Common Mistakes about Confederate Flags - Commentary by Randy Phillips

I have read a lot of statements in papers, magazines and on this and other websites, and heard a lot in the news, about Southern Heritage and Confederate flags. Some of it is true, some of it is outright lies, and some of it is the worst sort of propaganda--half true and half fantasy. And both defenders and opponents of our heritage are guilty of misrepresenting the facts.

I have heard and read over and over that the flag with a circle of stars on a blue field and two red and one white stripes (the real "Stars and Bars") is "The First National Flag of The Confederacy". Not true. In fact, it was a provisional flag used until the Confederate Congress chose an official flag. Though reported by a committee of the Congress on March 4, 1861, neither House actually ever voted on it. And that is a good thing, because as soon as hostilities started, it proved impractical on the battlefield. It looked too much like the U.S. flag.

By September, 1861, the provisional flag had been ditched by the Army of Northern Virginia, which chose the Confederate Battle Flag as its official standard. No national flag having been enacted, the provisional flag continued to fly at government buildings, in regiments which had incorporated it into their company flags, and some Confederate units not part of the Army of Nortern Virginia.

The Confederate Congress continued to try to adopt a flag at the 1862 session, and the joint committee agreed on a new design, very different from the provisional flag then flying over the capitol. It was introduced in one house, but Congress adjourned without acting again.

Finally, in 1863, the Confederate Congress enacted the first official National Flag of The Confederacy. It is common for a lot of Southern heritage supporters to claim the Confederate Battle Flag was not an official Confederate flag. They are wrong. Not only was it the official flag of the Army of Northern Virginia, The Confederate Battle Flag on a field of white (The Stainless Banner) is the only design on the first official National Flag enacted in 1863 by the Congress of The Confederate States of America. It is also the design on the official naval flag of the Confederacy.

Those people and groups who wish to defuse controversy by erasing the Battle, Naval, and National Flags of the Confederacy and replace them with the provisional flag are in fact erasing the most popular and official emblems of the Confederacy. They are replacing them with an obscure design the Confederacy rejected, an emblem which history professor Rick Cobb says the general public doesn't identify with the Confederacy at all. In fact, the provisional Confederate flag is so obscure, its nickname "the stars and bars" is mostly usd by the public to describe the battle flag.

Southern heritage people who describe the battle flag as "a soldier's flag" and imply it had nothing to do with the Confederate States of America or any Government are promoting a lie. It is also a strategic mistake. No matter how brave , how daring, how romantic the Confederate soldier was, the cause for which he fought was the source/goal of that bravery, daring, and romance. Those supporters of Southern heritage who try to distance the soldiers who fought for it from the cause of Southern independence are aiding and abetting those who want to erase it from history. They are assisting those who are trying to change it from a noble enterprise into something Southerners should be ashamed of and eliminate.

The Battle, First (and Second) National, and Confederate naval flags emblazon the emblem which signifies the Confederacy and the South to the entire planet. Those are the flags we should fly. When we don't, we are assisting in the erasure of our heritage no matter whether we describe our motives as "historically accurate for the particular moment or battle," or "compromise solutions" to a political and cultural hysteria which is trying to destroy our pride in, celebration of, and official recognition for the historic and cultural heritage all Southerners share.

Information on the Confederate flags can be found in Mr. Devereaux's wonderful book, "Flags of The Confederacy."

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Randy Phillips is a former State Representative and Director of GHC's Governmental Affairs.

Related Links
www.Confederateflags.org

Sonofthesouth.net

Americancivilwar.com

www.usflag.org

UCV flag from UGA
Note that United Confederate Veterans did NOT refer to the Stars & Bars as a "National Flag."