The Public Record
A documented account of how the former Speaker of the Mississippi House helped assemble the votes, control the legislation and remove the flag chosen by Mississippi voters in 2001.
Philip Gunn did not act alone, but he was not merely one legislator casting one vote. The documentary record shows that he led the House operation that made the flag's removal possible and helped construct a replacement process in which voters were never permitted to retain the historic flag.
Chronology
“As a Christian, I believe our state's flag has become a point of offense that needs to be removed.”
Gunn became the first prominent Republican state leader to call publicly for removing the historic flag. He continued advocating that position for five years.
Mississippi Today reported that Gunn began pressing his caucus during a June 11 Republican meeting. House Democratic Leader Robert Johnson later said the flag would not have changed without Gunn's leadership: Gunn took the initiative and persuaded his caucus that the change was important.
Gunn divided Republican House members among five members of his leadership operation. Gunn took one group himself. Each legislator was asked to commit to three things: suspend the rules, oppose any floor amendments and vote to change the flag. Gunn said the operation secured 84 commitments.
“First, you will vote to suspend the rules. Second, you will vote against any floor amendments offered. Third, you will vote to change the flag.”
Gunn also brought holdouts into his office individually. He described urging them to consider their legacy and how their children and grandchildren would remember the vote.
Gunn and House allies Jason White and Trey Lamar repeatedly negotiated with Lieutenant Governor Delbert Hosemann and Senate leaders. The agreed plan created a commission, required “In God We Trust” and prohibited the Confederate battle emblem. Reporting states that Gunn personally insisted upon the religious phrase.
Mississippi Today further reported that House and Senate leaders deliberately avoided putting the bill's contents on paper because they did not want details leaking to the press or giving the public and wavering lawmakers time to challenge the plan.
Ordinary deadlines for general legislation had passed. Gunn was the first-listed sponsor of House Concurrent Resolution 79, which suspended the applicable legislative rules so a flag bill could be drafted, introduced and passed at the end of the session. Gunn waited to bring the resolution forward until Senate leaders assured him that their chamber also had sufficient votes.
The House cleared the two-thirds procedural hurdle. Once that occurred, only a simple majority was needed for the flag bill itself.
HB 1796 repealed Mississippi Code Section 3-3-16, the statute recognizing the historic flag. It required state agencies and local governments to remove the flag from public property within fifteen days.
The same bill created a nine-member commission to select a replacement; prohibited the historic flag's Confederate battle emblem from appearing in any submission; required “In God We Trust”; and authorized Gunn, the lieutenant governor and the governor to appoint three commissioners each.
Governor Tate Reeves signed HB 1796 on June 30. The following day, Gunn and Hosemann presented the last historic flags flown over the Capitol to the Mississippi Department of Archives and History. Mississippi then had no official state flag while the commission developed a replacement.
Gunn exercised the authority HB 1796 gave him to appoint three of the commission's nine members. The commission—not the electorate—reduced the submissions and selected the single design that would appear on the November ballot.
By the time Mississippians voted, the historic flag had already been repealed, removed and legally excluded from consideration. Voters could approve or reject only the commission's selected replacement. Under HB 1796, rejection would have sent the commission back to propose another new design; it could not have restored the historic flag.
Gunn was the first-listed sponsor of House Bill 1, which placed the commission's design into Mississippi law after its approval on the restricted November ballot. Governor Reeves signed it on January 11, 2021.
The Essential Difference
The Documented Conclusion
Gunn was a principal architect and the decisive House leader of the removal process. He advocated removal, assembled the votes, helped negotiate the bill, demanded commitments against amendments, sponsored the procedural resolution, sponsored the repeal legislation, appointed one-third of the commission and sponsored the final statute adopting the replacement.
Philip Gunn helped overturn the result of Mississippi's 2001 statewide flag election without allowing voters to choose between the historic flag and its replacement. The Legislature first eliminated the historic flag and then asked voters to approve or reject only a government-selected replacement.
Primary Documents and Reporting