What can’t you take to Arlington National Cemetery on July 4? An American flag.

[240B]

The Washington Post
By T. Rees Shapiro
July 3 at 6:12 PM


Many Americans gathering to celebrate Independence Day will mark the holiday at Arlington National Cemetery. But for visitors feeling patriotic, there is one item that is banned on the hallowed grounds: a waving American flag.


Earl Granville, a retired Army staff sergeant and veterans advocate who lost his leg in a bombing in Afghanistan, said that he was surprised to learn about the obscure federal law that prohibits visitors from carrying an unfurled U.S. flag at the cemetery.


“There’s absolutely, positively nothing disrespectful whatsoever about carrying the colors to the cemetery where our fallen armed forces are buried,” Granville said.


The law — 38 U.S. Code § 2413 — emerged in 2006 when former U.S. Rep. Mike D. Rogers (R-Mich.) grew angry after watching mourners at a military burial face “chants and taunting and some of the most vile things I have ever heard,” Rogers told the Associated Press at the time.


(more)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/virginia-politics/what-cant-you-take-to-arlington-national-cemetery-on-july-4-an-american-flag/2017/07/03/b3a1241c-5fae-11e7-a4f7-af34fc1d9d39_story.html?utm_term=.449374fef8e8

[txradioguy]

*shrugs* ok so you can't go around waiving a full sized flag at ANC.

Doesn't seem like proper protocol since there is already a flag flying.

People are still free to take small flags in and place them next to the headstone of a loved one. 

[240B]

*shrugs* ok so you can't go around waiving a full sized flag at ANC.

Doesn't seem like proper protocol since there is already a flag flying.

People are still free to take small flags in and place them next to the headstone of a loved one.

I seriously doubt that anyone will enforce this "law". The law was made to stop nutjobs like Westboro from disrupting funerals. I would have no problem bringing a flag. And I'm sure that the guards there are more likely to salute it than they are to confiscate it. I think this will be a 'selective enforcement' rule.

[txradioguy]

I seriously doubt that anyone will enforce this "law". The law was made to stop nutjobs like Westboro from disrupting funerals. I would have no problem bringing a flag. And I'm sure that the guards there are more likely to salute it than they are to confiscate it. I think this will be a 'selective enforcement' rule.

You're right about that.

Having dealt with ANC they are more understanding than the story and the rule let on.