This is from another group and I thought it would be interesting

 From: "Mark Ferran" <mferran@nycap.rr.com>
Sent: Tuesday, April 01, 2003 5:13 PM
Subject: Re: Gold Fringed Flags

Let me give you some insights into the Gold-Fringed Flag fixation that some people have.  I attended Law School and did very well as a law-student (graduated with high honors).  Law students are given lots of law-books to read, and some of these students actually read those books.  You yourselves can buy and read these books.   But none of these books include any discussion of the nature of the Flag types which may exist, nor any Flag Protocols, symbology, nor anything else about the American Flag except some cases that deal with First Amendment Rights:  Can students be forced to salute the Flag in school?  Can people be punished for burning flags, etc.  So, for the most part, the symbology (e.g., gold fringes) on an American Flag means nothing at all to any Attorney or Judge.

"The nitwits have amongst themselves this strange superstition that the presence of a gold trim on a courtroom's flag somehow imposes some different sort of law than what's expected -- although they cannot get their stories straight on whether it's martial law or maritime law, the two being very different.  They have absolutely no legal authority for any of this and seem to be making it up as they go along.  They don't seem to have noticed that the gold trim appears only on INDOOR flags, which are made of fairly flimsy
material and would hang limp and drab without either breeze or sunlight indoors, so the gold trim provides some esthetic compensation for the lack of sunlight and breeze, and that all OUTDOOR flags, even the ones at military bases and on ships, don't have this fringe, because outdoor flags are made of heavier fabric and the wind and damp would soon ruin a fringe.
Back in 1925 the US Attorney-General relied on the opinion of the predecessor to the US Army's Institute of Heraldry that the fringe was not an addition or alteration of the flag, and therefore not  illegal, and
moreover had no symbolic  meaning.  Currently the Institute of Heraldry and the non-government Flag Research Center both issue fact sheets debunking this militia myth about the fringe on the flag.  There apparently has NEVER been a successful challenge to a court's decision or jurisdiction based on
the absence of a correct flag or the presence of an "incorrect" flag in the courtroom. }"
http://www.adl.org/mwd/sussman.doc

You can change the flag displayed in the Courtroom every five minutes, or once an hour, all day long.  That won't change the behavior of the Judge, nor will it affect the finality or gravity of the result of the proceeding.  Nobody on the other side of the "BAR" cares at all what the flag looks like or whether it has a gold fringe on it.

No one within the "Law Profession", whose primary interest is extracting money from the general population, cares anything at all about how the Judge  or the Court room is dressed, except to the extent that appearances make a good impression on the slobs who are paying attorneys for "Justice." Whitewashed Tombs are more saleable than tombs appearing in their natural state of decay and rot and stench.   If any typical attorney ever even noticed a gold-fringe on a flag in the court room, it would mean nothing more to him than a suggestion of what he was there For (Money) after all, and he would wish the fringe was real gold so he could cut a gold tassel or two off it during an intermission.

Haskins v. Wilbert (D Kan unpub 11/5/97) ("Judge Wilbert's jurisdiction is in no way predicated on ... the design of the US flag."); US v. Greenstreet (ND Tex 1996) 912 F.Supp 224 ("decor is not a determinant for jurisdiction"); Huebner v. State (Tex.App unpub 5/8/97); State v. Martz (Ohio App unpub 6/9/97); (tried to sue judge for not removing fringed flag nor installing "a flag that met plaintiffs' specifications"; court imposed Rule 11 fine of $1000) Wyatt v. Kelly, Chief Bankruptcy Judge (WD Texas unpub 3/23/98) 44 USPQ2d 1578, 81 AFTR2d 1463, 98 USTC para 50326; (trying to sue a town official and a judge for "accepting" a fringed US flag supposedly thereby "suppressing" the perp's rights)  Marion v. Marion (Conn.Super. unpub 6/18/98) http://www.adl.org/mwd/sussman.doc

The idea that only "IF the fringe is not there you can demand that you be under Constitutional Law" but that if a fringe is present in the room, you need not bother to demand respect for y our rights under the Constitution and the Laws is ABSOLUTELY INSANE AND SELF-DESTRUCTIVE.

Any private citizen who fixates upon the fringes upon the flag in a court  room, or whether the Judge is wearing a whig or not, INSTEAD OF HIS OWN LEGAL RIGHTS UNDER THE WRITTEN LAWS AND THE CONSTITUTION, is simply a FOOL who is probably not worthy to live as a free man in a republic in the first place.  That is certainly the view that many judges and attorneys will take after being bothered or harassed by the "flag-fringe" maniacs.  Slaves always aspired to learn to Read so that they might understand and claim the rights of free men under writen laws, instead of only being able to recognize only the symbols of the authority of their masters.  Fools who can read, but who ignore written laws, choosing instead to fixate on symbols, are practically inviting their own enslavement.  Judges and attorneys against them will take advantage of their foolish fixations to strip them of rights and property that they might have held onto if only they had instead fixated upon the Law, the Facts, and the Merits of their claims or defenses:
In G.D. Fowler v. State (Ark.App 1999), 67 Ark.App 114, 992 SW2d 804, "the defendant's objection to the fringed flag was emphasized by the prosecution during cross-examination, and similarly during the cross-examination of the defendant's fellow militia group members, and on appeal the exploitation of the defendant's objection to the courtroom flag was held to be so prejudicial, because it was calculated to arouse the jury's hostility to the defendant, that the conviction was overturned)
http://www.adl.org/mwd/sussman.doc

Some people truly deserve to be convicted of offenses, or to have their completely stupid lawsuits thrown out of Courts of Law, and when they are disposed of in that proper manner, some of those will try to blame the result on things like the fringes of the flag: ("The complaint will be dismissed not because this court operates under the regal splendor of a gold fringed flag but because the complaint is legally absurd.") Ch.H. Cass v. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co (MDNC unpub 10/1/98) 82 AFTR2d 6967

You can heed my warnings (www.billstclair.com/ferran ), and/or the Warnings from the Courts themselves, or you can continue to fixate on symbology and "fringe" ideas.  It won't hurt me immediately if you destroy yourselves, but the more flag-fixated people you lead to slaughter, the more emboldened the lawless among our Judges and Prosecutors will become.   So, consider the impact that your self-destruction will have upon others before you choose your fixation.

Consider the slaughter that has already happened to flag-fixated fools in the Courts:

"XIII. The Flag Issue:  A current popular argument is that the gold fringed flag indicates the admiralty jurisdiction of the court.  Naturally, pro ses have made this argument and lost:

1. Vella v. McCammon, 671 F.Supp. 1128, 1129 (S.D. Tex. 1987)(the argument has "no arguable basis in law or fact")
2. Comm. v. Appel, 652 A.2d 341, 343 (Pa.Super. 1994)    (the contention is a "preposterous claim")
3. United States v. Schiefen, 926 F.Supp. 877, 884 (D.S.D. 1995): in this case, the CFR cross reference index argument, and those regarding the UCC, common law  courts and the flag issue were rejected.