Government is not the solution to our problem. Government is the problem.
— President Ronald Reagan
Americans demand top-quality service from the private sector. They should get the same top-quality service from their government.
— President George W. Bush
it’s really strange for me to be agreeing with the great satan, but at the same time, why isn’t the government doing a better job of protecting our rights? it makes one wonder when they are they are the champions of democracy everywhere but in their own back yard…
Close vote expected on flag-burning amendment
BY MARNI GOLDBERG
26 June, 2006
WASHINGTON – Culminating emotional debate on patriotism and individual rights in the age of terrorism, the Senate is preparing to vote as early as Tuesday on a constitutional amendment to ban the burning or desecration of the U.S. flag.
It could become the first change to the Constitution approved by Congress in 35 years.
Supporters and opponents said the final result would be a cliffhanger, likely coming within one vote either way of the 67 needed to achieve a two-thirds majority and send the amendment to the states. If the Senate joins the House in approving the amendment, ratification by three-fourths of the states (at least 38) appears likely as many have already passed resolutions saying they would ratify it.
On one level, the debate takes its place among other culturally contentious issues the Republican congressional leadership has introduced in recent weeks, including a proposed ban on same-sex marriage. The issues are designed to appeal to the GOP’s conservative base ahead of the November congressional elections, but unlike some of those proposals, the flag desecration ban is seen as having a chance of passage.
The battle to ban the desecration of the flag has a long history. In 1989, the Supreme Court ruled that burning an American flag was a form of speech protected by the Constitution. In response to that ruling, Congress passed a law that would have punished anyone who purposefully mutilated, defaced, burned or trampled on the flag, among other actions. However in 1990, a 5-4 Supreme Court decision invalidated that law, once again coming down on the side of free speech.
Congress in response has attempted several times to change the Constitution and ban the activity, falling short each time. But a greater Republican majority and conservative presence in the Senate makes passage more likely this time, as does the emotional resonance of the Sept. 11 attacks. The amendment passed the House for the sixth time in 2005, on a 286-130 vote.
As the debate began Monday, the amendment’s supporters on the Senate floor used patriotic rhetoric to suggest the importance of the flag as representation of patriotism, liberty and the American union.
“I think of the veterans in our society,” said Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. “I think of the veterans’ expectation of the sanctity of the flag, I think of the flag as a symbol of what the veterans fought for, what they sustained wounds for, what they sustained loss of limbs for, what they sustained loss of life for.”
Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, one of the amendment’s chief supporters, said, “The flag is a unique symbol of our nationhood that demands protection. There are few public symbols that we do share as people.”
Hatch along with such organizations as the Citizens Flag Alliance, an umbrella group that favors the amendment, say that the court erred in labeling flag desecration a form of protected speech.
If the amendment becomes part of the Constitution, it would return to Congress the authority to pass federal legislation protecting the American flag.
Those who oppose the amendment suggest that the measure has nothing to do with flag protection, and they are frustrated by Congress’ frequent attempts to amend the Constitution in what they call a political tactic.
“(Republicans) want to exploit America’s patriotism for their gain in November,” said Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., adding, however, that he finds flag burning cruel and contemptible. “The real issue here is not the protection of the flag, it’s the protection of the Republican majority.”
Other organizations opposing the amendment said this debate diverts attention from ongoing issues facing Congress, and contributes to turning the Constitution into a bulletin board for posting the latest slogan.
“The Constitution has served the country well with a limited number of amendments,” said Elliot Mincberg of People for the American Way, a group that has spoken out against the amendment. “I have never seen (an amendment) like this one that would cut away from free speech.”
First Amendment concerns resonated on the Senate floor and elsewhere. Robert Corn-Revere, who wrote a report on the Flag Desecration Amendment for the First Amendment Center, pointed to history, suggesting that attempts to limit using the flag for political protest have only increased instances of flag burning.
Furthermore, the amendment would raise new problems while lawmakers and the courts struggled to define the terms “flag” and “desecration.”
For example, a shirt displaying the image of the flag may fall outside the law, as may a 47-star flag, which has never existed in U.S. history.
Opponents of the measure say the amendment would increase law enforcement’s ability to selectively prosecute people whose political messages were disagreeable.
“(The amendment) will open up a great period of uncertainty in a lot of litigation,” Corn-Revere said. “What it won’t do is increase respect for the flag, because you can’t force what goes on inside another person’s mind, and what it also won’t do is reduce the amount of flag burning and desecration.”
Burning the Bill of Rights
Senate Republicans are trying to torch a hole in the First Amendment’s free speech guarantee by passing an amendment to the Constitution that would allow federal and state authorities to punish flag-burning.
With the Fourth of July fast approaching, Senate Republicans are holding a barbecue. Unfortunately, instead of grilling hot dogs and hamburgers, they are trying to torch a hole in the First Amendment’s free speech guarantee by passing an amendment to the Constitution that would allow federal and state authorities to punish flag-burning.
Some things should be out of bounds even in a competitive election year. Messing with the Constitution is one of them.
In reality, of course, the Stars and Stripes are in no urgent need of protection from scruffy match-wielding protesters. The Senate has been debating the flag issue on and off for years – ever since the Supreme Court’s 1989 decision holding, quite properly, that flag-burning, however offensive it may seem, is constitutionally protected free speech. The amendment’s return – just in time to distract voters from G.O.P. failures on more pressing fronts – might be dismissed as a bad joke except for two things: an intense lobbying campaign on its behalf by the American Legion, and the fact that no lawmaker relishes taking a stand that might be portrayed as unpatriotic, especially in an election year.
The last time the full Senate voted on the amendment, in 2000, the measure came up just four votes short of the required two-thirds. Nose counters on both sides say that supporters of the amendment are now just a single vote shy. That means that when the roll call is taken on the amendment later this week, there are no freebies. On this round, every vote counts. The House has already approved the amendment, and its ratification by the states is virtually certain should the Senate go along.
As an alternative to the amendment, two of its opponents, Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton, Democrat of New York, and Robert Bennett, Republican of Utah, have proposed a statute against flag-burning instead. Unquestionably, passing a law to address this nonproblem is preferable to rewriting the Constitution. But in crafting a bill with a comparatively narrow reach, its sponsors have not cured the affront to free speech. For that reason, it deserves to be defeated.
As debate on the amendment proceeds, past supporters like Harry Reid, the Democratic minority leader, owe a duty to search their consciences. Each senator must cast a vote as if it is the deciding one. Given the political math, it well could be.