Origins

• The flag was first commissioned by the Flag Resolution of the Second Continental Congress, passed on June 14, 1777, while the Revolutionary War raged. It established the basic parameters of the flag, with its stars and stripes motif.
  
  

Colors

• There is no official reason for the red and white colors of the stars and stripes. The colors likely sprang from the colors of the British flag, under whom the pre-Revolutionary colonies lived.
  
  

Stars

• The flag originally had 13 stars, each representing one of the original 13 colonies. A new star is added to the blue field every time a new state is added to the Union: today there are 50, spaced in 5 rows of 6 and 4 rows of 5.
  
  

Stripes

• Unlike the stars, the stripes---7 red ones and 6 white ones---remain unchanged. They represent the 13 original colonies.
  
  

Changes

• The flag has undergone 26 changes since the time it was adopted, usually by adding a star whenever a new state is admitted into the Union. Plans are in place to add up to 6 additional stars on top of the current 50, if new territories (such as Puerto Rico or the District of Columbia) become states.