An Alabama man says his First Amendment rights were violated when he was fired from his job for refusing to remove a Confederate flag flying from his truck.
Phillip Sims said he normally doesn't fly the flag at work, but he was running late Monday and didn't have time to remove it. He said his supervisor at Turner Industries in Decatur, Ala., called him in to the office and asked him to remove the flag, WHNT reported.
“He said, ‘I hate to be the one to tell you that, but if you don’t, I’m going to have to fire you,'" Sims said.
Sims said he was offered his job back three times if he would just remove the flag, but he refused. He has contacted the American Civil Liberties Union in hopes the organization would help him. An Alabama lawyer said Sims doesn't have much of a case because Alabama is an "employment at-will" state, and employers don't even have to give a reason before terminating an employee.
Unlike other states, Alabama has no laws protecting the First Amendment rights of employees.
Sims says he doesn't regret refusing to remove the flag, Raw Story reported.
“It’s a statement of our heritage and it’s just my right to have it, and I don’t think that I should just give it up because somebody told me I had to,” Sims said.
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