Well, it’s that time of year again: Flag Day. Mind you, you don’t get the day off. It does seem peculiarly American to have a special day for celebrating something that many consider a really big deal and not get the day off. Two Presidents have acted on the matter and neither one of them saw fit to make it a holiday. Woodrow Wilson established Flag Day on May 30, 1916 just in time to have it on June 14, 1916. Evidently he just issued a proclamation and a lot of people didn’t pay any attention. It was left to Harry Truman to sign an Act of Congress into law in 1949 making it official: June 14, every year, Flag Day. Still, many continue to ignore the date. The lesson in this: If you want folks to celebrate something, you need to give them the day off.

The Act of Congress that Truman signed says the flag is “considered a living thing.” Obviously it is not a living thing. But statements like that are what make Congress so adorable. “Considered” a living thing? What does that mean? Does it mean that some people would like it to be a living thing but recognize that it is not? Does it mean that some people actually think it is living? Does it mean that it should be living? Does it mean that it is living in some metaphorical sense? There are some flag rules that seem to require that it be treated as a living thing. For example, you are not supposed to leave it up after dark. You have to take it down. In school this work was assigned to monitors. In the armed services I think they have “details” take it down. If you’ve got one in your yard, you need to do it yourself. But take it down you must. You wouldn’t leave your children out and about after dark would you? My daughter used to tuck her favorite doll in at night and wish it goodnight. I suppose it’s kind of like that.

Making the flag come in after dark is only one example of the flag’s treatment as a living thing. In old wars it was very important not to let the enemy get your flag. I’m not sure when that died out. I don’t think our soldiers carry flags into the fray anymore. But it used to be that letting the enemy get your flag was almost worse than letting it capture one of your guys. And the fellow that saved the colors – that’s what soldiers call flags – was a hero for the moment. It was a big disgrace if the enemy got your colors. It was as if losing your colors would cause all of the fight to drain out of you.

Flags were, in general, pretty big deals. The first Europeans to land in the new world always waded ashore to stick a flag in the ground. Eddie Izzard has a wonderful piece in which some Europeans wade ashore, stick a flag in the ground claiming the place for themselves and are immediately confronted by the current occupants who dispute ownership. The Europeans are quick to inquire: Do you have a flag?

June 14 was picked as Flag Day because on that date in 1777 the Continental Congress passed a resolution providing that the flag carry 13 stripes and 13 stars. It also specified the colors and their significance: red for “hardiness and valor”, blue for “vigilance, perseverance and justice”, and white for “purity and innocence.” It seems an odd collection of virtues. Hardiness? Purity? Perseverance? And the colors they selected seem pretty humdrum. Red, white and blue? There have to be lots of red, white and blue flags. We may have staged a revolt against the British and turned the world upside down, but changing colors? That, apparently, would have been considered a little much, too over-the-top. Overthrow a regal regime? Okay. Change the palette? No way.

The flag got its own special pledge on June 22, 1942. The Pledge of Allegiance was written in 1892 by Francis Bellamy (1855-1931), a Baptist minister and a Christian socialist. Evidently like Flag Day itself the pledge took awhile to catch on. Well, took awhile to become official and required. I’m not sure it ever really ‘caught on’. The original just had people pledging to “the flag”. Later they changed “the flag” to “the flag of the United States of America” just in case there might be some confusion or, I’m guessing here, people might secretly be pledging to some other flag. It was not until I was in Fourth Grade, 1952, that it was amended to stick “under God” in it. By that time most of us had memorized the earlier version and for a long time we waltzed right through “indivisible” and on to “with liberty and justice for all” skipping over the addition. It took us awhile to master the new version. The added language didn’t really fit very well and made what had been a little awkward downright clumsy. I’m not sure what motivated folks to change it. Once again I’m guessing when I suggest that perhaps it was intended to help us in our struggle with godless communism. It was a very popular struggle at the time.

The flag has not been without controversy. Jehovah Witnesses won’t salute it because they don’t worship false idols or something like that. The Supreme Court said they didn’t have to. The Supreme Court said nobody has to. It’s optional.

A lot of elected officials in Congress think there should be a law against burning the flag. It seems rather ironic that the only reason some people do burn it is to irritate the people who think the flag is a big deal. The people burning flags don’t share that view but they know they can tick off the people that they don’t agree with by burning it. It’s kind of like calling somebody’s mother a name. I found American flag diapers on the Internet. I think that if there are people in Congress opposed to burning the flag I ought to be able to find some opposed to letting babies do you know what on the flag.

Most people don’t even know that June 14 is Flag Day. You don’t see a lot of flags out these days and as I remember you never did. Whatever they may profess and despite years of reciting the pledge every morning, most Americans don’t give a lot of thought to the flag. They seem to know that there are those who give it a special place and that it can be useful as a merchandising tool, but otherwise they pretty much leave it alone. They don’t go out of their way to disrespect it, but for many it evokes all the attention a sidewalk does.

I don’t want to beat this to death but I think that those who feel the flag is a real special thing could help their own cause a great deal by simply giving us a day off. You want folks to like something; you got to give them a reason.