To the Editor:
Despite the efforts to sugar coat the Confederate flag with “the noble traditions of history, heritage and ancestry” (S.C. Gov. Haley ), the genesis of this hate filled emblem clearly shows the ugly, bigoted mindset of the Southern States when they seceded.
William Thompson, the designer of the “Stars and Bars,” the primary Confed-erate flag, labeled it the “stainless banner” because of its mainly white color. He called it “the white man’s flag” noting that the hugely white color symbolized “the supremacy of the white man.”
He further stated the opinion of the South that “as a people we are fighting to maintain the Heaven ordained supremacy of the white man over the inferior or colored race. A white flag would be emblematic of our cause.”
Unfortunately, in battle, the predominately white color was subject to misinterpretation so the South began to use just the saltire in the canton of the flag—the familiar St.Andrew’s cross—but a flag of their notion of white supremacy and God-promoted colored slavery nevertheless.
Seventy years later Adolf Hitler spouted the same sick idea of Aryan supremacy and a whole nation, with herd-cow mentality, killed millions of “untermenschen” rather than simply enslave them as the South did… well, yes, he did enslave some until they were freed by death.
And some are still preaching this heaven endorsed baloney today!!
Will we ever learn tolerance? Will we ever accept equality for all?
Carl Streeter
Ilion
