“That Ragged Old Flag”
If, in the course of human history, there has ever been a nation that was perfect, our history books have failed to record it and it has withered away into irrelevance. Every nation under the sun has had it’s share of troubles and has been inherently flawed because they have been created by inherently flawed human beings. Just as we refuse to be defined by our personal shortcomings and mistakes, so too should we refuse to define our country by hers.
Often quoted as America’s original sin, slavery is and has been one of the biggest tarnishing qualities of American history. The idea that a country that’s founding documents include the words “all men are created equal” is also a country where you could be subjugated because of the color of your skin invokes a sense of hypocrisy among the nation’s people. We feel as though we never really had the Republic that we set out to create from the beginning. However, you cannot define America by her original sin because of the numerous sacrifices that have been made to atone for it.
The deadliest conflict in American history, by far, was when good people set out to preserve the Union and to eradicate slavery from our society. In the end, 365,000 people had died fighting for the Union. What of their sacrifice? I cannot go on believing that America is an inherently racist place when that many people died trying to end the institution of slavery over 150 years ago. If the country wasn’t worth fighting for, why would that many people have given their lives trying to make it a better place?
Then we must consider the epic struggle towards equality between races and sexes in America. Numerous movements in the 20th century lead to the acquisition of voting rights by African Americans, women, etc. and our dynamic system of government and law ensures that certain rights really are inalienable once they have been established as rights via our Constitution. America must be remembered for it’s legacy of winning equality, not for the side of history that has opposed it and lost time and time again. By reminiscing and obsessing over the opposition to equality in the past, we do nothing except for remain victims to a long obsolete force and fail to recognize that America has worked the way it was supposed to from the very beginning.
Before you get upset by that last sentence, let me explain. When America was founded, the idea that your opinion mattered on any topic if you were not some sort of nobility was not a common one in the West. Most of the time you couldn’t even voice your opinion if it dissented from those in power. However, the premise of the American system is that there will inevitably be battles between competing ideas. Some ideas are good, and some ideas are bad. It is through this competition that we improve our society by eliminating the bad ideas in favor of the better ones. In this way, has America not succeeded? Are we not a more equitable and just country than we were in 1787 thanks to the better ideas winning over the support of people? Throughout our history, good ideas have taken hold and even though there has been struggle from the very beginning, what has defined us is our resolve and commitment to what is right and to bettering our country and ourselves over time.
Even with all her flaws, is America still not the greatest force for good in the world? Does having flaws automatically condemn a country into being a force for evil? Are we to forget how we combatted Fascists, Communists, Imperialists, and all sorts of other regimes? How we have spent the last century helping the rest of the world develop and offering protection to our allies? Listen to the words that Johnny Cash wrote in “Ragged Old Flag”
“On Flanders field in World War one
She got a big hole from a Bertha gun
She turned blood red in World War Two
She hung limp and low a time or two
She was in Korea and Vietnam
She went where she was sent by Uncle Sam”
Americans began a revolution that marked the start of the free world. They defeated the mightiest army in the world as a colony of that nation. Americans made the trek west in search of riches even under the threat of doom and disease during the journey. We fought a war against ourselves to ensure that our society really did have liberty and justice for all. We laid in the freezing trenches in World War I, and stormed the beaches in World War II as friends, brothers, fathers, and sons were slain by German machine gun fire. Our women and children made tremendous sacrifices stateside to defeat the most evil regime in world history. We combatted the oppressive Soviet Communist regime and provided aid to Europe as they rebuilt. We helped Asia become developed and provided protection to our allies there. We have made idols out of civil rights heroes such as Martin Luther King Jr. who laid out the blueprints to peaceful dissent and change. We endured after the most blatant attack on our people since Pearl Harbor when the Twin Towers fell in New York City. And now, as we grieve over the loss of hundreds of thousands of Americans to a plague that has scourged our nation, I have faith that this too shall pass and that we will come out of it stronger than we were before. As Cash says in the song,
“she’s been through the fire before
And I believe she can take a whole lot more”
The point is that our history is one that we can be proud of without thinking that every part of it was good. Indeed there is no nation on Earth where you could be proud of every part of their history. However, when looking at the overall theme and how the country has endured and developed into what it is now, I can’t help but remember the words that end the song;
“I’m mighty proud of that ragged old flag.”
