Mississippi's Flag Vote Revisited
By William "Brother" Rogers
After Mississippi’s recent flag vote, the Washington Post editorialized that Mississippi was “socially backward” and still “stuck in the past.” Anyone familiar with Mississippi’s tortured past and current social environment knows that such an indictment is grossly oversimplified.
Those of us with deep family roots in Mississippi who supported a new state flag were disappointed because we viewed this vote as a chance to change the negative stereotypes about our state. The danger now is that failure to adopt a new state flag will mask the eyes of the nation to the progress that is ongoing in Mississippi. Notwithstanding this recent vote, there is ample evidence that Mississippi is not stuck in the past.
First, the leadership in Mississippi strongly favored a new state flag, a move in itself that sends a strong signal about the progress Mississippi has made in recent decades. Seven of the state’s eight statewide elected officials, including the governor, publicly supported the new flag. The Mississippi Economic Council, which is the state’s chamber of commerce, endorsed the new flag. All of the presidents of the state’s eight public universities unanimously supported the new banner. Even the state’s most prominent historians endorsed changing the flag.
This public support from mostly white leaders in Mississippi contrasts sharply with the white leadership during the civil rights movement. Then, white political, educational and business leaders defiantly resisted change. Today they are leading the fight for change.
Second, the fact that the flag’s status even came to a vote shows that Mississippi is addressing its problems head on. Voting to remove the Confederate battle emblem would have been unimaginable just a few decades ago. Most change is incremental. The fact that so many voted for change is a positive development and a harbinger of a time in the near future when this racially divisive symbol will be removed from the official flag.
National editorial writers described Mississippi as out of the mainstream. Actually, the fact that Mississippi has become such a part of mainstream America may be one reason the old flag prevailed – to preserve a sense of Southern identity. Supporters of the old flag successfully linked it with Southern heritage. Advocates for a new flag focused too much on the economic impact and too little on the moral implications. The economic argument was undermined in the opinion of many Mississippians by the fact that Nissan recently selected Mississippi as the site for a $930 million vehicle assembly plant.
I suspect that Georgia and South Carolina specifically avoided a ballot referendum given the strong support of the Confederate battle flag in their states. The backlash against former Georgia Governor Zell Miller, who originally led his state’s fight to change their flag, nearly cost him his reelection. In South Carolina, numerous efforts to remove the Confederate flag from atop their statehouse failed, including a lawsuit filed by the city of Columbia and state business leaders. Their state legislature adopted a compromise only after South Carolina lost an estimated $20 million in revenue from an NAACP-sponsored boycott.
Even California, supposedly a progressive state, repealed affirmative action with Proposition 209. The real lesson is not that Mississippi is socially backward. It is that referendums on racial issues in America are best avoided until we make more progress improving race relations.
Relations between blacks and whites in Mississippi are thorny, complicated, unresolved, full of contradictions, and much in need of reconciliation. This does not separate us from the rest of America the way our actions during the Jim Crow era did. It makes Mississippi just like the rest of America
All of us, in Mississippi, the South, and indeed throughout the country, should use this opportunity to openly discuss race relations, not stereotype specific states. The controversy about the Confederate flag can be productive if Americans use it as a stepping-stone toward the unfinished business of racial reconciliation.
After Mississippi’s recent flag vote, the Washington Post editorialized that Mississippi was “socially backward” and still “stuck in the past.” Anyone familiar with Mississippi’s tortured past and current social environment knows that such an indictment is grossly oversimplified.
Those of us with deep family roots in Mississippi who supported a new state flag were disappointed because we viewed this vote as a chance to change the negative stereotypes about our state. The danger now is that failure to adopt a new state flag will mask the eyes of the nation to the progress that is ongoing in Mississippi. Notwithstanding this recent vote, there is ample evidence that Mississippi is not stuck in the past.
First, the leadership in Mississippi strongly favored a new state flag, a move in itself that sends a strong signal about the progress Mississippi has made in recent decades. Seven of the state’s eight statewide elected officials, including the governor, publicly supported the new flag. The Mississippi Economic Council, which is the state’s chamber of commerce, endorsed the new flag. All of the presidents of the state’s eight public universities unanimously supported the new banner. Even the state’s most prominent historians endorsed changing the flag.
This public support from mostly white leaders in Mississippi contrasts sharply with the white leadership during the civil rights movement. Then, white political, educational and business leaders defiantly resisted change. Today they are leading the fight for change.
Second, the fact that the flag’s status even came to a vote shows that Mississippi is addressing its problems head on. Voting to remove the Confederate battle emblem would have been unimaginable just a few decades ago. Most change is incremental. The fact that so many voted for change is a positive development and a harbinger of a time in the near future when this racially divisive symbol will be removed from the official flag.
National editorial writers described Mississippi as out of the mainstream. Actually, the fact that Mississippi has become such a part of mainstream America may be one reason the old flag prevailed – to preserve a sense of Southern identity. Supporters of the old flag successfully linked it with Southern heritage. Advocates for a new flag focused too much on the economic impact and too little on the moral implications. The economic argument was undermined in the opinion of many Mississippians by the fact that Nissan recently selected Mississippi as the site for a $930 million vehicle assembly plant.
I suspect that Georgia and South Carolina specifically avoided a ballot referendum given the strong support of the Confederate battle flag in their states. The backlash against former Georgia Governor Zell Miller, who originally led his state’s fight to change their flag, nearly cost him his reelection. In South Carolina, numerous efforts to remove the Confederate flag from atop their statehouse failed, including a lawsuit filed by the city of Columbia and state business leaders. Their state legislature adopted a compromise only after South Carolina lost an estimated $20 million in revenue from an NAACP-sponsored boycott.
Even California, supposedly a progressive state, repealed affirmative action with Proposition 209. The real lesson is not that Mississippi is socially backward. It is that referendums on racial issues in America are best avoided until we make more progress improving race relations.
Relations between blacks and whites in Mississippi are thorny, complicated, unresolved, full of contradictions, and much in need of reconciliation. This does not separate us from the rest of America the way our actions during the Jim Crow era did. It makes Mississippi just like the rest of America
All of us, in Mississippi, the South, and indeed throughout the country, should use this opportunity to openly discuss race relations, not stereotype specific states. The controversy about the Confederate flag can be productive if Americans use it as a stepping-stone toward the unfinished business of racial reconciliation.