Newburyport residents are insisting the Massachusetts state flag and seal are symbols of the legacy of white supremacy that must be replaced. They have gone so far as to demand action from the City Council.
On Feb. 27, the council received the notice asking them to pledge support to the Special Commission Relative to the Seal and Motto of the Commonwealth, according to a report by the Newburyport Daily News.
The resolution was sent to the General Government Committee after a 9-2 vote, according to Fox News. The opposition was from Ward 1 Councilor Sharif Zeid and Ward 5 Councilor Jim McCauley.
Zeid said there are other priorities that the city needs to attend to and that this is not “the right expenditure of time,” according to the Newburyport Daily News.
Per the report, residents Marianna Vesey and Linda Lu Burciaga are the two championing the initiative. They said 55 municipalities have undertaken the cause, adopting the changes. They also said other municipalities – including Amesbury, West Newbury, and Salisbury – are weighing whether to make the changes.
According to Fox News, Vesey claimed the seal asserts that white people are “in charge of this world and that we have to subdue the Native American people.”
And “One of the reasons that we can ignore this so easily is that our white supremacy culture has really allowed for the disappearance of the Native American world,” she said. “We’re really trying to say that they are not gone. They are here among us, and we really need to not only recognize that but to honor it.”
Burciaga told the outlet the flag and seal depicting a white hand holding a colonial sword over the head of a Native American is “problematic.”
“The belt was patterned by the illustrator after the red flannel belt of (Wampanoag leader) Metacomet who was the leader of the first native war of resistance against English colonization,” said Burciaga. “His severed head was impaled on a pike and displayed in Plymouth for more than 20 years as a war trophy.”
Burciaga has advocated for schools to teach “true history” about the state and Native American culture.
“Most of these schools are not teaching our youth about our true history in the state,” she added. “The use of mascots and also the cultural appropriation of some of the Native American artifacts and whatnot that have been taken from them. This is not just a symbolic ‘Get rid of the state seal and flag or change Columbus Day to indigenous Peoples’ Day’ thing. This also includes something that we should be doing for the rest of our lives, including education.”
Vesey said, “There’s also goes along with getting rid of mascots that are associated with Native Americans. It’s all part of that racist culture that we’re finally trying to address.”
She admits this new venture stemmed from a successfully changing Columbus Day to Indigenous People’s Day, according to the Newburyport Daily News.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.