Rasp
Senior Editor
'I am proud of my heritage': Former student defends Confederate flag
Former Anderson County High School student Tom DeFoe testified today that history and family stories about an ancestor inspired him to wear clothing containing Confederate battle flag emblems to school.
"I am proud of my heritage," he said. "And I am proud to be a Southerner. I don't see any reason that anybody can't wear what they are proud of."
He was testifying in a federal court lawsuit alleging that his civil rights were violated on occasions when school officials suspended him or made him turn a T-shirt inside out.
He will face cross-examination later today by attorneys representing the Anderson County school board, which is defending its dress code
policy that specifically bans the Confederate flag.
An all-white jury is hearing the case before U.S. District Judge Tom Varlan.
That the jury is all-white was not the result of selection strategy by either side. There were no black people in the small pool of people from which a panel was selected.
Of that pool, two people who expressed support for display of the controversial flag were booted off. As with all jury trials, which side did the kicking is kept under wraps from the public.
Also rejected was a member of a Civil War club and a former Alabama educator who acknowledged the flag "can inflame" but added she didn't "really know why blacks see it as a racist symbol."
Anderson County School Board Chairman John S. Burrell testified Monday that the school system's dress code has been in effect for some 26 years. It contained specific bans, including the display of Confederate flags, references to Malcolm X or the Ku Klux Klan and logos for cigarettes or booze but later
was changed to a generalized prohibition on the display of "racial or ethnic slurs or symbols, gang affiliations, vulgar, subversive or sexually suggestive language or images" and products students cannot legally buy.
The Confederate flag, he said, remained among the banned displays.
DeFoe ran afoul of the dress code in the fall of 2006, first, when he sported a T-shirt with the flag and, second, when he wore a belt buckle displaying it. In each instance, he admits he refused to either remove or cover the flag and was suspended as a result.
DeFoe contends, via attorney Van R. Irion, that he is a descendant of a Confederate soldier and was expressing pride in his heritage by cladding himself in Rebel flag wear. The school system cannot silence him because others might view the flag differently, Irion insists.
"The school board tells Mr. DeFoe he should be ashamed of who he is," Irion told jurors in opening statements.
Attorney Arthur F. Knight III, who represents Anderson Cou
nty school system officials, counters that it doesn't matter what DeFoe intended to say with his clothing choice.
"We fully understand the Confederate flag is not a racist symbol to everybody," Knight told jurors. "But there are others who â┚¬¦ consider that to be a racist symbol."