The
Unofficial 16-Star US Flag 1796
Although the star pattern used in
the canton of this Stars and Striped flag has been arranged in normal
horizontal lines, it was one made because this is an example of an unofficial
variant of a flag that never existed! In 1795, the United States flag law had
changed to have the flag go from 13 stars and stripes to 15 stars and stripes,
however, no provision was made for recognizing the entry of new States into the
union, or a standard process of how to change the flag design when this
happened. Therefore, in 1796, when Tennessee entered as the 16th State, the
flag wasn't changed as Congress discussed the problem.
Many times flag makers simply
ignored the fact that a stars and stripped flag using a certain number of stars
must be made official by the Congress of the United States by resolution, and
simply made new flags before the fact. After the 15 stars resolution, there was
no "approved" change in the flag until 20 states were made in 1818.
Hence, "officially" this flag didn't exist.
No comments:
Post a Comment