U.S. Flag An Act of Defiance for Voting Rights Activists

Reading by Matt Herron

Matt Herron is the photographer of this award-winning photo. His description of the photo is excerpted from an interview on the Telling Their Stories website. See more of Herron’s photos at Take Stock.

The picture was taken at the side entrance to the Governor’s mansion on Capital Street in Jackson, Mississippi on June 17, 1965.

The boy is Anthony Quin, aged 5. His mother, Mrs. Aylene Quin of McComb, Mississippi and her children were trying to see Governor Paul Johnson. They wanted to protest against the election of five Congressmen from districts where blacks were not allowed to vote. Refused admittance, they sat on the steps.

The policeman struggling with Anthony is Mississippi Highway Patrolman Hughie Kohler.

As Kohler attempted to confiscate the flag, Mrs. Quin said: “Anthony, don’t let that man take your flag.”

Kohler went berserk, yanking Anthony off his feet.

In the South during the civil rights movement, the American flag was a potent symbol of support for racial integration (and support for federal law).

Southerners who believed in racial segregation displayed Confederate flags instead. People were pulled from their cars by policemen and beaten simply for displaying an American flag on their license plates.

So the simple act of a small child carrying an American flag represented defiance of Mississippi law and custom.

Anthony Quin and Matt Herron at the 2014 exhibition in Jackson, Mississippi commemorating Freedom Summer. Source: March Matron

Read more: Iconic Photos by Matt Herron, The Confederate Flag: Symbol of Opposition to Civil Rights, and Matt Herron.

Dr. Wayne Anthony Quin died in 2015. Read tributes to his life by Matt Herron and Joyce Ladner at CRMvet.org.

Matt Herron died in 2020. Read a tribute to his life at Teaching for Change.