Georgia Senate approves changes to state flag design

Posted: Wednesday, January 31, 2001

ATLANTA - The Georgia Senate voted Tuesday to retire the state's controversial 45-year-old flag, following an emotionally wrenching four hours that at times seemed more like a revival meeting than a legislative debate.

By a margin of 34-22, five more than the minimum needed for a majority, senators adopted a new flag design that puts the Confederate battle emblem dominating the current flag onto equal footing with other flags that have flown over Georgia.

Beginning with Gov. Roy Barnes early in the day, supporters of doing away with the current banner and its Rebel emblem invoked their Christian faith over and over in an effort to convince wavering lawmakers of the righteousness of their cause.

"I believe Jesus would vote to change the flag to unite people," the governor told lawmakers during a 12-minute speech from the Senate podium, quoting from a letter he received from former Sen. Clint Day.

But senators fighting to save the present flag would not yield the moral high ground.

"I'm a Christian," said Sen. Joey Brush, R-Appling, who gave the most impassioned defense of the current flag. "I'm going to vote `no' because I believe deeply that it is the right thing to do."

Just six days after their House colleagues narrowly approved the change, senators passed the legislation that will shrink the current flag to a small icon that will stand alongside two other historical Georgia flags and two U.S. flags.

Most of the new flag will be occupied by the state seal in gold on a blue field.

Civil-rights advocates who have called for an economic boycott of Georgia if the legislature doesn't change the flag embraced the bill as a compromise even though it still retained that smaller version of the Confederate emblem they see as a symbol of slavery and racism.

But members of Southern heritage groups rejected the proposal as an insult to the memory of their ancestors who fought for the Confederacy.

While lawmakers on both sides argued that the flag vote was not a partisan issue, only six of the Senate's 24 Republicans voted for the change. Only four of the chamber's 32 Democrats opposed the bill.

Four of the six GOP "yes" votes came from senators representing suburban Atlanta districts, where large numbers of voters are not native Southerners.