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Show THE OBNOXIOUS FLAG LAW. Judge John Gibbons of Chicago has declared unconstitutional the obnoxious obnox-ious and idiotic flag law which was placed upon the statute books of Illinois Illi-nois by a band of ninnies who would fain make the American people believe that their sire was the American eagle and their swaddling clothes the American Ameri-can flag. The Macomb Journal, which was one of the first papers in Illinois to oppose the idiotic law, thus speaks of Judge Gibbons' decision: When what is commonly known as the compulsory flag laAv was passed, the Journal said, when negatively discussing dis-cussing the need of such a law, that men could nedther.be made religious or loyal through legislation; hence Unfavored Unfa-vored legislative hands off in both cases. It said every person should be made to obey the law which provides for the peace and protection of all, but the questions of religion or loyalty were matters of education and example. Hence the Journal was not in favor of the compulsory raising of the American j flag on school buildings or elsewhere. It believed that in the United States it took no law to teach veneration for the flag, but that wherever the occasion was that it should be run up, 500 willing wil-ling hands were present to do the work where there was one against it. It further stated that such a law was an insinuation that it took compulsion to show that the American people revered the Star Spangled banner. A Chicago judge has recently declared the law void that" makes it a crime to use the flag for advertising purposes; in summing sum-ming up the general condition, upholds what this paper then said and what was extensively criticised at. the time, in the following language: "The men , who today are being prosecuted under ! this law would tomorrow leave home and kindred and rush to the front to defend the honor and glory of that dear old flag. We need no flag law in the state of Illinois to make men patriotic, to prevent men from desecrating the flag. Every man in all this land vies-w vies-w ith his neighbor.in showing devotion, lovaltv and reverence to the flaer. and it is a reflection upon the names of Illinois Illi-nois patriot dead to have enacted such a law." ' |