The Pledge of Allegiance. The Bush administration really wants to keep the phrase "under God" in the pledge.
"Whatever else the (Constitution's) establishment clause may prohibit, this court's precedents make clear that it does not forbid the government from officially acknowledging the religious heritage, foundation and character of this nation," Solicitor General Theodore Olson wrote in a court filing.[Washington Post]This is hardly surprising, and it almost isn't worth rehashing such well-tread territory as our nation's secular foundation, and its rich history of separation of church from state. Sigh. Anyway, here are some interesting details on the history of the Pledge:
Francis Bellamy (1855 - 1931), a Baptist minister, wrote the original Pledge in August 1892. He was a Christian Socialist. In his Pledge, he is expressing the ideas of his first cousin, Edward Bellamy, author of the American socialist utopian novels, Looking Backward (1888) and Equality (1897). Francis Bellamy in his sermons and lectures and Edward Bellamy in his novels and articles described in detail how the middle class could create a planned economy with political, social and economic equality for all. The government would run a peace time economy similar to our present military industrial complex. The Pledge was published in the September 8th issue of The Youth's Companion, the leading family magazine and the Reader's Digest of its day. Its owner and editor, Daniel Ford, had hired Francis in 1891 as his assistant when Francis was pressured into leaving his baptist church in Boston because of his socialist sermons. As a member of his congregation, Ford had enjoyed Francis's sermons. Ford later founded the liberal and often controversial Ford Hall Forum, located in downtown Boston. In 1892 Francis Bellamy was also a chairman of a committee of state superintendents of education in the National Education Association. As its chairman, he prepared the program for the public schools' quadricentennial celebration for Columbus Day in 1892. He structured this public school program around a flag raising ceremony and a flag salute - his 'Pledge of Allegiance.'... In 1923 and 1924 the National Flag Conference, under the 'leadership of the American Legion and the Daughters of the American Revolution, changed the Pledge's words, 'my Flag,' to 'the Flag of the United States of America.' Bellamy disliked this change, but his protest was ignored. In 1954, Congress after a campaign by the Knights of Columbus, added the words, 'under God,' to the Pledge. The Pledge was now both a patriotic oath and a public prayer.... What follows is Bellamy's own account of some of the thoughts that went through his mind in August, 1892, as he picked the words of his Pledge:It is curious to me how much controversy there is over the phrase "under God." I never worried much about it until the court case came up. When I heard about the suit to remove "under God" from the Pledge, my response was to say, "Yeah, that guy is probably right, but who cares?" Evidently Christian Americans care. A lot (or as they say here in Alberta, "a whack"). Now that the Christians have made such a heavy stink about it, I have come to believe that the simple phrase is about Christian hegemony in American politics and social life. If the Christians had quietly won to keep the Pledge as it is, I wouldn't have even cared. But now that the issue has been fought at such a high level, and with such public ferosity by the religious community, my personal opinion has been amplified against it. Funny how that happens. Regardless of what happens now, Christians are facing a secular, religiously apathetic future for America. The issue over the Pledge is only a canary that portends a coming drought in American religious sentiment.It began as an intensive communing with salient points of our national history, from the Declaration of Independence onwards; with the makings of the Constitution...with the meaning of the Civil War; with the aspiration of the people... The true reason for allegiance to the Flag is the 'republic for which it stands.' ...And what does that vast thing, the Republic mean? It is the concise political word for the Nation - the One Nation which the Civil War was fought to prove. To make that One Nation idea clear, we must specify that it is indivisible, as Webster and Lincoln used to repeat in their great speeches. And its future? Just here arose the temptation of the historic slogan of the French Revolution which meant so much to Jefferson and his friends, 'Liberty, equality, fraternity.' No, that would be too fanciful, too many thousands of years off in realization. But we as a nation do stand square on the doctrine of liberty and justice for all...If the Pledge's historical pattern repeats, its words will be modified during this decade. Below are two possible changes. Some prolife advocates recite the following slightly revised Pledge: 'I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all, born and unborn.' A few liberals recite a slightly revised version of Bellamy's original Pledge: 'I pledge allegiance to my Flag, and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with equality, liberty and justice for all.'[link]
