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"Our ancestors well understood the principle that to make a people free and self-reliant, it is necessary to let them take care of themselves, even if they do not take quite as good care of themselves as some superior power
might." --Charles Eliot

Burn What's Yours but Not What's Mine
by Jacob G. Hornberger, president, The Future of Freedom Foundation

Conservatives are once again calling for a constitutional amendment that would permit the government to punish people who burn the American flag. Opponents of the amendment contend that such an amendment would constitute an assault on the First Amendment guarantee of freedom of speech. Actually, however, the flag-burning matter is not a free-speech issue but rather a private-property issue. If a particular flag is owned by the U.S. government, I have no right to burn it because it belongs to someone else, not to me. The same holds true for a flag owned by my neighbor or anyone else. But if I own a flag, it belongs to me and that means I have the right to do anything I want to it, including destroying it. The same principle
would hold true, of course, with respect to a Constitution-burning
amendment. People don't have the right to burn the Constitution that resides in the National Archives because it is owned by the government. But everyone is free to burn their own Constitution because it belongs to them. Come to think of it, have you ever wondered why Republicans and Democrats never call for a Constitution-burning amendment?