OXFORD, Miss. — This week, the University of Mississippi Associated Student Body Senate will vote on a resolution to try and remove one of those symbols – the Mississippi state flag.
“We are forever tied to the horrors of our past,” Allen Coon, the 20-year-old sophomore who introduced the proposal, said. “We’ve flown this symbol of oppression, we’ve defended it, we’ve fought for it and it’s time to recognize that was a mistake and to move forward and show the world and our nation that we’re prepared to welcome all people and respect the identity and history of all Mississippians.”
The flag has been a symbol of the state since it was adopted in 1894.
In 2001, however, it was determined the flag was not official and a state-wide vote was held to choose between the flag and a replacement design that substituted the Confederate saltire for an arrangement of stars.
The flag with the Confederate imagery won with more than 60 percent of the vote.
But since the June 17 shooting at a black church in Charleston, SC, that left nine people dead, the controversy surrounding the flag has reignited.
Writings by the suspect in the shooting show racial motivation and he was photographed several times with Confederate symbols.
Jennifer Stollman with the Winter Institute for Racial Reconciliation has chronicled the complex history of the university and said the Charleston shooting escalated the conversation.
“The university leans on the Winter Institute in many ways to make sure that they’re up to date, that they’re creating the best most inclusive campus is can,” Stollman said. “They’re navigating some old narratives with some new expectations.”
Several race-related episodes around campus last year jogged painful memories, the most notable of which was a noose hung on the statue of James Meredith, the first black student to attend the university.
But the call for change is not without its detractors.
Student senator Andrew Soper wrote in a change.org petition in support of the flag, “removing symbols, flags and monuments will do nothing to change the way people feel in their hearts.
Ole Miss students, and my fellow Mississippians, rise up and push back on political correctness and support the state flag.”
There’s another petition on the site calling for Soper to be impeached.
The university is deeply rooted in tradition – a vestige of Southern history and pride – and has historically been combative to change. Already at least three of the state’s public universities do not fly the state flag, while it still soars over the state’s flagship university.
“Why is this something that divides us? Why can’t we get behind this? Why can’t we understand that this affects people every day that they go to class?” Coon said. “That flag is coming down. If it doesn’t pass, we will find a way.”
The vote is slated for Tuesday.