FLAG OF THE UNITED STATES. By the act entitled "An act to establish the flag of the United States," passed April 4, 1818, 3 Story, U. S. Laws 1667, it is enacted § 1. That from and after the fourth day of July next, the flag of the United States be thirteen horizontal stripes, alternate red and white; that the union be twenty stars, white in a blue field.
§ 2. That, on the admission of every new state into the Union, one star be added to the union of the flag; and that such addition shall take effect on the fourth day of July then next succeeding such admission. See Preble, Hist. of Amer. Flag.
It has been held in an unreported case in Illinois that a statute requiring the nation al flag to be floated over every school-house during school hours is unconstitutional, on the ground that it transcended the police power of the state, Wright, J., contending that the legislature could not enact a stat ute with penal sanctions unless it had for its object "the maintenance of the police author ity of the state, the morals of the state, or the health of the state. The question that
arose in this case was whether, in a group of college buildings, each building was com pelled to display a separate flag, and the de cision that one flag floated from a flagstaff for the group of buildings, was not a compli ance with the law is severely criticised in 30 Am. L. Rev. 746.
A state statute (Nebraska), punishing the desecration of the flag and its use for adver tising purposes, is not invalid although it excepts periodicals, etc., in which it is used unconnected with advertising matter ; Halter v. Nebraska, 205 U. S. 34, 27 Sup. Ct. 419, 51 L. Ed. 696. But in Ruhstrat v. People, 185