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Former City Worker Sues City of Tampa for Firing Him Over Confederate License Plate
AP ^ | 03/12/2003

Posted on 03/12/2003 9:32:49 AM PST by Phlap

TAMPA, Fla. (AP) - A former city worker who was fired for refusing to remove a Confederate flag license plate from his truck is suing the city of Tampa.

In a federal lawsuit filed Tuesday, Larry A. Carpenter, 47, said his First Amendment right to free speech was violated when he was fired over the dispute.

Carpenter was ordered in January 2002 to remove the license plate or park his truck off city property. He refused to do either, was cited for insubordination and was fired from his job as a traffic maintenance specialist in the Public Works Department.

Carpenter's attorney, J. Benton Stewart II, said his client, a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, is proud of his heritage and merely wants the city to develop a written policy that is uniformly applied.

Stewart said other city workers who drive vehicles with bumper stickers bearing political slogans and offensive statements are allowed to park on city property.

Messages left with City Attorney Jim Palermo were not immediately returned. Carpenter declined to comment on the lawsuit Wednesday.


TOPICS: Front Page News; Politics/Elections; US: Florida
KEYWORDS: dixie; dixielist
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To: connectthedots
"While I could never understand what honor there is in be the "son of a ______" or the "daughter of a _______"

He's talking about being a member of an organization called "The Sons of Confederate Veterans". They are among many historical groups that do the battle reenactments.

They are no different from other organizations like "Daughters of the Confederacy" (DOC), Daughters of the American Revolution" (DAR), and "Daughters of the Alamo" (DOA - The Alamo would have been torn down in the '30's without them)
141 posted on 03/12/2003 5:43:27 PM PST by chaosagent
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Comment #142 Removed by Moderator

To: JebBush2008
I take it you haven't heard of La Raza and Aztlan(?).

And there are groups in Japan that still celebrate their WW2 dead. And groups in Germany that celebrate their WW2 soldiers.
143 posted on 03/12/2003 5:46:19 PM PST by chaosagent
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To: Xenophobe
That shame was foisted on the symbol by others. There was no "shame" in the confederate flag until very recently. This man has the same right to exhibit his symbols as do blacks who want to display the green red and black separatist flag. No, I do not agree that their trauma was so very great that they cannot bear to look upon the flag. Not one of them was a slave under it. Ever.

It is a totally modern deconstruction technique that unfortunately gains sympathizers. All some ONE has to do is complain about feeling threatened, the entire rest of the population must stop in concerned horror. Lets get real.

As long as "they" want to make it an issue, it will be a symbol, not of slavery and "hatred"[which says more about the user of that term than the subject of that term] but of free expression and individuality.

144 posted on 03/12/2003 6:01:15 PM PST by Adder
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To: JebBush2008
"In 1944 my Dad who was from New Orleans was dodging bullets and killing Nazi's while your ancestors were segregating schools and dictating who drank out of what water fountain. In the 1960’s my Dad took our family to march for Civil Rights while most white people in the south opposed the movement. Where were you and your family those summer days back in ’65?

So....your dad was a war hero, eh? Just like you have Confederate ancestors.......right? You're so full of crap it's coming out your ears. If you want to see what my father did during the war you can check my homepage. BTW....what unit did YOU serve with? .....or were you too busy marching with MLK to bother with the military?

I still say you're a liar and a Coward.

145 posted on 03/12/2003 6:11:08 PM PST by Godebert
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To: Xenophobe
As our culture changes so do perceptions and values.

Are you supportive of cultural relativism? Just curious.

146 posted on 03/12/2003 6:13:48 PM PST by GOPcapitalist
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To: Godebert
Must have been tough fighting that war with a pillow case over your head.
147 posted on 03/12/2003 6:29:55 PM PST by JebBush2008
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To: JebBush2008
LOL
148 posted on 03/12/2003 6:34:40 PM PST by Diddle E. Squat
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To: Xenophobe
Outgunned and undermanned, the men of the South fought valiantly, and I'm glad they are my countrymen. That being said, symbols have power, and should be exercised carefully.

I agree wholeheartedly.

That is why I believe that military symbols such as the Confederate Battle Flag should be vigorously defended against any political misuse by race baiters and hate mongers of either color.

A loathsome misuse of the Confederate Battle Flag can be found here: Ku Klux Klan...The flag of the South is now the flag of World Wide White unity!

The use of the Confederate Battle Flag by hate groups and racist politicians, be they white or black, is a slap in the face to the valient men who died under that banner and should be condemned as strenuously as the misuse of Old Glory by those same hate groups.

Once we allow the hate mongers to define the symbolism of our History, they win.

149 posted on 03/12/2003 6:43:18 PM PST by Polybius
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To: JebBush2008
"Must have been tough fighting that war with a pillow case over your head."

I guess that answers my question. Pathetic.

150 posted on 03/12/2003 6:43:28 PM PST by Godebert
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To: Adder
Ya know, you and I may not like it, but the confederate flag has become the most prominent symbol of segregationism and racism. Too bad, so sad, that's life. Same way with the rainbow flag and stickers. Are you going to drive around with a rainbow sticker on your car and be shocked when someone considers you gay? No matter what, that is the association most people will make with that symbol. Same for the Confederate flag. And from some of the responses I have witnessed and read, not without a measure of potential truth.

But to the original story of this thread, the guy parked on his employer's lot. The employer is free to set standards for behavior/dress/presentation on company property, just like wearing a slogan t-shirt. The employer gave him the option of not parking in their lot, but the employee pushed the issue. I would have fired him, too.

OBTW, I'm a native Texan, spent some wonderful years in Georgia, and had great...great grandparents that survived Sherman's march to the sea(which is why they then moved to Texas). So any posters that wants to throw out the "You Yankees don't understand" reply can save it.
151 posted on 03/12/2003 6:47:44 PM PST by Diddle E. Squat ( And the Georgia flag should be changed back to the pre-'50's one, by vote of course.)
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To: Polybius
Sorry, but that battle with the KKK was lost years ago. The defense of the 'military' history of that flag was way too slow to get started.
152 posted on 03/12/2003 6:49:14 PM PST by Diddle E. Squat
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To: Xenophobe
Being strung up and having their genitals ripped off? Systematically denied voting rights, educational opportunities, even the right to use the same water fountains?

Wait a minute, I thought you were talking about the Confederacy, now you're describing life for blacks in the north. Or have you forgotten the Draft Riots of 1863 where blacks were hung by whites angered at fighting for the northern tyrant and his tariff war, the abolitionists hung or tarred and feathered in the north that even suggested equal rights for blacks. As for drinking fountains, I suggest you look to the 'land of lincoln' that wouldn't even allow blacks to live in the state after 1853 or Oregon that banned blacks in their constitution in 1859 among other northern states that gave made Jim Crow laws look tame.

That's some of the factual evidence not discussed in classrooms isn't it? That's some of the evidence that doesn't paint the all holy d#mn north in the best of lights isn't it? Face it, the facts are covered up to protect the myth of a man that went to war for one reason and one reason only. To gain his tariff monies he felt due to him

Voting rights? What voting rights? Many northern states refused to admit the existence of blacks let alone give them voting rights!! Perhaps you could explain why in 1860, 237654 free blacks continued to live in the Southern states or states loyal to the Confederate cause while in your all holy north only 240967 blacks lived in states loyal to the union during the war. Surely, if life was so hard down here and free blacks were treated so badly, then they all would have gone north. Of course we're not considering that in some cities (i.e. Charleston) blacks owned a large amount of property and (I know this is blaspheme to your idol) even rented out housing to whites. The facts are there in the historical record. But again, keep going on the koolaid. It's not helping, but it will help you ignore factual evidence

153 posted on 03/12/2003 6:56:23 PM PST by billbears (Deo Vindice)
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To: Rebelbase
Shhhh!!!! He doesn't exist. That's just a figment of your imagination.

May God bless HK Edgerton (former NAALCP leader) and all he does for our continued fight

154 posted on 03/12/2003 7:00:32 PM PST by billbears (Deo Vindice)
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To: JebBush2008
My family is from Rome GA and E Alabama. My dad (a WWII combat veteran of N. Africa and Italy) and our preacher were standing on the Pettus Bridge when the tear gas and the dogs came down. (Admittedly, dad confessed he was thinking, "What the !@)#$(*$% am I doing here?") When a civil rights worker was ambushed and killed a short while later, and nobody would bury the body, my dad hauled the dead man all the way back to Atlanta to a funeral home that WOULD bury him. (Wondering all the while what he was going to say if a sheriff's deputy pulled him over and asked why he had a corpse in the back seat.) :-D

My dad also has four Confederate veteran great grandfathers. He and I have both attended a lot of reenactments, battlefield rides and walkovers, etc. etc. The battle flag of the Army of Northern Virginia is part of that history.

Once you start excising history because somebody, somewhere, claims they are "offended", you are going to put us in the position of the editors of the Large Soviet Encyclopedia, who would periodically send out razor blades and new pages with instructions to replace articles that had come to "offend" the powers that were.

It also occurs to me that much of the agitation against the battle emblem has not been done in good faith. For example, the situation in S. Carolina. The NAACP agreed to move the flag from the capitol to a nearby Confederate monument, then after they got what they wanted they started agitating to get it off state property altogether. Next little Tommy Daschle said the flag shouldn't fly anywhere in the United States (I believe he's backed off that but that's what he said initially before he was called on it). If they get rid of the flag, they'll start on Confederate monuments and statues (as they already have in Richmond VA).

It isn't about the Confederate flag - it's about a bunch of insecure, hateful race-baiters who will not be satisfied until every vestige of that time is removed except for THEIR version of events.

155 posted on 03/12/2003 7:07:42 PM PST by AnAmericanMother (. . . save your Dixie cups . . . the South shall rise again!)
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To: hoosierskypilot
you're a conservative white male LOL thanks, but female. Hey, you never know in a forum! And no, its not an insult. The liberal facist pig would have been!! ;-)
156 posted on 03/12/2003 7:14:34 PM PST by eyespysomething (Stop crying or I'll give you something to cry about)
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To: JebBush2008
Um, no, that would fall under the same first amendment rights. Hey, I'm for the rights of everyone, even the stupid!
But if that were me, I wouldn't be surprised to find it vandalized!
157 posted on 03/12/2003 7:17:00 PM PST by eyespysomething (Stop crying or I'll give you something to cry about)
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To: chaosagent; JebBush2008
And there are groups in Japan that still celebrate their WW2 dead. And groups in Germany that celebrate their WW2 soldiers.

The Germans lost World War One but the German Air Force, to this day, has a fighter squadron named in honor of the Red Baron, Manfred von Richthofen, Jagdgeschwader 71 "Richthofen".

Hell, we in America even named a pizza after him.

But why go so far away from home to find examples? Fort Benning, Fort Bragg and Fort Hood are all named in honor of Confederate warriors.

So was the USS Stonewall Jackson (SSBN-634)

Losing a war does not dimish the respect that is due an honorable warrior.

158 posted on 03/12/2003 7:18:35 PM PST by Polybius
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To: Godebert
Is that flag a family heirloom? Or did you get it somewhere? I like it.
159 posted on 03/12/2003 7:22:10 PM PST by eyespysomething (Stop crying or I'll give you something to cry about)
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To: Old Professer; Xenophobe
'Fess up; you're just here to stir up trouble, right?

Xenophobe signed up 2003-03-10. Could be...

160 posted on 03/12/2003 7:22:13 PM PST by TXnMA ((No Longer!!!))
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