... The Jim Crow era in American history dates from the late 1890s, when southern states began systematically to codify .. in law and state constitutional provisions the subordinate position of African Americans in society ... The year 1890, when Mississippi wrote a disfranchisement provision into its state constitution, is often considered the beginning of legalized Jim Crow ... http://www.jimcrowhistory.org/history/crea...

In 1894, at the beginning of the modern Jim Crow era, Mississippi replaced the magnolia flag with one containing the Confederate emblem



In 1956, two years after Brown v. Topeka, as the civil rights movement began to spread, Georgia modified its flag to contain the Confederate emblem



<flags from:> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flags_of_the_...

In 1962, as lunch counter sit-ins spread across the south:

... the Confederate battle flag was placed on top of the South Carolina statehouse by vote of the all-white legislature ... http://www.infoplease.com/spot/confederate...

So the flag has a nasty habit of reappearing in the context of the denial of civil rights, based on skin color. But more importantly:

... If flying the flag is deeply hurtful to a third of your population, it’s just downright rude to keep doing it ... http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/archives/...