For all the bemoaning your grandparents do about the end of the "good old days," you'd assume that the world has pretty much gone to shit over the course of a single generation. Well, you can rest assured that many of the "modern" problems we deal with today were around in Grandpa's time, too -- he just didn't notice because he was too busy doing the Charleston while shooting Nazis and banging his poodle-skirted girlfriend. We don't have a ... super firm grip on timelines around these parts.

5 America Had Something Like the Patriot Act in 1871

Library of Congress

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9/11 was one of the most significant events in modern American history. When Americans suddenly realized how vulnerable they were to terrorism, the government rolled out some controversial new legislation designed to make everyone feel a little safer, even if they might have to let go of some personal freedoms along the way, like the right to communicate with other human beings privately, or the right not to have their genitals fondled in an airport by a GED candidate in a short-sleeve button-up.

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"If your genitals have done nothing wrong, you have nothing to hide."

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But It's Been Happening Since ...

Before Americans were afraid of al-Qaida, they were afraid of some guys known as the Ku Klux Klan, who were a bit paler, but otherwise shared the same general questionable fashion sense and love of hate-filled murder. The government responded with the Enforcement Act of 1871, aka the KKK Act, a piece of legislation giving them powers to investigate and prosecute any suspects of cross-burning, race-related murders, and general dickitry. And as the Patriot Act's granddaddy, the 1871 act did the best it could to make its descendants proud: Suspending habeas corpus? You got it. Sending out the Army to support arrest and prosecution? No problem at all. Trying civilians in military courts? Yeah, baby! Entering foreign lands to kidnap terrorists? Sure, why not? Spy drones and wireless taps? Almost certainly!

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(We warned you we weren't great with timelines.)

National ArchivesÂ

Cracked Fact: No one in those days could use email without fear of being monitored.

The KKK Act worked, and over the years it enabled the government to dismantle the most threatening and hardcore parts of the old-timey Klan, which you will not hear us defending, no matter how shady and frightening the measures to combat them may have been. It's hard to muster up sympathy for folks who justify murder by the amount of melanin their victims possessed.