California Flag-Banning

CBS Los Angeles reports that by a vote of 72-1 the California Assembly has passed and sent to the Senate a bill that would bar California state government departments “from selling or displaying items with an image of the Confederate flag.” The article, somewhat sloppily, does not say which Confederate flag (there were several), but more on that in a moment.

Assemblyman Isadore Hall, D-Compton, the bill’s sponsor, “introduced the bill after his mother saw replica Confederate money being sold at the state Capitol gift shop. He called the image a symbol of racism meant to intimidate. ‘Its symbolism in history is directly linked to the enslavement, torture and murder of millions of Americans,’ Hall said of the Confederate flag. ‘The state of California should not be in the business of promoting hate toward others.’” The lone dissent came from Assemblyman Tim Donnelly, R-San Bernadino, a leading Republican candidate for governor. “We shouldn’t be here picking the kind of speech we like,” Donnelly said. “I am not standing here defending the symbol. I am standing here defending the principle that the First Amendment principles should apply in all state buildings, of all places.”

Now let’s take a look at what was, and was not, banned. Assembly Bill 2444 “would prohibit the State of California from selling or displaying the Battle Flag of the Confederacy or a similar image, or tangible personal property inscribed with those images, unless the image appears in a book that serves an educational or historical purpose.” For those of you not up on your Confederate history, this is the Battle Flag:

confbattleflag

Since only the “Battle Flag of the Confederacy” was banned, it is still presumably legal for California state government offices to sell the “Stars and Bars,” the  official flag of the Confederacy from March 1861 to May 1863:

starsbars

And then there is the “Bonnie Blue Flag”  that flew over the Confederate batteries that fired on Fort Sumter:

Bonnieblue

Although the official flag of the Confederacy for two years does not appear to be banned from sale by the pending bill, any chart of the fifty state flags that includes the Mississippi state flag presumably could not be sold:

MissFlag

In another drafting problem, note that AB2444 bans not only the Confederate Battle Flag but any “similar image.” So, query: is the Alabama state flag a “similar image” banned by the bill? Here it is:

AlaFlag

The history of the adoption of the Alabama state flag in 1895 reveals the clear intent to model it after the Confederate Battle Flag.

Prior to publishing the 1915 Alabama Official and Statistical Register,  Dr. Thomas Owen, director of the Alabama Department of Archives and History interviewed  individuals who had been around at the time that the bill was introduced.  He concluded that the flag was intended to “preserve in permanent form some of the more distinctive features of the Confederate battle flag, particularly the St. Andrew’s cross.”

An official opinion by the Attorney General of Alabama in 1987 confirmed that “the legislature modeled the state flag after the battle flag.” So, is this flag “similar” enough to the Battle Flag to be banned? Perhaps someone should ask Assemblyman Isadore Hall, D-Compton.

If AB2444 is passed by the California Senate and signed by the Governor, will California state government offices and gift shops be allowed to sell the first official flag of the Confederacy, which flew over the first capitol in Montgomery, but prohibited from selling posters that show the flags of all 50 states?

Sometimes morally preening political correctness is harder than it looks.

Say What? (3)

  1. Joe Hooker May 6, 2014 at 5:53 pm | | Reply

    What? They forgot the Hardee flag? The way things are going in People’s Republic of Kalifornia you wonder whether the American flag might be next.

    Ironies abound, of course. Anything you can say about the Confederate flag you can say about the US flag — that slavery was legal until 1866 (longer than in the Confederacy!), and that it was used as a Klan symbol. Speaking of which, should we ban the cross?

    FWIW Florida also patterned its flag after the Southern Cross, and both NC and Texas have the Bonnie Blue flag on theirs.

  2. Carl May 6, 2014 at 6:27 pm | | Reply

    It is encouraging to learn that California has so few real problems that its government can spend time deciding which historical symbols are permissible.

    As a side note, the Bonnie Blue Flag was the flag of the West Florida Republic of 1810 (which later entered the US as parts of Louisiana, Mississippi, & Alabama) before it was a Confederate flag.

  3. CaptDMO May 7, 2014 at 3:06 pm | | Reply

    Gee…what’s important is Assemblyman Isadore Hall, D-Compton, was progressive in banning something, and instrumental in setting a precedent in banning “stuff” deemed “offensive” to…..somebody.
    While I personally take issue with wearing American Flag t-shirts (the flag is NOT an article of clothing)on May 5, were there any calls to ban French Flag shirts, by Americans, in American Schools, on the day best honored in the US with sales of avocados, and beer, inexplicably with (now costly)lime?
    Can theft of welfare state attitudes, resources, and revered “access” to economic opportunity, in California be considered “cultural appropriation” worthy of Chauvinist boycott of foreign assault on the Constitution?
    (Much like “discrimination”, look “Chauvinism” and “Boycott” up, anywhere BUT “Wiki”, OR (apparently) The Legislative Record “usage” malapropism .)

Say What?