Flying the Flag (Or Not)

Geitner Simmons has an interesting post on the propriety of flying — or banning, which he prefers — the Confederate flag. The Insecure Egotist has an equally interesting reply.

I am sympathetic to Simmons’s desire to have the state avoid antagonizing substantial numbers of its citizens by, as it were, waving an offensive red flag in their face. The flag, in short, should not be flown by public authorities in public places.

Still, I’m troubled by Geitner’s statement that “State governments would be wise, and fully entitled, to ban such displays.” Choosing not to fly an offensive flag is one thing — states, after all, can’t fly every flag; they have to choose. But banning offensive displays is another matter. This may be purely semantic, but semantics can be important.

I am also troubled by the legal argument that the Justice Dept. made in defense of the Veteran’s Administration’s refusal to fly the flag: “There can be no doubt that display of the Confederate battle flag would be perceived as the government’s endorsement of that flag.”

If that is the government’s position, it should proceed to raze all Confederate symbols and monuments in national parks or other federally managed lands. Gettysburg, for example, should have Union monuments but no Confederate monuments. U.S. Highway 1 south of Washington, D.C., should no longer be called “Jefferson Davis Highway,” or U.S. 50 Mosby Highway. What about federal funds going to museums that display Confederate symbols?

State governments shouldn’t fly Confederate flags, but neither should we support arguments for lowering them that may do far more damage than their display.

UPDATE – The United Daughters of the Confederacy is suing Vanderbilt University to prevent it from removing the word “Confederate” that is inscribed in stone on a building to which the UDC heavily contributed ($50,000 of the $150,000 construction costs in 1935). The UDC says its contribution was to help erect a monument and memorial to Confederate soldiers, and its suit claims a breach of contract.

“There’s a movement at Vanderbilt to really focus on diversity and multiculturalism,” Carolyn Kent, a former United Daughters’ Tennessee president, said last month. “But in that mix, there seems to be no room for anyone of Confederate descent.”

Irrelevant Addendum – Bryn Mawr College gives no financial aid based on merit. If the UDC suit succeeds, could I, as the tuition-paying parent of a student who would qualify for merit aid if it existed, file a suit to force Bryn Mawr to honor the explicit terms in the gifts of many dead dowagers who gave money to be awarded to the best students in various fields? Standing might be a problem, but since the dead dowagers are no longer (standing, or anything else) maybe I could claim to stand in for their ghosts….

UPDATE to UPDATEErin O’Connor continues the discussion of Vanderbilt’s attempted defacement, complete with quotes from a Vanderbilt faculty member who thinks all Confederate veterans should have been hung and all Confederate sympathizers the equivalent of holocaust revisionists. I’m not quite sure I myself qualify as a Confederate sympathizer, but I’m probably close enough to note the irony in my being called a holocaust denier.

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