Our ‘history’ was appropriated long ago

While I agree with Mr. Valentino’s letter in May that the history of Mississippi’s flag — nor any historical event, symbol, etc. — should ever be forgotten, I would like to offer a few corrections to his comments because “Those who fail to learn the lessons of history are destined to repeat those lessons.”

His sentence structure implies the magnolia flag was a Confederate emblem. It was the Mississippi state flag before the formation and after the dissolution of the Confederacy.

He says there were but seven Confederate states, implying the 13 stars couldn’t represent the Confederacy. However, there were 13 Confederate states. 11 seceded without descent, and two (Kentucky and Missouri) formed “provisional governments.”

While I am not prepared to address the claim that the Confederate emblem was used by various troops during World War II, I will quote the flag’s designer, William Thompson:

“[W]e are fighting to maintain the heavenly ordained supremacy of the white man over the inferior or colored race,” and that “it would soon take rank among the proudest ensigns of the nations, and be hailed by the civilized world as THE WHITE MAN’S FLAG,” in which Thompson included the capitalized emphasis at the end.

As to giving “a piece of our history to the KKK, motorcycle gangs, etc.”: They appropriated that history decades ago, thus we cannot prevent that misappropriation of “our” history. The only way to regain our history and our heritage is to deny “them” the pleasure of seeing their “chosen” emblem used as the official representation of our great state.

This story was originally published June 28, 2016 at 9:00 AM with the headline "Our ‘history’ was appropriated long ago."