Flag Day, though not a national holiday, is a day set aside for all Americans to honor the great Red, White and Blue. Flag Day was officially sanctioned as a day of celebration by President Wilson in 1916, though it has its roots ion l885 when a 19-year-old teacher in Waubeka, Wisconsin, Bernard John Cigrand, instructed his pupils in his one room schoolhouse to write an essay about what the flag meant to them.

On the morning of Dec. 14, 2012, six months ago, little first graders in sleepy little Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., just sat down from proudly pledging their allegiance to the flag. Three minutes later, 20 of them and five of their teachers, were killed, shot at close range by Adam Lanza, armed with enough munitions to defend half of the state.

I wonder what their little essays would have said if the they were writing about the significance of the flag on this day. If they had lived, would they say that the flag, for all of its symbolism of ‘one nation, under God, with liberty and justice for all,’ was there for them? Or did the flag offer greater protection to the rights of a killer more than their right to be safe and protected in a country that professes to so love our them?

Last week the NRA gave a lifetime membership to an eight-year-old boy who was suspended from school for biting his Pop Tart into the shape of a gun and was given a standing ovation when presented with his momentous award at their national convention. There have been strident attempts to mandate that citizens in certain towns, even here in Maine, to own a gun. Move to Nelson, Georgia and you had better pack a pistol or else. I guess the ‘or else’ is that in a perverse twist of the Second Amendment, your right to ‘life, liberty and pursuit of happiness’ has been defined as having to owning a gun.

Flag Day, is now sadly subordinate to gun rights activists, who defile any person questioning the right to brandish a gun almost anywhere/anytime. Legislators who pass laws criminalizing the desecration of the American Flag make it increasingly more difficult to protect first graders. The rights of 20 little children in Sandy Hook are seemingly less than the rights of people given unfettered access to weapons of mass destruction. Let me be clear, the Second Amendment, like all Constitutional rights is a bed rock of America. Yet, the interpretation of this amendment, those that ward off almost all sensible controls, defies rational thinking.

I have two black labs and two vehicles. There are more laws and ordinances controlling my dogs and cars than those that control my Savage 30-30. I can give my rifle to my neighbor today without papers of transfer. Yet, I register my cars, have to transfer title if I sell it, have to have it inspected, and have to prove that I am capably licensed to drive it. I have to license my dogs, have their shots up to date and even pick up their poop. Yet I can do anything I want with my rifle, including walking through Hannaford's with it slung over my shoulder while shopping.

Four thousand, seven hundred Americans have been shot to death since Dec. 14, 2012. It is time to rethink the meaning of Flag Day. It is time to reflect on the rights of little children to sit in an American school and be safe from those that should never have their hands on a gun. It is time for the Commissioner of Education and the Governor of the great state of Maine to have the courage to address school safety in a thoughtful way other than to have Gov. LePage flash his NRA membership card.

Governor, that card should, by ownership, guarantee that children in your schools are safe. What have you or Commissioner Bowen done to thoughtfully address the safety of our citizens/our children other than to silently support stupid legislation that would have armed teachers and custodians in schools? What have you done, just give us thing you have done, to insure that guns will not be allowed in the hands that will kill children in your schools. Don’t you think it is about time?

William Shuttleworth, a veteran, gun owner, superintendent, dad and granddad believes that the Second Amendment should insure that our children have a right to attend school without being shot to death. Little Jesse Tyler Lewis, a six-year-old boy, lies 10 feet from his wife’s mother in Newtown, Conn., in the Zoar Cemetery. He can be reached at wshuttleworth@hotmail.com

More columns by William C. Shuttleworth

William C. Shuttleworth: Caution, school may be dangerous for your child

Drugging kids for their own good

Every town is Newtown

William C. Shuttleworth: An open letter to Governor Paul LePage

Conversations with three high school dropouts

Is it school reform or parent reform that really is needed?