Is that an American flag combined with a Confederate flag? Does the person flying that thing understand how ironic that pairing is? https://twitter.com/PolarBarrett/status/1250444669269524483

Also, why fly Confederate flags in Michigan's capital? Michigan may not have been the location of any battles, but when the state was asked to supply four regiments for the Union, the governor sent seven.

When President Buchanan was waffling on the slavery issue, a MI politician resigned from his cabinet, saying he was old enough to see "the Constitution born and now feared he was seeing it die."

When SC seceded, MI's governor gave a rousing speech, saying, "This is not time for timid and vacillating councils, when the cry of treason and rebellion is ringing in our ears."

Later, when Virginia asked Michigan to send delegates to a conference aimed at finding compromise with the South, MI legislators passed a resolution saying "concessions and compromise are not to be entertained or offered to traitors."

Nancy Koester's book quotes a letter from a MI soldier that read, "The more I learn of the cursed institution of slavery, the more I feel willing to endure, for its final destruction...Let Christians use all their influence to have justice done to the black man."

So, flying the Confederate flag in Lansing, the capital of Michigan, is ironic at best and offensive at worst. Michigan was never on the side of the Confederacy.

The most common defense of the Confederate flag that I've heard is that it honors history and heritage. Well, that flag is not part of Michigan's history and Michigan's ancestors hated it.