Why is flag burning still not a crime?

Question

don't say freedom of speech

Answer 1

I can wear flag underwear. Shall that be a crime too?

The point is, yea it is disgraceful, but all the more shame and public scrutiny on any group that does do it.

It is a nonissue, something that we shouldn't waste our time with.

Answer 2

Even though the typical Freedom of Speech counterargument is a good one, I'm not going to make that one because there is an even better argument.

There is an inalienable right to property. A particular flag is a piece of property. If I choose to burn my flag, it is within my property rights to do so, provided that I own the flag and am doing so on my land or on the land of somebody who has no problem with my decision to burn the flag.

Another point. Why should the flag be treated as a God and be protected from being blasphemed against? Why should we do for the flag what some Muslims wish we would do for Allah?

Answer 3

I don't know, but I wish it was. Freedom of Speech? Is the Fairness Doctrine freedom of speech? No, but some of the same people who support the Fairness Doctrine say burning the flag should be protected by Freedom of Speech. It makes no sense, does it?

Answer 4

PROPERTY RIGHTS.

If I buy a flag, it's mine and I can do what I want with it. If I cannot, then the government has appropriated it and owes me compensation.

You know who the REAL flag burners are? The American Legion. Burning is how the Flag Code specifies we are to retire a worn-out flag. So it's not the burning that bothers people, it's the statement being made. Statement which is protected by the First Amendment. If you can't accept that, you would desecrate my Constitution. And that's not a mere symbol.

Answer 5

United States
The Flag of the United States has sometimes been used in symbolic defacement, often in protest of the policies of the American government, both within the country and abroad.

In 1862, during the Union army's occupation of New Orleans in the American Civil War, the military governor, Benjamin Franklin Butler, sentenced William B. Mumford to death for removing an American flag. Today, defacing a flag is an act of protected speech under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, as established in Texas v. Johnson, 491 U.S. 397 (1989), and reaffirmed in U.S. v. Eichman, 496 U.S. 310 (1990).

After these decisions, several "flag burning" amendments to the Constitution have been proposed. Any amendment to the US Constitution must first be passed by a two-thirds majority in Congress and then be ratified by 38 of the 50 U.S. states (a three-fourths majority). On June 22, 2005, a flag burning amendment was passed by the House with the needed two thirds majority. On June 27, 2006, the most recent attempt to pass a ban on flag burning was rejected by the Senate in a close vote of 66 in favor, 34 opposed, one vote short of the two-thirds majority needed to send the amendment to be voted on by the states.[2]

The United States Flag Code lists many guidelines for the use and display of the flag, many of which are largely ignored. For example :

"No part of the flag should ever be used as a costume or athletic uniform"
The flag "should not be embroidered on such articles as cushions or handkerchiefs and the like, printed or otherwise impressed on paper".
American sports teams often wear an American flag on their uniforms.[3] This would appear to be in clear violation of the Flag Code. Flags are even used sometimes as carpeting[citation needed], violating such guidelines as not allowing the flag to touch the ground, not displaying it in a horizontal position, and not displaying it in a manner which is likely to allow it to get soiled.

The ritualized burning of the American flag is considered an appropriate way to dispose of a damaged or soiled flag. Flags are burned in retirement ceremonies by the American Legion, Boy Scouts,[4] The Veterans of Foreign Wars, the Daughters of the American Revolution, and the Sons of the American Legion.[5]

Flying an American flag upside down is not necessarily meant as political protest. The practice has its origin in a military distress signal; displaying a flag in this manner is "a signal of dire distress in instances of extreme danger to life or property"[13]; it has been used by extension to make a statement about distress in civic, political, or other areas.

While desecration of the American flag is legal in the United States, it is illegal to "deface, defile or contemptuously abuse" the Confederate flag in the state of Florida. Three men were arrested for burning the flag at Yale University. [6]

Answer 6

Because this is America - and any one with an IQ above 75 takes such action and immediately dismisses it as the acts of an extremely stupid and possibly mentally ill person.
As discusting and revolting as this is, consider - they are burning the symbol of their rights which are so tolerant and compelling, they include their right to burn the flag - huh?
This makes about as much sense as ripping up a winning lottery ticket.

Answer 7

I would never burn a flag but....freedom of opinion and beleifs....it is our constitutional right. Our founding fathers gave us the right to do that....they burned the british flag

Answer 8

Why not say Freedom of Speech there afraid you can't win an argument based on that because whether you like it or not that's why Bucko

Answer 9

The image of the American flag is place on everything from soup to nuts. When is that going to be illegal? Where is your indignation about that?

Answer 10

for the life of me, I don't respect or understand that one, regardless of how one interprets the constitution.