A Confederate history group is planning to unfurl a car dealership-size Battle Flag over I-95 near Richmond, Virginia. In response, another group will fly a large US flag downtown.
A Confederate flag waves in a trailer park in Spring City, Pa. On Saturday, competing groups will display Confederate and US flags in Richmond, Virginia.
Steven M. Falk/Philadelphia Daily News/AP
No matter who you think should have won the Civil War, you will have someone to root for on Saturday as the Johnny Rebs and Blue Coats unfurl their separate gigantic battle flags over Richmond, Virginia, the capital of the Confederacy.
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News that a Confederate history group is planning to unfurl a car dealership-size Battle Flag over I-95 near Richmond sparked a counter-flag movement that grew to the point where a rival group, more sympathetic to the federal idea, plans a countercharge, by flying a massive US flag near downtown.
Though the tensions between the North and South today tend to flare up mostly on newspaper op-ed pages and the Internet, the high emotions around the flag symbolism continues to tear at the US zeitgeist, a reminder that, aside from the resolve of slavery, fundamental differences of opinion about the ship of state linger among honest Americans.
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While history suggests that the fighting will mostly be verbal and symbolic, residents and police in Chester, where the Confederate group, Virginia Flaggers, will hoist its flag next to I-95, say they are concerned about violence, with local resident Frankie Nichols telling a local NBC affiliate, “You never know what people will do when they get excited.”
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