Flag Burning

by Richard A. Cheatham, Press Media Group, LLC

Once again, Congress is discussing a Constitutional Amendment that would allow it to make laws preventing the desecration of the American flag. Again, symbolism is being employed to befuddle a naive and easily fooled American citizenry. It’s much like an enemy making a noisy frontal attack, while concentrating their main assault on the flank.

What about the freedoms the flag is supposed to represent? The Stars and Stripes is today more a reminder of lost liberties than the symbol of a country and people that have preserved and protected their freedoms.

Many brave Americans say, “I fought for the flag in....” Were they, and others back home, so focused upon the flag they failed to fight for what the flag stood for here in this country? The pen is mightier than the sword. Swords kill, but pens move the swords!

Many who fight for the flag must not have shown up for the domestic fight when government dictate became more important than individual liberty. Remember the oath, “...I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic...” Isn’t an American who distorts and erodes Constitutional liberties an “enemy” too? Where were these flag defenders when the servants switched places with their masters?

“Congress has the responsibility to preserve and protect the reality behind the symbol,” you say? Who elected them? Check the penalty for being asleep on guard duty!

Wasting time on symbolism, while letting the guts be ripped out of the reality behind the symbol is the worst form of ignorance, irresponsibility...even treason. While busy reciting the pledge of allegiance to the flag, most fail to notice the “for which it stands” part being taken from under their very noses.

Want important, rather than frivolous, reasons for Constitutional Amendments? Since Supreme Court Justices have such trouble understanding that citizens are the masters and government officials only their servants rather than the other way around, consider these.

Private property (owned by masters) shall not be taken through eminent domain for any private use even if such use might be expected to generate higher tax revenues for some government body (the servants).

The citizenry being the master and the government only its servant, the right of the people (the masters) to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed (by its servants).

Juries (made up of masters) having the power to judge not only the facts, but also the justice and validity of the law in cases before them, judges (our employee-servants) must never inform them otherwise.

The Interstate Commerce Clause shall have no power over transactions (by the masters) that take place within the borders of a state.

Government (the servants) shall have no role in “promoting economic development” which must remain the sole province of individual private citizen-entrepreneurs (the masters) with whom the government (servants) must never compete.

©2005 by Richard A. Cheatham. All rights reserved. Mr.Cheatham is a professional speaker/writer whose weekly column, “Drawing Back The Veil” appears weekly in The Lynchburg Ledger. Mr. Cheatham is syndicated through Press Media Group, LLC, 434-332-2845. Contact him through, Living History Assoc., Ltd., at www.LHALtd.com or DrawBackVeil@aol.com.