From: atlantareb@mac.com
Mr. Demastus,
Three hurrahs for a singular Virginia Flagger, Susan Hathaway! I want to commend her for the stand she took in holding up our battle flag in public . . . ALONE.
As she said in her August 21 post to this board: "Recently, I was advised that we should fly/carry the First National because 'no one knows what it is'. HUH???? I believe THAT is exactly the kind of reasoning that has gotten us where we are today. By buying into the guilt by association hogwash, our own folks have shunned the battle flag, leaving the impression that we are all ashamed of it and prefer it stay 'in a museum, hidden from public view."
YEA, Susan! Would that more of us had your courage to confront the enemy. You give encouragement to the Southern People. I too display the flag in public when I do my 5-mile run around a local park here in Atlanta. It is wonderful to see how encouraged our people are (black and white) when they see this flag. I am photographed EVERY time I run. And when I answer the question about what I am doing, my answer varies from "I am still fighting the War" to a longer discourse. And, sometimes, I just listen to individuals with all kinds of misunderstandings. And, sometimes, I am cussed at, but not nearly so often as you might think.
As Jefferson Davis said, "The contest is not over, the strife is not ended. It has only entered on a new and enlarged arena. The champions of constitutional liberty must spring to the struggle, like the armed men from the seminated dragon's teeth, until the government of the United States is brought back to its constitutional limits, and the tyrant's plea of "necessity" is bound in chains strong as adamant:
For Freedom's battle once begun,
Bequeathed by bleeding sire to son,
Though baffled oft, is ever won."
So help me God, I will sacrifice all I own and take a bullet to the brain, before I will lay down this Cross of St. Andrew. God bless our forebears and the heritage they have bequeathed to us. Give me strength, Lord, to do my part now that my turn has come.
Alan Keck
