
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, September 2, 1995                   TAG: 9509060020
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

BRIEFLY PUT . . .

WE DON'T believe for a minute that Boy Scouts would ever burn the American flag to show disrespect for the national symbol or for marshmallow-roasting purposes. Nevertheless, with all the hoopla over a proposed constitutional amendment to outlaw flag burning, an item in The Washington Spectator's Sept. 1 newsletter is worth noting.

Apparently, the Boy Scouts of America have a manual called ``Your Flag'' that goes into some detail about flag burning. The official Boy Scout procedure, approved by the Army, Navy and Marine Corps, is to cut worn flags ``into small pieces that will burn easily and completely on a modest but blazing fire'' and reduce them ``to ashes unrecognizable as a former flag."

No one, we hope, would suggest that Boy Scouts who do this ought to be arrested. Yet those who would exempt Scouts from a law against flag burning would be conceding, in effect, that the activity should be illegal only when it is undertaken as a form of political expression. So much for the First Amendment.

by CNB