The BBC's Marcus Herbert: "Some did hide their faces behind flags"

Eighteen members of the white supremacist group stood silently - faces exposed - outside a courthouse in lower Manhattan on Saturday.

But there were scuffles as police tried to keep several hundred opponents of the Klan from trying to break up the rally.

Protesters - and media - outnumbered Klan members at the rally

"Everybody's here to say no to the KKK," lawyer Ron Kuby said of the demonstrators.

"You have people here who sometimes can't stand to be in the same room with each other, but they're all here today. We have unity."

BBC's Brian Barron in New York: "Sunglasses, but not masks"

New York City officials succeeded in unmasking the Klan when a federal appeals court ruled Friday that the city could enforce a 150-year-old law barring people from gathering in masks.

In the end, Klan members wore their traditional white hoods and robes, but with their faces uncovered.

"When I looked into their faces, I saw my ancestors hanging from trees, being castrated, raped and murdered," said one of the anti-Klan demonstrators, Cynthia Dades of Manhattan.

Grand wizard of Church of the American Knights - a KKK branch - Jeffery Berry blamed the small turnout on the ban on masks.

He said that as many as 100 people would have appeared if they could have hidden their faces.

Test case for Klan

The KKK say blamed the poor turnout on the mask ban

The New York Civil Liberties Union sued the city on behalf of the Church of the American Knights accusing the city of violating the group's First Amendment rights.

The First Amendment to the US Constitution guarantees the right of free speech and assembly, and other fundamental civil liberties.

The BBC's Marcus Herbert said: "The American constitution is very firm on this - you can pretty much say what you like, no matter how controversial it is.

"The crucial thing was that New York City has a law - a very old law - saying you cannot demonstrate wearing a mask. In the end, the court supported them."

The Klan has successfully challenged similar laws in towns in Indiana and Pennsylvania.