viewed as an inAmerican act by many, while others believe it is an action to represent freedom of political speech, and an unconstituional intrusion up on the first amendment to enact laws prohibiting acts such as flag burning. I believe there is away to compromise between the two opinions, and have a possible policy that both sides could agree on. To desecrate a flag means to burn or deface the flag, use it unconventionally, or bear the image of the flag on an item to be destroyed and/or soiled. Still views vary throughout the nation as to whether the acts are disrespectful or symbolic of national pride, but desecrating a flag is most commonly known as a protest against a country's foreign or domestic policies, a protest against government, …show more content…
In the years following the Civil War, the battle to keep the trademark value of the American flag was fought on two fronts. While many white Southerners' still had a preference for the old Confederate flag. Business' had tendency to use the flag as a standard advertising logo. To respond to this perceived threat, 48 states passed laws banning flag desecration. Amazing how the first desicration laws where established to protect the legitimacy of the country more than the flag, now turned to an invasion to individual rights. The First U.S. Supreme Court Ruling on Flag Desecration ocuured in 1907, the most early flag desecration statutes prohibited marking or otherwise defacing a flag, using it in flag in commercial advertisment, and Dis-Honnoring for flag in any way-by publicly burning, trampling on it, spitting on it, or otherwise showing a lack of respect for it. In Halter v. Nebraska 1907, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld these statutes as constitutional. Federal Flag Desecration Law of 1968, Congress passed the Federal Flag Desecration Law in response to a Central Park event in which peace activists burned American flags in protest against the Vietnam War. The law banned any display of contempt directed against the flag, but did not address the other issues dealt with by state flag desecration laws, this resulted in an troubling situation. In 1969 the Supreme Court Ruled That Verbal Disparagement of Flag is Protected Speech, Civil rights activist Sydney Street, who had burned a flag at a New York intersection in protest against the shooting of civil rightist James Meredith, was prosecuted under New York's desecration law for defying the flag. The Court overturned Street's conviction by ruling that verbal disparagement of the flag a reason for Street's arrest is protected by the First Amendment, but did not directly address the issue of flag