The Waubonsee, American and Illinois flag fly outside of the Waubonsee Community College Dickson Center. This flag is one of the many that would have to be replaced if Illinois were to change its flag. Photo by Kevin Sigrist.

By: Kevin Sigrist, Editor-in-Chief

From Jan. 10 through Feb. 14, 2025, Illinois residents have had the chance to cast their vote daily in a government-run redesign competition for the Illinois state flag. After reviewing more than 4,800 entries, the competition included voting options for ten fully new redesign finalists, as well as the state’s current, centennial and sesquicentennial flags. Voters could vote once per day for any of the 13 flags through the 36 day period. Though the competition drew attention throughout the state, it is considered non-binding, meaning the Illinois government does not have to follow what the polls dictate, if they even do anything at all. Besides the vague specification of “later this year” on the Illinois Flag Competition, there is no set date as to when a government decision will be released. However, the contest results will inform a report by the Illinois Flag Commission that will present its findings and recommendation to the Illinois General Assembly by Apr. 1, 2025.

The last time the Illinois flag was remotely changed was on Jul. 1, 1970. As a result, many Illinois residents found the flag to be dull and outdated, with many critiques consisting of its predominantly white background, overcomplicated design, and overinvolvement of numbers and text. 

On Aug. 7, 2023, Governor J.B. Pritzker signed a senate bill titled SB1818, which was created to explore the creation of a new state flag and was named after Illinois’s founding in 1818.  The signing of this bill is what led to the creation of this contest.

All of the 13 finalists are available for viewing at www.ilsos.gov/special/IFC/10finalists.pdf, all accompanied by descriptions of their content and some background information on their creators. Each finalist was numbered based on the order out of the 4800 they were submitted in. 

Many of the flags share very similar components. Many had state symbols, such as an I for Illinois, the state butterfly or state flower. Various aspects of President Lincoln, blue stripes or shapes representing Lake Michigan and the shape of Illinois were also common. More abstractly, 21 stripes, stars or other attributes representing Illinois as the 21st state to join the Union and six point stars to represent Chicago were a trend as well.

The results of the actual poll is not accessible, but a poll of 20 Waubonsee students revealed disjointed findings, with 30% voting to keep the current flag, 25% voting for number 2246 and the remaining 45% of voters being spread out. Flags 4669, 3754, 2752 and the Centennial Flag all received zero votes.

Waubonsee Political Science Professor Richard Kiefer finds the competition generally fun and interesting but ultimately did not find any entries that stood out to him.

“I mean, I thought like, [Number 2752] kind of is all right, but this still looks like somebody did this off like a graphic template… I know you weren’t allowed to use AI or stock stuff, but it just looks a little amateurish,” Keifer said. “[Number 4420] kind of looked interesting with the red white blue, but to me, it also almost looks like the French flag flapping.”

Though the bill and contest faced very little criticism, there have been concerns about how many people actually participated in voting.

While the actual number of voters is also currently not available to the public, it is quite apparent that most Illinois citizens did not vote for a flag. At the Waubonsee level, of the 20 students that were surveyed, only 15% actually participated in the voting process.

While many Illinois citizens are excited to see the reveal of the poll results and the State of Illinois’s final selection, the possibility of no actual change is entirely possible given the fact that the competition is non-binding.

“Most people, I don’t think, are even aware that they did this, and it’s essentially a non-binding contest. You would need action from the state to change it,” Keifer said.

One of the main criticisms of the competition is that given the current state of the American government and political world, many believe that the changing of the state flag is not relevant enough to be a focus of the government.

“Some people are critical of it saying, ‘Just leave it alone. The old flag’s okay. It might be a little boring, but we’ve had it. 
It’s not offending anybody. Why even waste energy on this?’ Because there’s also a cost thing,” Keifer said. “If we change the flag, then suddenly every state building would have to have a new flag, which maybe it’s a nominal cost, but they argue we should be saving money not adding more.”

At Waubonsee, students tend to agree with this statement, as 60% of students in the survey found the changing of the flag to not be an important matter, and 70% found the current flag to be satisfactory.

“I was kind of surprised that they were doing it in the first place because we’ve got other issues with petitions and the economy and federal funding and stuff. I think it certainly shouldn’t be a priority. It should be way down there,” Kiefer said. “I would be surprised, and I can’t imagine the Governor just trying to force something like this unless it was universal, everybody loved it, and there was broad support in the state legislature and the assembly for it, and I don’t know that it’s on the radar for most people right now.”

Regardless of the criticism, the contest proceeded smoothly for its entire duration and is now up to the Illinois Flag Commission. The release date and results are expected in 2025, but the exact timing has not been determined, but more information can be expected by Apr. 1, 2025.