§9565 — Title 10 Armed Forces | U.S. Code

Summary

The Secretary of the Air Force can return or send the flags, standards, and guidons (the unit flags and banners) of Air Force or Space Force units that have been demobilized. If a unit was called into federal service from a state’s Air National Guard, the state’s governor can ask for its flag back. If a flag can't go back for that reason, the governor can ask that it be sent to the state that supplied most of the unit’s members when the unit was formed, as the Secretary decides. The United States keeps ownership of these flags. The Secretary cannot give or send any flag unless there are acceptable plans to preserve and care for it.

Title 10, §9565

Armed Forces — Source: USLM XML via OLRC

(a)The Secretary of the Air Force may dispose of colors, standards, and guidons of demobilized organizations of the Air Force or the Space Force, as follows:

(1)Those brought into Federal service by the Air National Guard of a State may be returned to that State upon the request of its governor.

(2)Those that cannot be returned under clause (1) may, upon the request of its governor, be sent to the State that, as determined by the Secretary, furnished the majority of members of the organization when it was formed.

(b)Title to colors, standards, and guidons of demobilized organizations of the Air Force or the Space Force remains in the United States.

(c)No color, standard, or guidon may be disposed of under this section unless provision satisfactory to the Secretary has been made for its preservation and care.

Notes & Related Subsidiaries

Historical and Revision Notes

Revised sectionSource (U.S. Code)Source (Statutes at Large) 9565(a)5:202 (less 3d and last sentences).Mar. 4, 1921, ch. 166, § 2, 41 Stat. 1438. 9565(b)5:202 (3d sentence). 9565(c)5:202 (last sentence). In subsection (a), the words “Any which were used during their service by such organizations and” are omitted as surplusage. The first 15 words of the last sentence are substituted for 5:202 (1st 45 words of 2d sentence). The words “the Quartermaster General” are omitted, since the functions which, for the Army, are assigned by statute to subordinate officers of the Army, are, for the Air Force, assigned to the Secretary of the Air Force.

Editorial Notes

Amendments

2021—Subsec. (a). Pub. L. 116–283, § 923(e)(5)(A), inserted “or the Space Force” after “organizations of the Air Force” in introductory provisions. Subsec. (b). Pub. L. 116–283, § 923(e)(5)(B), inserted “or the Space Force” after “the Air Force”.

§9565 Colors, Standards, and Guidons of Demobilized Organizations: Disposition