U.S. Supreme Court Upholds Flag Burning as Protest

The Supreme Court decision to support the freedom of expression and speech inherent in the burning of the American flag is clearly going to swell your mail bins, and mostly, I suspect with the outcries of the enraged, including most “leaders” in Washington.

The most ludicrous complaint will be that this somehow demeans the sacrifices made by those who “died for our flag.” Nonsense! One, hopefully, doesn’t die for a symbol. The right to have that symbol? Of course. The principle for which that symbol stands? Most assuredly. But not for the simple, albeit beautiful piece of cloth.

It is ironic, in fact, that the desire of the seeming majority of our citizens to allow prosecution of flag burners would cheapen and violate part of our Bill of Rights, probably the most important single set of principles that has made our country so great.

And, no, I could not, would not, participate in such an act; neither I, nor any of those justices who voted to uphold the basic freedom in this issue, support or condone the burning of our flag: We support the right to do so.

A simple, but true allegory: My father, Robert R. Rissman, was a partner in the ‘50s and ‘60s law firm of Wirin, Rissman, and Okrand, the legal representatives for the local chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union (before it became fashionable to be card-carrying members!). A.L. Wirin, as the senior partner, fought for and won the right for a local neo-Nazi spokesman to utilize public school facilities to spew out his vitriolic messages: As long as he stopped short of inciting to riot, it is his right to publicize his point of view, however offensive it might be to most of us. But to express his personal distaste for the content of that meeting, leading the parade of picketing protesters outside the meeting he worked to ensure would convene, was Wirin himself: “I support your right to speak; I can’t stand the ideas you wish to spread”--principle personified.

If we bemoan the decline of morality in too many our public figures (with sorrowful examples from the political and religious right and left), let’s take pride in and have hope from such acts of principle by our high court, epitomizing what this country is truly about.

EDWARD M. RISSMAN

Calabasas