Our country’s inclination toward inclusion is almost always a good thing. Except for today. Memorial Day is for an exclusive group. Unfortunately, our tendency to get everyone under the umbrella has diluted the meaning of this holiday. Memorial Day is not to honor any and all who have died. Nor is it Veterans Day, which honors all who have served in the military.
Memorial Day is day of remembrance for those who have died in our nation’s service. At first observed on May 30, in 1971 Congress made it a holiday celebrated on the last Monday in May. Traditionalists would like the day to return permanently to May 30, but efforts have stalled. No one has figured out how to take back a holiday, and thus a three-day weekend, without setting off a revolution.
Efforts have been made to reclaim the day: In 2000, Congress passed the “National Moment of Remembrance” resolution, which asks that at 3 p.m. local time, for all Americans “to voluntarily and informally observe in their own way a moment of remembrance and respect, pausing from whatever they are doing for a moment of silence or listening to ‘Taps.’”
Communities and civic organizations can incorporate such a moment into their own parades and gatherings.
Citizens can also show their respect by using the most traditional symbol of all: flying the flag of the United States of America at half-staff all day and taking it down at sunset.
Tired of all the Memorial Day sales, barbecues and sporting events, traditionalists want an entire day of mourning, but that’s not realistic, or even desirable.
The Martin Luther King Jr. holiday has become a community action day — people get out and volunteer. Doing good works has given the day meaning, rather than asking people to contemplate “equality.” Memorial Day has an aspect of this — when volunteers place flags on graves. More volunteer opportunities could add another dimension to the day, such as helping a family who just lost a son or daughter, husband or wife in Iraq or Afghanistan.
On Friday, news agencies reported that three American soldiers were among 25 people killed in Iraq Thursday in an upsurge of violence that brought to 60 the number killed over a 24-hour period.
This Memorial Day, we are especially mindful of the roughly 4,300 American men and women who have died in Iraq, and hundreds more in Afghanistan. As with all those we honor today, we don’t believe their duty or memory is diminished, even as we welcome the warmth of summer at the same time.
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