1903 - Nebraska creates a misdemeanor display any word, figure, mark, picture, design, drawing, or advertisement of any nature on any flag. You also couldn't sell any object featuring the US or Nebraska flags. It was also a crime to publicly mutilate, deface, defile, defy, trample, or cast contempt by words or act upon either flag. In 1907, the SC upheld the law as being constitutional and saying that it promotes peace, order, and well-being of the people. After that, several states did something similar.

1918 - Congress prohibits uttering, printing, writing, or publishing any disloyal, profane, scurrilous or abusive language about the US flag that would bring it into contempt, scorn, or disrepute. This is the Sedition Act and it also prohibited displaying the flag of any foreign enemy. They did this, in part, due to protests about WWI where people were arrested over the state-level flag desecration laws. In 1919 the SC upheld the Sedition Act as constitutional.

1931 - The Supreme Court strikes down a state law in California that banned red (communist or anarchist) flags. Yippy!

1940 - SC upholds Pennsylvania state law that requires public school students to salute the flag while reciting the pledge but this was reversed in 1943. Justice Jackson wrote "If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion, or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein.”

1967 - Protestors were photographed burning the US flag at Vietnam draft protests. In 1968 congress passes the Flag Protection Act and makes it so feds can imprison or fine anyone who casts contempt upon any flag of the US by public mutilation, defacing, defiling, burning, or trampling. In 1969 this was partially overturned because someone was charged only with verbally disrespecting the flag. The SC said states can't arrest people for verbal disparaging remarks at the flag. They ignored the burning part for other defendants.

1984 - Greg Lee Johnson of the Communist Youth Brigade burned an American Flag during the Republican National Convention in Dallas Texas that year. This would lead to a big Supreme Court ruling in 1989. Extant Gen Xers among us may remember some of this. It was one of those proto culture war issues that boomers simply would not shut the fuck up about and Aaron Sorkin was seething about it in The West Wing decades later. The SC said that government isn't allowed to prohibit free speech just because society finds it offensive or disagreeable and the American flag isn't especially protected.

Since then they tried to pass a constitutional amendment during every single Congress between 1995 and 2005. It failed in 2006. Trump, of course, brought it up in 2024. If it comes up again, it'll probably pass.

States and modern Republicans have been wanting to do this for a while. It's always been the Supreme Court that holds them back.