Flag Day: Are you displaying the US flag correctly?

SALT LAKE CITY (KTVX) — If there’s one thing Americans love, it’s displaying our flag — but are you doing it correctly? Follow these rules, and you’ll always be respecting Ol’ Glory.

A combination of the Federal Flag Code and 1989’s Flag Protection Act govern how the flag should be displayed, respected and properly disposed of.

Things you should never do

• Let the U.S. flag touch the ground or anything beneath it, including the floor, water or merchandise
• Place anything on the flag, including letters, insignias or designs of any kind
• Use it as a wrapping or to hold anything
• Use it as bedding, drapery, or apparel or to cover a ceiling. It should not be used as a costume or athletic uniform. (Flag patches are OK)
• Use it for advertising or promotional purposes, including printing it on boxes, napkins or anything intended for temporary use
• Dip the flag for any person or thing
• Display it with the stars on the bottom, except as a signal of distress
• Carry the flag horizontally
• Fasten the flag or display it in a way that will harm it or soil it
• Keep your flag flying during stormy weather, unless you are specifically flying an all-weather flag

Things you should always do

• Unless you’re planning to properly illuminate it throughout the night, the flag should only be flown between sunrise and sunset
• Fly it at half-staff to honor a newly deceased federal or state government official or by the order of the U.S. president or your state’s governor. On Memorial Day, the flag should fly at half-staff until noon
• Fly it higher than any other flag (except during church services conducted by naval chaplains at sea). Other flags should surround it
• If you are dangling it or not flying it from a staff, it should hang flat. If suspended over a street, the stars should face north or east, depending on the direction of the street
• When displayed as projected from a building, the stars should be placed at the peak
• When displayed with another flag against a wall with crossed staffs, the U.S. flag appears on the left-hand side with the staff in front of the other flag’s staff
• When carried in a procession, the flag should be either on the marching right (the flag’s own right) or in front of the center of the line if there are other flags
• Dispose of damaged flags in a dignified way, preferably by burning