Maine, ayuh Maine
The controversial vote in November you’ve never heard about.
Behold, a November vote that has received very little ink, but may bloom into a controversy in this election year filled with so many controversies I’ve lost count. Down Mainers are being asked to choose a new flag. Or not. Here’s the flag they’re voting on. You might recognize it. Sort of.
Vexillologically1 speaking, the new design is much, much better than the boring, seal-on-blue flag that’s flown over Maine for 115 years. As flags go, the proposed Maine flag, which was chosen from over 1,000 submissions, rivals Utah’s new flag, or the one adopted by Minnesota voters, in design, simplicity, and symbology. It meets most of the “Five Principles” for a “good flag” laid out by NAVA vexillologists. I am not sure where those principles came from, other than the minds of the people who own the website. But they seem like common sense to me.
Keep It Simple. The flag should be so simple that a child can draw it from memory.
Use Meaningful Symbolism. The flag's images, colors, or patterns should relate to what it symbolizes.
Use 2 or 3 Basic Colors. Limit the number of colors on the flag to three which contrast well and come from the standard color set.
No Lettering or Seals. Never use writing of any kind or an organization's seal.
Be Distinctive or Be Related. Avoid duplicating other flags, but use similarities to show connections.
That’s impressive, considering the “new” flag design is nearly 250 years old. Here’s the current flag, which fails so hard at “good flag,” it could be a reasonable substitute for the Tennessee Titans’ playbook. In fact, that guy on the right leaning on an anchor looks a lot like Will Levis.
The fad of U.S. states abandoning their starchy old military designs for modern, “better” (it’s a matter of taste, n’est ce pas?) flags isn’t something that normally enflames “threat to democracy” bloggers or network talking heads. Don’t get me wrong: it’s a good thing, because in the scheme of things, a flag is just a piece of fabric affixed to a pole. But flags are one of the things that tend to get people riled up, emotionally, because, like baseball uniforms and football helmet logos, change is bad, even when it’s really good. (I mean, the Jets changed their logo back to the 1978 version, and it’s awesome, even though I viscerally hate the Jets more than a nest of giant spiders hiding under my bed.)
Here’s some new “good” state flags.2
But Maine isn’t looking to change their flag to anything new. Historically speaking, Maine’s new flag is really the old flag.
Because I like writing about history, here’s some history.
The Pine Tree State wasn’t a state, at first. It was originally—that is, after the original inhabitants were wiped out by Euro-plagues and war—a department of the Imperial Commonwealth of Massachusetts (like French Guyana is a department of France), separated from its mother’s elite socialist udders only by a thin strip of that mad hive of libertarians known as New Hampshire. Maine, such as it was, didn’t have a state flag, but it did fly a flag.
That flag featured a star and a pine tree. See, Maine has lots of pine trees. In fact, it’s the most forested state in the nation. Bangor, until Stephen King’s “Carrie” hit bookshelves, was known as the lumber capital of the world. Here’s the original Maine flag, unofficially.
Massachusetts, for its part, used a pine tree flag as a maritime ensign for state vessels and privateers. The one now known as the “Pine Tree Flag” is the one favored by George Washington. It was emblazoned with the words “AN APPEAL TO HEAVEN.” That flag (along with the one above) was designed in 1775, and officially adopted in 1776. The Pine Tree Flag, minus the words (which were removed by the Massachusetts legislature in 1971) is still the official maritime ensign for the commonwealth.
Maine was admitted to the Union as the 23rd state in 1820, part of the Missouri Compromise that added both a free state, and a slave state—Missouri. It didn’t stop the nation from sliding into civil war. Maine, of course, fought for the United States, and committed an impressive number of troops (73,000) to the effort, considering the state’s small population. Joshua Chamberlain led the 20th Maine, which famously held the crucial Little Round Top at Gettysburg (besides fighting other battles), for which he was awarded the Medal of Honor. It was Chamberlain who ordered U.S. troops to signal their respect for surrendering Confederates at Appomattox Court House, directing troops to stand at attention and “carry arms” as the defeated rebels passed by. He then went on to serve as governor of Maine, and also president of Bowdoin College.
All of this happened while Maine had no official flag, but flew, unofficially, the Star and Pine Tree. It was not until 1909 that the state legislature decided to adopt an official flag—the seal-on-blue they now have. I don’t have any interesting history to share about the current flag, mostly because I didn’t look for it. If you have any blue Maine flag stories you want to share, feel free to hit the comments.
I bet you’ve heard of the Pine Tree Flag. You know it because it was also carried by some groups of people marching from the White House to the Capitol on January 6th, 2021. That act so tainted it that some Americans believe any flag with a pine tree must be expunged from our nation. After it was found flying from a pole at Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito’s summer home, it was deemed by the New York Times to be “controversial.”
About a thousand news cycles ago, the city of San Francisco removed the Pine Tree Flag from the city’s Civic Center Plaza. No surprise there, from the place that would remove Abraham Lincoln’s name from a high school because black lives didn’t matter enough to him. But it doesn’t have to be this way.
The referendum reads, simply:
Do you favor making the former state flag, replaced as the official flag of the State in 1909 and commonly known as the Pine Tree Flag, the official flag of the State?
A "yes" vote supports replacing the existing state flag with a flag consisting of a pine tree and the North Star on a buff (light tan) background, often called the Pine Tree Flag.
A "no" vote opposes changing the Maine state flag design.
For locals, this issue has carried some political freight. Governor Janet Mills, a Democrat, would not sign the bill that put the referendum on the ballot in 2023, though it was approved by both houses of the legislature. She also didn’t veto it, but allowed it to become law without her signature on July 27, 2023. That was too late for the measure to be on the 2023 ballot, so it slid to 2024.
A Mills spokesperson said it was “to allow time for robust public debate and discussion on all sides of the issue,” which is political speak for “hot potato.” They grow potatoes in Maine, you know. Between April 1 and May 10 of this year, the legislature played footsie with moving the flag referendum to 2026, first voting to kick the can, then reversing itself. Again, Gov. Mills refused to sign, this time allowing the vote to go forward this November.
So Maine voters now get to decide whether to get a really cool flag, depicting the state’s long history as a tree-blanketed “vacationland,” neighboring more Canadian provinces than U.S. states; or rejecting the flag that is similar to one carried by (likely) ignorant MAGA “stop the steal” rallygoers, which means keeping the terrible flag they’ve got.
In the scheme of things, this is a very unimportant vote. But I think there’s more to it. See, with traumatic national events, there’s a point where we decide, as a people, to stay bitter, or to get better. In New York City, when One World Trade Center was finished, on the site where the two WTC towers fell, we decided to get better. We look upon the terrible day of 9/11 as a matter of history, tears, and memory.
Maine voters picking the flag that features a star and pine tree, directly derived from the Pine Tree Flag that George Washington loved as his favorite: “AN APPEAL TO HEAVEN,” is not a statement of rebellion or devotion of MAGA (Maine is not a particularly far-right place). It is a statement of healing and redemption.
Down Mainers are a practical people. They’re not prone to religious displays, unless it’s related to fishing or hunting. They don’t go in for ridiculous fringe ideas. They’re down-to-earth folks, who like building ships, digging for gems, cutting trees, and lobstering. If anyone can redeem what has become a symbol of division and extremism, and turn it into a symbol of new hope and direction, it’s the good folks in Maine.
I hope they pick the new flag. I know it will create controversy. But in the end, when places like San Francisco fly the flag of the State of Maine, not the “Pine Tree Flag,” it will be a symbol of healing, of getting better, not bitter.
The new old flag is the right choice.
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The North American Vexillological Association: The World’s Largest Organization of Flag Enthusiasts and Scholars has a website. From the looks of it, it was designed around 1998 (they are proud of it), and never updated. For people so hung up on simple and meaningful design, the site is shockingly dated and stale. It’s like walking into an electrician’s house to find knob and tube wiring and pennies in the fusebox. Oh well, in flags and websites, it is as the Romans said: De gustatibus non disputandum.
I didn’t include Mississippi’s new flag, because to me, it doesn’t look “new.” It looks a bit like the U.S. military Bronze Star ribbon with a magnolia flower smacked on top instead of an oak leaf. It also isn’t a “good” flag by NAVA’s Five Principles: it reads “In God We Trust” on the bottom of the star halo.
I'm really digging that Utah flag.
Two things that stood out to me; which is one of the reasons i hang around you guys:
1). Vexillological. No freaking idea.
2). Potato's grown in Maine.
Thanks, growth is important no matter what age.