Thread by @EricColumbus

George H.W. Bush — in many senses Trump’s opposite — shared his penchant for using the American flag as a political weapon. Over the past three decades, nearly all GOP leaders were happy to do the same — except for Mitch McConnell. Let’s review. 1/

Running for president in 1988 against Massachusetts Governor Mike Dukakis, Bush’s team discovered that in 1977 Dukakis had vetoed a bill that would require teachers to lead kids in pledging allegiance to the flag each day or pay a fine. 2/

Concerned about the bill’s constitutionality, Dukakis had sought an advisory opinion from Massachusetts’ top court, which concluded that the bill would infringe on teachers’ First Amendment rights. Relying on the opinion, Dukakis vetoed the bill. 3/
masscases.com/cases/sjc/372/…

The Bush campaign flogged this for months. “Should public school teachers be required to lead our children in the Pledge of Allegiance?” Bush asked at his convention speech. “My opponent says no — but I say yes.'' 4/
csmonitor.com/1988/0921/afla…

Bush's rhetoric soon turned darker. His rhetoric soon turned darker. “What is it about the Pledge of Allegiance that upsets him so much?'' Bush asked about Dukakis at an August rally. 5/
nytimes.com/1988/08/25/us/…

Bush campaigned in Findlay, Ohio, known as “Flag City.” There were a lot of flags in this NYT report (by @maureendowd). 6/
nytimes.com/1988/09/17/us/…

Four days later, Bush trekked to New Jersey to make an appearance in an actual flag factory. The subtext, of course, was that Bush was somehow more patriotic than Dukakis. 7/ washingtonpost.com/archive/politi…

At the same rally where Bush asked why the Pledge of Allegiance upsets Dukakis, Bob Hope suggested that Nancy Reagan’s fine White House China was at risk “if the Greeks get in.” Dukakis was the son of Greek immigrants. 8/

At another rally, singer Loretta Lynn lamented that Dukakis was just not her type. “Why, I can’t even pronounce his name!” (A reporter noted that “the crowd roared with glee.”) 9/
nytimes.com/1988/09/29/us/…

A Republican Senator, Steve Symms, claimed that photos existed of a young Kitty Dukakis burning an American flag at a demonstration against the Vietnam War. (No such photos ever surfaced, and Symms later recanted his claim.) 10/
nytimes.com/1988/08/29/us/…

Five months into Bush’s presidency, SCOTUS struck down a Texas statute that criminalized flag-burning. The 5-4 opinion cut across the usual fault lines with Scalia in the majority and Stevens inexplicably joining Rehnquist/White/O’Connor in dissent. 11/ law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/t…

In response, Bush immediately called for a constitutional amendment to overturn the Supreme Court’s decision. 12/
articles.latimes.com/1989-06-28/new…

Democrats beat back the effort, but the next two decades would feature repeated attempts by GOP leaders to pass such an amendment and gut protections for core political speech in order to combat a nonexistent scourge. 13/

It seemed obvious that criminalizing flag burning would actually provoke more jackasses to seek attention by burning the flag — as happened after Congress passed a federal flag protection statute that, to no one’s surprise, was struck down by the Supreme Court in 1990. 14/

Nearly every GOP official eagerly demagogued the flag issue. One who did not was Mitch McConnell. In 1990, McConnell had supported a flag-burning amendment. But by the issue's reemergence in 1995, he had changed his mind. 15/ books.google.com/books?id=9cO3C…

The flag-burning amendment came closest to succeeding in 2006, with both houses of Congress under GOP control (and George H.W. Bush’s son in the White House.) 16/

An amendment needs 2/3 of the House and Senate and becomes law after ratification by 3/4 of all states. In 2006, the flag-burning amendment made it through the House but failed in the Senate by just a single vote. 17/
washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content…

McConnell was one of three Republicans to vote against it. He would explain his vote days later in an op-ed in a Kentucky newspaper. 18/
richmondregister.com/opinion/why-i-…

McConnell’s ascendance to Senate leader may be why the GOP stopped demagoguing the flag until Trump came along. Indeed, Trump didn’t even campaign on the issue, quite possibly because he just didn’t think of it — until weeks after his victory. 19/

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/803567993036754944

McConnell quickly made clear this wasn’t going to happen. 20/ politico.com/story/2016/11/…

Eventually, of course, Trump hit upon NFL kneelers as the objects of his flag shtick. 21/

George H.W. Bush may have wrapped himself in the flag, but Trump wraps the flag in himself, like he’s taking a hostage. 22/

I’ll close with words from SCOTUS' 1943 decision in West Virginia v. Barnette, in which the Court held that students cannot be compelled to pledge allegiance to the flag, thereby articulating a fundamental principle that Bush pretended to forget and Trump has never known. 23/

"If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein." 24/end