White guilt has Massachusetts on the brink of a historic mistake

Symbols matter. Just ask Cracker Barrel.

One day you’re playing peg solitaire and selling catfish.

A logo redesign later and you’ve lost $100 million in shareholder value. That doesn’t count the renovated restaurants that need to be re-renovated.

By removing the cracker and the barrel from the Cracker Barrel logo, the company attempted a break from history. It didn’t go well.

Yet Massachusetts is determined to follow Cracker Barrel’s route, replacing its glorious, history-laden flag.

Market share can be regained. Bad quarters can be papered over by good ones. CEOs and marketing teams can be replaced.

But once history’s slate is wiped clean, that’s it.

This is not Mississippi removing the Confederacy’s final vestige from its state flag in 2021.

This is a break from the very best of American history.

The Confederate flag had to be moved into the Mississippi flag before it was removed from it. Both the antebellum flag and the modern version emphasized the Magnolia tree — appropriate for the Magnolia State.

But Massachusetts? An “original six” state, home of Plymouth Rock, the pilgrims and the first Thanksgiving, expunging its history?

Activists tried to change the name of Faneuil Hall, too.

Faneuil Hall was a meeting place for pro-independence colonists. It was known as the “cradle of liberty” decades before that and was later the site of Boston Tea Party planning.

Then-Boston Mayor Marty Walsh balked at the idea, saying it would kill off Faneuil Hall’s historical prominence.

Protesters wanted it renamed for Crispus Attucks, one of the men killed in the 1770 Boston Massacre. History considers Attucks, a black man, the first casualty of the Revolutionary War.

“I think that if we change the name of Faneuil Hall, 30 years from now we’d forget what happened there,” Walsh said.

Activists agitated to change the name and the flag in March 2020, at the Boston Massacre’s 250th anniversary.

That’s all this is: Activists seeing racism everywhere.

In the flag’s case, they’re met by self-interested politicians willing to placate them. Ex-Gov. Charlie Baker, a Republican, started this process, and Democratic successor Maura Healey will close the loop.

The push for change started decades ago but was accelerated by George Floyd’s 2020 death and the resurrection of Black Lives Matter.

In the eyes of activists, Massachusetts might as well be Mississippi.

Here’s the good news: If Massachusetts wants a woke state flag that displaces the white guy, it already has one.

The pennant itself.

The Bay State flag depicts peaceful coexistence — of a sort.

Atop the flag is a white man’s arm wielding a sword, a remnant of the 1775 Great Seal.

The full version depicted a Minute Man holding the sword in one hand and Magna Carta in the other.

Before he told fellow colonists “The Redcoats are coming!” Paul Revere engraved it.

Below the arm and sword, inside a blue shield, is an Indian chief holding a bow in one arm and an arrow in the other. The arrow is pointed down, no threat.

Both men are armed for conflict. But they’re hoping it doesn’t come to that.

Outside the shield, in yellow letters surrounded by blue ribbon, reads the state motto in Latin. It translates to: “By the sword we seek peace, but peace only under liberty.”

As state mottos go, that’s a pretty cool one.

The current-day flag, dating back to 1908, is a great marriage of the Native Americans who first resided in Massachusetts and the Englishmen who settled there.

The Indian chief depicted is Massasoit, whose image also graces a statue at Plymouth Rock — his alliance with the Pilgrims brought peace.

In the first colonial seal, dating to 1629, the chief wore a fig leaf. Revere gave him an outfit.

Leftists have somehow found offense and racism in Massasoit’s prominent and powerful depiction. They have perverted history for political ends.

That none of the three finalist designs recently unveiled depicts actual people only proves the point: This is about erasing history, not atoning for it.

Massachusetts, your friends in other states — even New York — are worried for you. Imagine trading Paul Revere and Massasoit for Maura Healey and Photoshop.

That’s what Massachusetts is about to do, and it’s all driven by activist pressure and white guilt.

Unpopular opinion: The Massachusetts flag is already great.

It depicts men of different creeds as capable of violence but preferring peace. It reminds us that peace among men is an accomplishment and not the default.

By the sword we seek peace. What’s so bad about that?

James David Dickson is an independent journalist and historian in Michigan.