier books on Reconstruction. Nelse and Eva from The Leopard’s Spots reappear as the “faithful souls.” Helen Lowell, also from The Leopard’s Spots, is now a friend of Elsie Stoneman, and Dick reemerges as a minor character. Flora Camp has been transformed in the play into Flora Cameron, Ben’s much younger sister. Although some of the major characters from The Clansman as a novel (Dr. Cameron, Ben Cameron, Austin and Elsie Stoneman, Silas Lynch, and Gus) have crucial roles in the play, others (including Jeannie and Marion Lenoir, Phil Stoneman, Margaret Cameron, Mrs. Cameron, and Lydia Brown) are omitted entirely. Yet the play also introduces several new characters, including Nellie Graham, a friend of the Camerons who is given some of the lines and qua
lities of Marion Lenoir; General Nathan Bedford Forrest, the Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan; and William Pitt Shrimp, the governor of South Carolina. Other principal differences between The Clansman as novel and play revolve around chronology and setting. Whereas the novel starts with the ending of the Civil War and its action takes place both in Washington (Books I and II) and Piedmont (Books III and IV), the play does not commence until election day 1867 and its action takes place entirely in Piedmont.
Act I of the play focuses on the election. Blacks are drinking and voting repeatedly, while most of the whites are disfranchised. Austin Stoneman appears. While he is pretending to be in the South for the sake of his health, he is really the commander of the Black League. Because of the election and the excited state of the blacks, young Flora Cameron is told by her father and brother to stay close to her home. Ben Cameron meets Elsie Stoneman, who has nursed him back to health after his injuries in the war. While the two of them argue—for example, over slavery and the fact that Elsie treats Silas Lynch, her father’s black protégé, as a social equal—it is evident that they are in love. Elsie is determined, however, that she will not marry without her father’s approval. Austin Stoneman reappears, together with Lynch (who covertly admires Elsie). Ben, deliberately ignoring Lynch, goes off to vote, and Elsie also leaves. Left alone with his acolyte, Stoneman explains that he plans to recruit Ben Cameron as the white leader of the Black League and asks why Lynch has not yet posted the order of the commanding general permitting the intermarriage of whites and blacks. When Lynch objects that doing so would be a dangerous act, Stoneman takes the proclamation and pins it to the bulletin board outside the Camerons’ house, which is now operating as a hotel. Once all the blacks have voted, Alex, a rascally if naïve black election official, closes the polls, ignoring the protest of Dr. Cameron. Ben Cameron is concerned, if the blacks carry the whole state, that the whites will no longer have any form of protection. He suggests to his father that the only answer to the secret nighttime meetings of the Black League is a similarly secret white organization, the Ku Klux Klan, but Dr. Cameron makes him promise never to resort to violence without first seeking his father’s advice. Stoneman returns, and confessing that he is the leader of the Black League, he invites Ben to join him at its head. Ben asserts that he cannot accept social equality with blacks, and Stoneman, who has guessed that Ben loves Elsie, asks him to prove himself worthy of her. At this point, the election results are announced: Shrimp has won the governorship and Lynch the lieutenant-governorship by a landslide, and the new Legislature will consist mostly of blacks. For the sake of Elsie, Ben agrees to continue listening to Stoneman’s arguments but refuses to meet with Lynch under any circumstances. His father now points out the proclamation about intermarriage posted by Stoneman outside the Camerons’ house, and Ben demonstrates his rejection of Stoneman’s offer (and outlook) by tearing it down.78
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