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Introduction: The Flag-Burning Debate
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19264 |
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Section : |
MODERN THOUGHT
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| Issue
Date : |
7 / 1991 |
190 Words |
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Editor
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In 1990 the Supreme Court decided that burning the United States flag is a form of symbolic speech, hence protected by the First Amendment. Consequently, burning the flag is a protected act that cannot be made illegal. That decision provoked a brief storm of protest from people who revere the flag and feel that it should be protected.
The arrival of the Fourth of July this year will no doubt bring out many people who fly, march to, and otherwise honor the flag. But it may also provoke a spasm of flag-burning incidents by other people, who wish to flaunt this new freedom, or who resent the flag-wavers, or who just want to get media attention through cheap theatrics.
This point/counterpoint debate discusses the flag-burning issue. Stephen Bates agrees--somewhat reluctantly--that the court reached the right decision, and discusses the principles allegedly at stake in the debate. Morton Kaplan argues that some restrictions on action and behavior are acceptable, and that the actor cannot escape the consequences of flouting such a prohibited action by claiming that the act was symbolic and therefore protected by the First Amendment.
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