Guest Editorial | Why I Bring the American Flag to Protests

[Letter by Stephen Matlock, North Bend Resident: Views expressed are those of the author, not the Living Snoqualmie website. You may submit letters to info@livingsnoqualmie.com]

Today (June 14, 2025), there was a protest and demonstration in North Bend at the traffic circle where Park Street intersects North Bend Way.

I was there, as were a few hundred other residents of the valley, from young kids to teens, young adults, older adults, and even some seniors, such as my wife and I.

There were signs in abundance with various messages about the protest, tagged with the social media meme #NoKingsDay. Some were protesting the attack and capture of migrants at their places of work, their churches, their schools, or even their homes. Some were protesting the cutbacks in social programs to help the needy, including the elderly, the sick, or the poor. Some were protesting the rapid and negative changes in our form of government, changing a representative democracy into the rule of one man, and some of the signs were directly opposing that man.

I did not bring a sign, not for lack of trying, but it turns out that with the changes to our economy and the changes to our shopping experience, there were no local stores in the Upper Snoqualmie Valley with poster board or markers. My attempt to create my own clever sign with a witty message was frustrated!

So, I did something I’ve never done before: I brought my American flag, the large one I hang on my house at holidays.

Now, I’m not one to wave the flag often. I am a quiet American who thinks that there is entirely too much emphasis put upon a symbol and too little effort put into making that symbol mean something about our nation as a place where we live in dignity and respect, freedom and liberty, self-care and community care. I put up the flag on certain national holidays to declare in my own way that I celebrate these United States—and frankly, as a way to honor my father, a World War II veteran; my brother, a U.S. Air Force veteran; my two uncles, U.S. Navy WWII veterans; my nephews, U.S. Army veterans, and my best friend, a U.S. Marine. I put up the flag as my sign of respect for the nation I live in, and as a sign of respect to those who put themselves in harm’s way to protect this nation.

The flag represents the nation as a republic of governing officials elected to take care to faithfully execute the laws of this nation and to obey their oath to the Constitution. And when I put up the flag on my house, it is to show my agreement with this symbol of the republic.

So I brought the U. S. flag to this protest for this reason: It is time to remove the American flag as a symbol of repression and hate, destruction and malice, supremacy and fear, and return it to its rightful place as a symbol of hope and unity for a nation that would be as good as the words of the Constitution which governs it.

This flag reminds us that it is necessary and right to protest and to peacefully assemble—two rights guaranteed by the Constitution—and to demand redress for our complaints against a government that has tattered the Constitution in its pursuit of a white nationalist agenda.

When the government no longer serves the people and no longer obeys the Constitution, it is past the time to protest that government: it is time to change that government. But with our current system of government, we must wait for elections to change our representation, so in the meantime—we must protest.

The same flag that I fly on national holidays belongs at these protests because it is also a symbol of the Republic of the Constitution, where our free speech rights and our peaceful assembly rights are guaranteed.

Maybe we don’t need so many flags. Maybe we need to have people who understand what the flag symbolizes and what we hold true about our governance. Maybe the flags are a cheap and meaningless way to show our allegiance to a political party.

But until the day when we have restored a Constitutional republic and no longer have a tyrant, I will fly that flag as a symbol of protest and a symbol of the republic for which it stands.