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Klux Klan or the White Citizens Council.

But this is a new day, and the first weeks of the new administration have been impressive.

Oppressive restrictions on women's right to choose and the right of working people have been removed with the stroke of a pen.

Ancient discrimination based on status is being removed too but not without an ugly argument reminiscent of the bigoted battle against Truman's racial integration of the armed services 45 years ago.

We've heard the arguments against gays and lesbians, and we've seen the threatened insubordination of the military chiefs once before. They said then and they say now: morale will suffer. Closeness in showers and foxholes will doom discipline. They can't soldier. Difference and diversity mean dissension and decay.

These complaints were born of bigotry in 1948 and they echo that mindless bigotry today.

The rest of the picture so far is encouraging.

Campaign finance reform is on the agenda again.

One hundred thousand more people came to celebrate the new administration than attended the Reagan inaugural in 1980 and the Bush inaugural in 1988 combined.

Ten times as many Americans are reaching out to touch the new administration - calls to the White House are up from 5,000 to 50,000 per day.

A cabinet has been assembled that looks more like America