The Pledge Case
A
California attorney, “Michael Newdow, filed suit in March 2000 against the Elk
Grove Unified School District. Mr.
Newdow sued for his daughter, who was enrolled in the Elk Grove public schools,
as ‘next friend.’ He said the words
‘under God’ in the Pledge of Allegiance amounted to an unconstitutional
establishment of religion and that, as such, the daily recitation of the Pledge
with the offending words interfered with his right to inculcate his daughter
with his religious beliefs.”[i]
On
“June 26, 2002 … the United Ninth States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
ruled that the Pledge violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.”[ii] The case was appealed to the United States
Supreme Court which ruled Newdow did not have standing to file the suit. The Ninth Circuit court ruling was
reversed.
There
have been several other court cases involving the Pledge and the words “Under
God” brought by Newdow and by others.[iii] This battle over these two words will not go
away. It appears the battle lines are
drawn and sides are being chosen by competing worldviews determined to remove
or retain these two simple words in the Pledge of Allegiance.
After
being asked several times about my “Christian perspective” on this case I will
attempt to delineate it in the next few pages.
► The Underlying Battle
Firstly,
the issue is not per se the recitation of the words “under God” as much as it
is the principle underlying those words. I care not whether the Pledge is recited in
schools, but the issue of attempting to unmoor the USS America from the pier of
its foundation is. To be left adrift in
the sea of humanity without an anchor for our “unalienable rights,” given the
track record of most of the other floating vessels, is a cause for great
concern.
Whether
one likes to admit it or not, the Declaration of Independence, directly anchors
our “unalienable rights” to a “Creator God.” For the first 150 – 175 years of our existence
that anchor was unmovable, unshakeable, and unimaginably thought secure.
So
for many conservative Christians the issue is not simply a pledge recitation,
but a profound resistance to the unmooring of those “unalienable rights.” The Pledge case is only one of the many sea
battles in this battle of antithetical armadas. Simply put, the issues run much, much deeper
than these simple two words under dispute.
Secondly,
as many have stated these two simple words “is in fact not meaningless, but
meaningful as an expression of religious faith.” As Francis Bellamy envisioned in his original
Pledge, his words had a “meaningful … expression of religious faith.” It certainly wasn’t by accident that this
socialist worshipped the “Total State” and sought to promote his particular
worldview. Nor was it meaningless to the
US Congress who, in 1924, modified his pledge to include a direct reference to
”the Flag of the United States of America” much to the consternation of
Bellamy. Neither was it meaningless to
the US Congress who, in 1954, again modified his pledge to be more in harmony
with America’s history and its general population, by inserting the words
”under God” again to the chagrin of Bellamy’s descendants.[iv]
As
the US Congress stated in defense of its inclusion of these two words:
“At this moment in our history the principles
underlying our American Government and the American way of life are under
attack by a system whose philosophy is at direct odds with our own. Our American Government is founded on the
concept of the individuality and the dignity of the human being. Underlying this concept is the belief that the
human person is important because he was created by God and endowed by Him with
certain unalienable rights which no civil authority may usurp. The inclusion of God in our pledge therefore
would further acknowledge the dependence of our people and our Government upon
the moral directions of the Creator. At
the same time it would serve to deny the atheistic and materialist concepts of
communism with its attendant subservience of the individual.”[v]
As
the text of the original 1954 bill stated: “This is not an act establishing a
religion.... The phrase ‘under God’ recognizes only the guidance of God in our national
affairs." AND as the bill’s chief sponsor stated of the bill: “… the
children of our land, in the daily recitation of the pledge in school, will be
daily impressed with a true understanding of our way of life and its origins.”[vi]
So,
in reality, those two simple words are not meaningless to the conservative
Christians no more than they are meaningless to others. The Pledge without the words is nothing more
than a socialist utopian dream that has proven unrealistic in the modern world,
and the Pledge is offensive to those who have rejected our historical
foundation. (Maybe it might be better to
jettison the whole Pledge thing.)
This
issue is much, much more than these simple two words. Even if these words were
eliminated, or the entire Pledge removed, it would not change the focus of the
battle. That battle is for those “unalienable rights” and where our founders
anchored them.[vii]
► ► The Singular Reality
Newdow
has been “collecting stories from those who have had adverse experiences as a
result of the words ‘under God’ in the Pledge of Allegiance.” He asks that “[i]f you or your children were
emotionally or otherwise injured, please provide us with an accounting of the
experience(s)… we want are specific
incidents, such as when a teacher singled out a child, when a friendship was
lost, when someone was ridiculed or otherwise harmed due to not saying the
‘under God’ words or sitting through the Pledge recitation as a protest to
those words.”[viii]
Others
have stated the coercive nature of the Pledge in public schools as a means of
discarding these two offending words. To
them this is the singular reality
and it is the only reality that truly matters in this debate/discussion.
The reality is that for the first 150 - 175 years of our
existence we were a nation “under God” and our government openly and officially
confirmed this fact both by its words and actions. Given the preponderance of
evidence to this reality, it would be impossible to deny and only those who
have a specific agenda contrary to our nation’s historical reality would even
dare to deny this.
The reality is that since the secular fundamentalist side
gained control of the judiciary within our lifetimes our historical past has been
in doubt. They have effectively gained control of the judicial oligarchy and
are attempting to change our historical past to one that conforms to their
specific and narrow worldview by judicial fiat. Unfortunately for their side,
our historical past is fully ascertainable by the superabundance of evidence in
our historical records.
The reality is that our Constitution does not guarantee “sex
education, abortion discussions, or [so-called] proper science education.” To
force all school children to endure the left’s moral agenda is, indeed, an
indication of wanting to “push a liberal morality on the public.”
The reality is that their side have completely and conveniently
ignored the anchoring of our “unalienable rights” precisely because there is no
other anchor available other than the collective will of society; which is the
stated purpose of Bellamy’s writing of the original Pledge and the exact reason
that the US Congress decided to include those two words now deemed as
offensive.
The reality is that this Pledge case is irrelevant to the
purpose of the right’s and the left’s ultimate goal. As has been previously
stated, it is only one of the many battles being waged for the anchoring of our
rights. If our “unalienable rights” are
not anchored to God, as they apparently believe, and contrary to what the founders
believed, where have they decided to anchor them?
The reality is that the Pledge is not coercive in the sense
that it is not mandatory, but voluntary. If one believes that others might feel
“awkward” because of not wanting to recite the Pledge in a voluntary setting, I
agree that some will feel “awkward.” BUT no more “awkward” than the multitudes
upon multitudes who have felt “awkward” because their worldview collides directly
with the standard operating procedures of the left’s agenda in schools. If
one’s desire is not to have children feel “awkward” then one needs to stand up
for those on the right who have to daily endure the “humiliation” from their
teachers and peers in school. Otherwise one’s claim of “concern” for the
coercion of children is capaciously and capriciously inconsistent.[ix]
Finally,
this singular reality is this battle
over the Pledge only a surface scratch on the body politic with the real
problem lying much, much deeper into the organs of our body politic. We can
continue to argue about whether aspirin or ibuprofen would help, when we really
need surgery. So, we can reduce the pain
by taking aspirin, and eliminating the two offensive words out the Pledge, and
still not be any healthier in the body politic because we have still refused to
deal with the illness affecting our uniquely American experience.
That
is the singular reality!
► ► ► Conclusion
Several
have stated that the Establishment Clause forbids the mention of God by the
“government.” But the Establishment
Clause had not had an effect on the “under God” phrase, nor the other
multitudes upon multitudes of examples where our government’s acknowledgement
of God was pronounced for the first 150 - 175 years. To claim that today this
is a direct violation of the Establishment Clause misses the “original intent”
and the interpretation of the Establishment Clause for most of our nation’s
history.[x]
A
recitation of the Pledge with the “under God” words is only an acknowledgement
of where our founders recognized the guidance of God in our national affairs. Louis Rabaut, who was the chief sponsor of the
1954 bill to include the words “under God’ said, “the children of our land, in
the daily recitation of the pledge in school, will be daily impressed with a
true understanding of our way of life and its origins.” Notice that one of the reasons stated for the
inclusion of these two words was to inform our children of our “origins.”
Whether
or not children, or adults for that matter, believe in God, or any god, or no
god, would not change our heritage. Nor
would it change the “origins” of our Founding Fathers’ insistence of anchoring
our “unalienable rights” to the Creator God. As has been repeatedly stated, even a daily
recitation of the opening lines of the Declaration of Independence would be a
reminder of where our Founding Father’s thought our “unalienable rights” were
anchored.
Are
we to ignore our historical past simply because our founding was predicated
upon a Creator God? Are we to imbue our
school children with ignorance of the religious underpinnings of our nation
simply because the majority of our Founding Fathers were Christian in their
worldview? Are we to impugn the first 175 years of our history simply because
they felt the providence of God on our country? Are we to impose a gag order on teaching
school children the foundation of our Republic?
This
debate over two words is insignificant in the totality of the cultural war. It has not been lost on the right that the
left’s incrementalism in promoting its agenda is well established. So, while one may want to harp on the Pledge
case, it is not lost on others that some do not want to deal with the
underpinnings of why those two words actually matter; to both sides.
[i] Wikipedia
- Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newdow_vs._US_Congress,_et_al.
[ii] Web
site of Michael Newdow – “Past Litigation - http://www.restorethepledge.com/
[iii] Ibid
[iv] The
Pledge of Allegiance - A Short History by Dr. John W. Baer - http://www.oldtimeislands.org/pledge/pledge.htm
[v] The New
American, July 29, 2002 - One Nation Under the State?
[vi] Ibid
[vii]
CA State Senator Tom McClintock wrote: “If the source of our fundamental rights
is not God, then the source becomes man – or more precisely, a government of
men. And rights that can be extended by government may also be withdrawn by
government.” Article Why the Pledge
of Allegiance Matters –
http://www.declaration.net/news.asp?docID=4066&y=2004
[viii] Web
site of Michael Newdow – http://www.restorethepledge.com/
[ix] Being
forced to recite the Pledge is not the same as a “voluntary” recitation of the
Pledge, as I am under the impression that we are talking about “voluntary”
recitation; especially given the fact that the USSC ruled in 1943 that children
“couldn’t be required to say the Pledge.” The point of feeling coerced is
irrelevant given the overwhelming stigmatizing suffered by others who are
constantly given the feeling of coercion by their rejection of the present
status quo in the majority of our schools in other “voluntary” settings.
[x] Asking
children to recite something that was “legal” for most of our history, (with
respect to the acknowledgment of God in the public square), is not something
that can be arbitrarily attributed to a violation of the Establishment Clause
unless the interpretation of the Establishment Clause has changed; which it has
within the last 50 years. So a recent reinterpretation of the Establishment
Clause is still a subject of much debate. One side may have effectively changed
the interpretation of the Establishment Clause by judicial fiat, but that does
not mean that others cannot gain the political clout to return it to its
“original intent.”
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