![\"Gadsden_flag.svg\"](\"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/Gadsden_flag.svg_-500x333.png\")
<\/a><\/center><\/p>\nThe other day, Eugene Volokh wrote in the pages of the Washington Post<\/a> about the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s investigation into a complaint that a black Federal worker filed about a cap that a colleague wore to his federal job which had the Gadsden flag displayed on it. The complainant charges that he’s offended by the flag because Christopher Gadsden, the creator of the flag, owned slaves back in 1775 when he designed it.<\/p>\n Actually, it was Benjamin Franklin, who owned no slaves, who began graphic representations of the American colonies with a timber rattler in 1754. According to Wikipedia<\/a>, the complainant in the above mentioned case would also be offended by the US Marine Corps, since Gadsden had a hand in creating them, too;<\/p>\n [T]he Second Continental Congress authorized the mustering of five companies of Marines to accompany the Navy on their first mission. The first Marines enlisted in the city of Philadelphia, and they carried drums painted yellow, depicting a coiled rattlesnake with thirteen rattles, and the motto “Don’t Tread on Me.” This is the first recorded mention of the future Gadsden flag’s symbolism.<\/p>\n At the Congress, Continental Colonel Christopher Gadsden represented his home state of South Carolina. He was one of seven members of the Marine Committee who were outfitting the first naval mission.<\/p>\n Before the departure of that first mission in December 1775, the newly appointed commander-in-chief of the Navy, Commodore Esek Hopkins, received the yellow rattlesnake flag from Gadsden to serve as the distinctive personal standard of his flagship. It was displayed at the mainmast.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n