Flag Wrap Up(date)

Today, Sunday, 28 June 2020, the Mississippi Legislature approved a bill to remove the current state flag, which features the Battle Flag of the Army of Northern Virginia in the canton. The bill goes to the governor for his signature, and he's already said he would sign it. (Actually, the Governor refused to consider such bills when he was Lieutenant Governor, consistently stated his preference for "letting the voters decide," and changed his pitch only when a two-thirds "supermajority" of Legislators voted yesterday to suspend rules in order to consider this bill after the usual deadline.)
 

Updated Update: On 30 June 2020, Governor Tate "Tater Tot" Reeves signed the bill into law. This means his signature went down on the right side of history. (It's entirely conceivable that he might have simply not vetoed the bill and let it become law by holding it for 15 days. (There's no "pocket veto" in Mississippi.)

A few legislators (and the Governor) have persisted in saying that this matter should be "decided by the voters." There was no popular vote to make the Magnolia the state flower or the mockingbird the state bird; the Legislature had no problems with those. In representative government, voters decide this sort of thing by electing people to represent them in Jackson. Passing the buck on a matter like this -- which is exactly what the Legislature did 19 years ago -- simply allows the usual gerrymandering and dirt road politics to block what needs to happen.

And this needed to happen. 

"Stennis" Flag

Lots of folks have proposed various designs. Besides the historical Magnolia Flag, one that has gotten a lot of attention is the so-called "Stennis flag," designed by the grand-daughter of (in)famous Mississippi Senator John Stennis. This one is popular enough that it's available (for a fee) as an official Mississippi "vanity" automobile tag.

Great Seal Flag

But don't forget, this is still a knucklehead state. The bill that passed today says that in November voters will pick a new flag. It also says that any option presented to the public vote must include the words "In God We Trust." 

I won't belabor this last point by stirring up a pot of "whose tax money will be paying for the inevitable lawsuit." Right now, the important thing is that the 1894 flag has been retired.

Back in October, I posted a diatribe about the Mississippi state flag. At that time, I failed to mention that some state institutions were already "rebelling" against the 1894 flag. All eight state universities stopped flying the state flag several years ago. This isn't all that surprising, since as all good Miss'ippians know, universities are chock full of liberal professors with degrees from damnyankee institutions, Democrats & librarians. It's also not surprising, because three of the eight universities are historically black institutions and one of the three "flagships" has an African-American president. 

A number of Mississippi municipalities started taking down the state flag over the past decade. This gained momentum after the Charleston church shootings in 2015, and over the ensuing five years, more and more cities have stopped displaying the state flag. The latest addition to the list of cities not displaying the state flag is Gulfport, where the city council voted two weeks ago to display the Magnolia flag instead. And within the next 15 days, all other municipalities, counties, and state offices have to take down the old flag.

Things are heading in interesting directions. Next up: Confederate statuary.

As I've said before, in God we trust. All others pay cash.

Pass the biscuits, willya?