Upside-down American flag

How to read it

Union down means the canton, the blue field of stars, is at the bottom of the flag instead of the top. The rule is section 8(a) of the Flag Code, in Title 4 of the US Code, under the heading that no disrespect should be shown to the flag. The Congressional Research Service notes that the Code prescribes no penalty and has no enforcement provisions: it is a guide for civilians and civilian groups to follow voluntarily. A flag on a sleeve with its stars on the right is a different thing, the reverse side flag of a uniform, and its stars are still at the top.

Also searched as: flag union down, flag upside down distress, inverted flag, upside down american flag, upside down flag, upside down flag meaning.

A signal from the sea

The ensign flown upside down was a distress signal at sea long before the Flag Code. Commander Hilary P. Mead of the Royal Navy, writing in the US Naval Institute’s Proceedings in 1936, gave examples from British practice: a short code of 1812 for merchant ships used the ensign union down at the fore topgallant masthead for distress from shortage of hands, and the journal of Charles Chambers, surgeon of the fireship Prometheus, calls an ensign hoisted union downward “the regular signal of distress”.

Not an international signal

Mead wrote that the colours upside down were not one of the authorised signals of distress, and could hardly be one internationally, because some ensigns, such as the French and the Danish, look the same whichever way up they are hoisted. He found it remarkable that the United States, with its strict flag code, accepted the ensign union down as one of its established distress signals.