Driving Dixie Down: Removing the Confederate Flag from Southern State Capitals: An Excerpt

Driving Dixie Down: Removing the Confederate Flag from Southern State Capitals An Excerpt by James Forman Jr. It is the spring of 1984 in Atlanta, and the groundskeeper at Franklin Delano Roosevelt High School is starting his morning routine. In my twelfth grade homeroom we have finished the morning business—attendance has been taken, the announcements have been made. We are simply waiting for the bell to signal the start of the first class period. As I wait, my eyes return to the groundskeeper, who is carefully unfurling and raising a series of flags. First is the American flag, last is the Atlanta Public Schools flag, and sandwiched between the two is the Georgia State flag. I am drawn to this flag, particularly to its wholesale incorporation of Dixie. I observe the same scene almost every morning, and almost every morning I hate the fact that I watch. I want so desperately to ignore the flag, ignore Dixie, and ignore the history for which it stands. For relief, I take my eyes off the flag and glance down again at the groundskeeper, who is still pulling the cords to raise the trio of flags. Like most of the students and teachers , the groundskeeper is black. I think of the incongruity of having black children, in a largely black city, watch a black man raise the symbol of the Confederacy for us all to honor. I tell myself to laugh, hoping that this will keep me from crying. But I cannot laugh, and I dare not cry, so I close my eyes and try to forget. If I could just forget. My eyes close tightly, my fists clench, and I slowly force from my mind images of the flag, of the Ku Klux Klan, of Bull Connor and George Wallace—of black people in chains, hanging from trees, kept illiterate, denied the opportunity to vote. The bell has rung. My teacher is calling my name: "James, are you ok?" I look up, startled. "Yes ma'am, I'm fine," I say, as I collect my books and head for class. "I'm fine," I repeat to myself, as I walk out the door. I have forgotten; I have purged my mind; I am able to get up and walk out of the door. But overcoming the flag has taken a piece of me—a piece that I will not easily recover. Reprinted by permission of the Yale Law Journal Company and Fred B. Rothman and Company from the Yale Law Journal, vol. 101, pages 505-526. ...