The Confederate battle flag rose again outside the South Carolina Statehouse Monday, two years after the state decided to remove it following the massacre of nine members of a historically black church in Charleston, NBC News reported.
The stars and bars waved from a temporary plastic stand Monday, not in a flagpole planted in the earth. The move was meant as a protest against recent decisions throughout the South to remove Confederate monuments from public places.
"They are trying to demonize and vilify our ancestors 150 years after their deaths," South Carolina Secessionist Party president James Bessenger insisted.
Demonstrators far outnumbered the roughly two dozen flag supporters outside the statehouse, some of whom wore replica Confederate uniforms.