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Clark Bredahl
Fontanelle
Our nation has a very special holiday this month. No, it’s not the new-fangled one on the calendar this week that I’m betting most Americans can’t define. Rather, it was the one last week that is now sometimes left off of calendars celebrating birth of the American flag. Differences in how the two holidays came into being are indeed stark.
Three years ago, Juneteenth became a federal holiday commemorating the ending of slavery in the United States. It marks the day (June 19, 1865) Union General Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston, Texas, to inform enslaved African Americans there that the Civil War had ended and they were free. It makes for a good story, especially if you want to be politically correct.
If you prefer to be historically correct, slavery in this country ended Jan. 1, 1863, with signing of the Emancipation Proclamation by President Abraham Lincoln. That executive order was then affirmed by the blood of more than 1.5 million Civil War casualties of all skin colors. Finally, slavery’s abolition was enshrined into Constitutional law via the 13th Amendment on Dec. 18, 1865. When the good news finally arrived in Texas would seem to be a moot point.
By contrast, on June 14, 1777, the Second Continental Congress of these newly United States took a break from writing the Articles of Confederation to pass a resolution stating that “the flag of the United States shall be 13 stripes, alternate red and white,” and that “the union be 13 stars, white in a blue field, representing a new constellation.”
Over 100 years later, in 1916, President Woodrow Wilson marked that anniversary by decreeing June 14 as Flag Day. And, on Aug. 3, 1949, President Harry Truman signed into law an act of Congress officially establishing the date.
Though not a federal holiday granting workers a paid day off, Flag Day until recently was noted on all calendars and was proudly celebrated along Main streets across the fruited plain from sea to shining sea. On our most recent Flag Day last Friday, flags - many of them tattered and torn – still flew triumphantly above the rubble of wrecked homes and farmsteads across Adair County.
On June 14, 70 years ago, President Dwight Eisenhower added another layer of significance to Flag Day by signing into law HJ 243 which added the words, “under God,” to the Pledge of Allegiance. In doing so, Eisenhower said “millions of our school children will daily proclaim in every city and town, every village and rural school house, the dedication of our nation and our people to the Almighty.”
Contrary to the political rankling which preceded enactment of the Juneteenth holiday, addition of “under God” to the Pledge of Allegiance was anything but controversial. Both chambers of Congress in 1954 cast politics aside and unanimously agreed that “under God” should be added to the pledge.
Presidents from George Washington and James Madison to Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan have warned that a free nation cannot long survive without the God-fearing self-discipline of its public. Many today seem determined to make that prophesy come true. The rest of us still proudly fly the American flag that has stood for God, country and freedom for nearly 250 years and hopefully will do so well into the future.
Sadly, it’s not a sure-fire thing.