Fierce controversy ensued, including a court order that the board show cause why they should not be forced to rescind the resolution, and at least two state legislative proposals to ban ethnic or national flags in public classrooms other than the official U.S. flag.

After Whitney, bad tendency test continued to be used by the Court in cases such 1931's Stromberg v. California, which held that a 1919 California statute banning red flags was unconstitutional.

The prospect of such a significant first game prompted Robert Ford, a black Charleston city councilman, to call on Citadel officials to ban "Dixie" and Confederate flags at the game.

Col. Benjamin Legare, the Citadel's spokesman, said that school officials had not addressed the question of whether to ban "Dixie" and Confederate flags.

"In light of the situation in the Persian Gulf, it is clear that banning American or other flags is not something any of us feels comfortable doing," said Larry I. Palmer, Cornell's vice president for academic programs and campus affairs, who made the decision to suspend the ban.

At his inauguration ceremony last week, he banned Confederate flags.

Berkeley has drawn scorn for banning large American flags from being displayed on fire trucks for fear of inciting antiwar demonstrations.

Rather than banning flags of convenience, which would violate the right of every sovereign state to have a merchant fleet, under the 1995 EU directive on port state control, national maritime authorities must impose more effective sanctions on flag states which fail to carry out their international treaty obligations.

How far have we come in banning flags of convenience?

Prevention also means taking the swift and courageous decision to ban flags of convenience in the territorial waters of the Union.