Flag (and fag) burning

I read Hendrik Hertzberg's awesome commentary on the flag burning Constitutional amendment that was defeated this week in the July 3 The New Yorker. Here's an excerpt:

The American flag is an abstraction, an idea expressed in a certain arrangement of colors and shapes.
Any particular flag is merely a representation of that idea; and the idea of the flag, in turn, is a symbol of something else. That something else is certainly not the government of the day; nor is it, at bottom, the land or the nation, or even the people. It is, again, an idea—the idea of liberty, made real by institutional arrangements that protect the freedom of citizens to think and speak as they will. Liberty, which is a big idea, protects itself by protecting the expression (though not, of course, guaranteeing the triumph) of other, smaller ideas, good and bad. And the idea of liberty is embodied in the Constitution.

“Desecration” is a word foreign to the vocabulary of that fiercely secular document, whose only references to religion are in its stern proscriptions of any religious test for public office and any government establishment of, or infringement upon, religious practice. Still, almost all Americans, whatever their religious beliefs or lack thereof, would probably agree that both the flag and the Constitution have a certain sacred character. Most would probably agree on a hierarchy of sacredness that places the flag below the Constitution, and the Constitution’s instrumental passages—those dealing with the mechanics of government—below the Bill of Rights. If the proposed amendment is adopted, it will be the first time that the First Amendment, which is the Constitution’s crowning glory, has itself been amended—and to constrict it, not expand it.

The flag is not a piece of cloth, any more than the Constitution is a piece of paper; and the flag’s sacredness is not damaged when a piece of cloth representing it is burned or trampled or used as an autograph book, any more than the Constitution can be damaged by the destruction of a printed copy. But the Constitution can and would be damaged, to the nation’s shame, by the addition of something as inimical to its spirit as the flag-desecration amendment.

And for a lighter look at the subject, read on about the fag burning amendment... :-)

Have a wonderful Fourth of July weekend, everyone!