Raise The Flag

 

Flags.

I like flags. I don’t know why?

A flag is a piece of fabric (most often rectangular or quadrilateral) with a distinctive design and colors. It is used as a symbol, a signaling device, or for decoration.

The term flag is also used to refer to the graphic design employed, and flags have evolved into a general tool for rudimentary signaling and identification, especially in environments where communication is challenging (such as the maritime environment, where semaphore is used). The study of flags is known as “vexillology” from the Latin vexillum, meaning “flag” or “banner”.

National flags are patriotic symbols with widely varied interpretations that often include strong military associations because of their original and ongoing use for that purpose.

 

From my knowledge of history, a “flag” or a “banner” started as a sign of a tribe or family. In a battle or a gathering, a flag was used to fly above the crowd to be seen by members. Symbols and colors were also transformed to coats of arms.

With all the flags being waved and shown recently reminded me of this story.

 

Abbot Howard Hoffman (November 30, 1936 – April 12, 1989), better known as Abbie Hoffman, was an American political and social activist who co-founded the Youth International Party (“Yippies”). He was also a leading proponent of the Flower Power movement.

Hoffman was arrested and tried for conspiracy and inciting to riot as a result of his role in protests that led to violent confrontations with police during the 1968 Democratic National Convention, along with Jerry Rubin, David Dellinger, Tom Hayden, Rennie Davis, John Froines, Lee Weiner, and Bobby Seale. The group was known collectively as the “Chicago Eight”; when Seale’s prosecution was separated from the others, they became known as the ‘Chicago Seven’. While the defendants were initially convicted of intent to incite a riot, the verdicts were overturned on appeal.

 

Appellant Hoffman was convicted in the Court of General Sessions on the charge he “knowingly cast contempt upon the flag of the United States by publicly mutilating, defacing and defiling” it, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 700, entitled “Desecration of the flag of the United States.” After waiving his right to a trial by jury he was tried by the judge. He was sentenced to a $100 fine or imprisonment for thirty days. The District of Columbia Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction, Hoffman v. United States, 256 A.2d 567 (1969), and allowed this appeal. 

The Government’s case in chief consisted of a brief oral statement to the court by the Assistant United States Attorney embodying facts, which the defense stipulated represented the basis for the charge. It appears that on the morning of October 3, 1968, in response to a subpoena to testify before the Committee on Un-American Activities of the House of Representatives, appellant, accompanied by a number of other persons, approached the Cannon Office Building where the Committee met. Three Capitol Hill policemen observed appellant wearing a shirt, which, while not actually a flag of the United States, resembled the flag sufficiently to come within the terms of the statute. Pinned to the shirt were two buttons, one bearing the legend, “Wallace for President, Stand Up for America,” the other saying, “Vote Pig Yippie in Sixty-Eight.” The officers arrested appellant “after confirming their conclusion with their fellow officers” that the shirt “closely resembled the symbols and designs of the American flag.”

At the conclusion of the Government’s case as thus presented, the court denied appellant’s motion to dismiss the charge for failure to prove a prima facie case under the statute. Appellant then testified in his defense. He said:

“ I had a shirt that resembled the American flag. I wore the shirt because I was going before the Un-American Activities Committee of the House of Representatives, and I don’t particularly consider that committee American in the tradition as I understand it, and I don’t consider that House of Representatives in the tradition that I understand it, and I wore the shirt to show that we were in the tradition of the founding fathers of this country, and that that committee wasn’t. That’s why I wore it.” 

Hoffman continued his activism into the 1970s, and remains an icon of the anti-war movement and the counterculture era. He died of a Phenobarbital overdose in 1989 at age 52.

 

At the time I thought the shirt looked cool. It was a bold design to protest (or praise) the United States of America, or at least their symbol. Like Uncle Sam, the bald Eagle and apple pie, the stars and strips shows the old American red, white and blue to the world. The flag is carried by a color guard in parades. All Americans know the words to the Pledge Alliance to the Flag. There is a Flag Day. When a great leader dies, the flag is lowered to half-staff. Dead soldier’s coffins are draped in the flag.

The Ole Glory is our nations brand.

 

The Flag Code - Respect for Flag

No disrespect should be shown to the flag of the United States of America; the flag should not be dipped to any person or thing. Regimental colors, State flags, and organization or institutional flags are to be dipped as a mark of honor.

(a) The flag should never be displayed with the union down, except as a signal of dire distress in instances of extreme danger to life or property.

(b) The flag should never touch anything beneath it, such as the ground, the floor, water, or merchandise.

(c) The flag should never be carried flat or horizontally, but always aloft and free.

(d) The flag should never be used as wearing apparel, bedding, or drapery. It should never be festooned, drawn back, nor up, in folds, but always allowed falling free.

Bunting of blue, white, and red always arranged with the blue above, the white in the middle, and the red below, should be used for covering a speaker's desk, draping the front of the platform, and for decoration in general.

(e) The flag should never be fastened, displayed, used, or stored in such a manner as to permit it to be easily torn, soiled, or damaged in any way.

(f) The flag should never be used as a covering for a ceiling.

(g) The flag should never have placed upon it, nor on any part of it, nor attached to it any mark, insignia, letter, word, figure, design, picture, or drawing of any nature.

(h) The flag should never be used as a receptacle for receiving, holding, carrying, or delivering anything.

(i) The flag should never be used for advertising purposes in any manner whatsoever. It should not be embroidered on such articles as cushions or handkerchiefs and the like, printed or otherwise impressed on paper napkin or boxes or anything that is designed for temporary use and discard. Advertising signs should not be fastened to a staff or halyard from which the flag is flown.

(j) No part of the flag should ever be used as a costume or athletic uniform. However, a flag patch may be affixed to the uniform of military personnel, firemen, policemen, and members of patriotic organizations. The flag represents a living country and is itself considered a living thing. Therefore, the lapel flag pin being a replica should be worn on the left lapel near the heart.

(k) The flag, when it is in such condition that it is no longer a fitting emblem for display, should be destroyed in a dignified way, preferably by burning.

 

Today, the Flag has become just another logo for commercialism. Patriotism has lost respect for the flag’s powerful image being raised at Iwo Jima. Betsy Ross did not intend for her design to spread out on a football field or become wallpaper for televised debates. When you do not play by the rules in football, the referees throw a flag.

Remember when, after 9/11, everyone was putting metallic flags on their cars? Everyone had a flag hanging at their front door as symbols of unity, not seen since the Second World War.

Where are they now?

 Just like the words to the Star Spangled Banner:

“O say can you see, by the dawn’s early light
What so proudly we hailed, at the twilight's last gleaming
Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight
O’er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming?
And the rocket’s red glare, the bombs bursting in air
Gave proof through the night, that our flag was still there
O say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave”