Teaching kids to respect the flag by requiring them to stand during the Pledge of Allegiance might have some emotional appeal. Standing ought to be standard procedure while the pledge is being recited. Yet passing a law to make children take to their feet would be counter-productive at best, unconstitutional at worst.

We get where Rep. Harry Accornero, R-Laconia, is coming from. He says he sponsored House Bill 1146, which would require that public school children in New Hampshire stand while the Pledge of Allegiance is being recited at the start of each school day, to teach children to respect the flag.

“I grew up in an era when it wasn’t even considered that you didn’t stand and respect the flag,” he said on Tuesday. “Our Consitution is being thrown down the toilet. I thought this would encourage young people to appreciate what the flag means and the people who fought and died for it.”

Patriotic sentiment, but the approach is flawed. The Pledge of Allegiance contains the words “under God.” The state cannot require kids to say those words. Can it require them to stand during official recitations? Probably not.

Even if it could, doing it by law would take the leftist approach to solving the problem: If people won’t voluntarily do something you think they should do, pass a law to make them.

That would address the symptom (failure to stand during the pledge), not the cause: a reduction in genuine, heartfelt affection for the flag and the nation it represents. Making children stand for the pledge is not the way to teach them to love their country. We do that by living up to its ideals and by teaching children what those ideals really are.