By Kellyn Brown, 7-22-09
Montana Republican Congressman Denny Rehberg has sponsored a bill that would create a constitutional amendment prohibiting the physical desecration of the American flag. Similar legislation has been introduced at least seven times since 1990 after the Supreme Court ruled that burning the flag was a constitutionally protected form of free speech. In 2006, Congress came came closest to amending the Constitution to outlaw the practice.By a single vote, the U.S. Senate today rejected a proposed constitutional amendment that would have granted Congress the power to pass laws banning acts of "physical desecration of the flag of the United States."
The 66-34 vote fell one vote short of the two-thirds majority of 67 needed to approve the amendment and send it to the states for ratification and inclusion in the Constitution. While the Flag Desecration Amendment has been approved by the House of Representatives in every term of Congress since 1995, it has never passed in the Senate.
“This is about honoring and respecting the sacrifice of hundreds of thousands of Americans who served to protect liberty and freedom,” said Rehberg a member of the House Appropriations Committee and the House Liberty Caucus. “These high ideals have always unified Americans, and though some may denounce our country and our troops, why they would want to physically desecrate a symbol of freedom is beyond imagination.”[End of article]