Subject
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Proclamation Declaring June 14, 2025, as Flag Day in Rockville, Maryland
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Department
City Clerk/Director of Council Operations Office
Recommendation
Staff recommends that Mayor and Council read and approve the proclamation, and Henderson Smith Edwards American Legion Post 86 Color Guard will accept the proclamation.
Discussion
The American Flag is a living symbol of our great nation. Its care is essential to honoring our country’s past, present, and future.
Flag Day, also called National Flag Day, in the United States, is a day honoring the national flag, observed on June 14. The holiday commemorates the date in 1777 when the United States approved the design for its first national flag.
Many Americans celebrate Flag Day by displaying the Red, White, and Blue in front of homes and businesses. The day commemorates the adoption of the Stars and Stripes as the official flag of the United States.
Flag Day is a non-federal holiday in the United States that honors the history and meaning of the American Flag. To celebrate Flag Day, get a high-quality American flag and display it in a prominent location outside of your home. Raise the flag at sunrise and lower it at sunset to adhere to the U.S. Flag Code.
Respect for the flag:
No disrespect should be shown to the flag of the United States of America; the flag should not be dipped to any person or thing. Regimental colors, State flags, and organization or institutional flags are to be dipped as a mark of honor.
(a) The flag should never be displayed with the union down, except as a signal of dire distress in instances of extreme danger to life or property.
(b) The flag should never touch anything beneath it, such as the ground, the floor, water, or merchandise.
(c) The flag should never be carried flat or horizontally, but always aloft and free.
(d) The flag should never be used as wearing apparel, bedding, or drapery. It should never be festooned, drawn back, nor up, in folds, but always allowed to fall free. Bunting of blue, white, and red, always arranged with the blue above, the white in the middle, and the red below, should be used for covering a speaker’s desk, draping the front of the platform, and for decoration in general.
(e) The flag should never be fastened, displayed, used, or stored in such a manner as to permit it to be easily torn, soiled, or damaged in any way.
(f) The flag should never be used as a covering for a ceiling.
(g) The flag should never have placed upon it, nor on any part of it, nor attached to it any mark, insignia, letter, word, figure, design, picture, or drawing of any nature.
(h) The flag should never be used as a receptacle for receiving, holding, carrying, or delivering anything.
(i) The flag should never be used for advertising purposes in any manner whatsoever. It should not be embroidered on such articles as cushions or handkerchiefs and the like, printed or otherwise impressed on paper napkins or boxes or anything that is designed for temporary use and discard. Advertising signs should not be fastened to a staff or halyard from which the flag is flown.
(j) No part of the flag should ever be used as a costume or athletic uniform. However, a flag patch may be affixed to the uniform of military personnel, firemen, policemen, and members of patriotic organizations. The flag represents a living country and is itself considered a living thing. Therefore, the lapel flag pin being a replica, should be worn on the left lapel near the heart.
(k) The flag, when it is in such condition that it is no longer a fitting emblem for display, should be destroyed in a dignified way, preferably by burning.
Position and manner of display
• When flags of two or more nations are displayed, they are to be flown from separate staffs of the same height. The flags should be of approximately equal size. International usage forbids the display of the flag of one nation above that of another nation in time of peace.
• The flag of the United States of America, when it is displayed with another flag against a wall from crossed staffs, should be on the right, the flag’s own right and its staff should be in front of the staff of the other flag.
• The flag of the United States of America should be at the center and at the highest point of the group when a number of flags of States or localities or pennants of societies are grouped and displayed by the staff.
Mayor and Council History
Mayor and Council present this proclamation annually.