NATION : Flag Burning ‘Dead Wrong’: Bush
NEW YORK — President Bush today declared that, while he will support the Supreme Court decision backing the right of protesters to burn the American flag, “Flag burning is wrong--dead wrong.”
“The flag of the United States is very, very special,” Bush said, departing from the text of a speech on volunteerism to a civic group.
The President made the flag a major focus of his 1988 presidential campaign, even giving a stump speech outside a New Jersey flag factory. He repeatedly attacked Democratic opponent Michael S. Dukakis for having vetoed as governor of Massachusetts a proposed state law requiring recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance in schools.
In a 5-4 ruling Wednesday, the Supreme Court restricted the power of states to punish those who burn or otherwise desecrate an American flag.
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