The shortest argument about the Pledge of Allegiance

[TheRedMan]

The meat of the case is very simple, and has been brutally obscured by the media.

In 1954 Congress passed a law adding the words "under God" into the Pledge of Allegiance. This was intended to separate us from the "godless Communists." It was clearly the intent of the writers and signers of that law to place an acknowledge of a diety, specifically the Christian Almighty into the Pledge. Since the Pledge is, in fact, a PLEDGE, meaning an oath, Congress established pledge of loyalty that requires acknowledgement of the Christian God, therby establishing Him as the state diety.

First Amendment reads, "Congress shall make no law respecting the establish of a state religon, or the free practice thereof." Clearly Congress made a law oriented at establishing a state religion. Therefore the 1954 Act should be invalid.

However, the "free practice" clause of the First Amendment, also allows people to say the amendment with the phrase "under God" if they so choose.

The source of the controversey is simply that people do not separate invalidating the Congressional Act with the right of the peope saying the Pledge to say what they want. Make the separation clear, and all is well.

[Warpy]

1. A short history of the pledge

...and its transformation from a pledge to the ideals of liberty into a Christian loyalty oath can be found at http://history.vineyard.net/pledge.htm

Any country which requires a daily loyalty oath from its children, whether or not they force their god into it, is creepy.

[bryant69]

2. I don't know about that

I mean everybody tries to indoctrinate children with the values that they believe in. The Pledge of Allegiance might be a little heavy handed, and certainly there are reasons to be uncomfortable about a sort of "blind loyalty" to the United States. But it's not really much different than any number of other attempts to teach kids values.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[gWbush is Mabus]

3. you can teach kids values without coercing them to accept a god that may o

or may not exist

[bryant69]

7. Certainly

I'm not necessarily defending the "under God" part of Pledge (although it doesn't bother me all that much), just saying that there's not a huge leap between the pledge encouraging kids to be loyal to their country and teaching kids that sharing is good and lieing is bad.

Is Loyalty to your country a good thing or a bad thing? Some people would say no, others would say yes.

Bryant
check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[sybylla]

8. Encouraging is one thing, mandating is entirely another

And in my opinion, that only applies to adults. You cannot convince me a 7-year-old understands what "you have the right to remain silent" means when it comes to recitation of anything in a classroom led by the teacher or anyone else in a leadership position.

[Warpy]

5. A daily loyalty oath

...required by the government through institutions of learning?

Creepy.

[BurtWorm]

6. What other state-sponsored attempt to teach values compares?

The pledge is a daily oath. You're not asked to think about it. You're asked to just stand up and do it.

[truthspeaker]

4. "under God" or "indivisible": pick one

They're mutually exclusive.

[adriennel]

9. I find this whole issue

completely ridiculous. I have never cited the pledge of allegiance in class because I went to elementary school outside the US : )Does this mean I'm not a good American, because I didn't recite the stupid pledge everyday? gimme a break! we sang the national anthem time and time again (sometimes more than 1, depending on the country I was in), isn't this enough patriotic indoctrination??
All the people in support of "tradition" and keeping the phrase "under God" in the pledge of allegiance need to understand that this phrase was NOT originally in the pledge and should be removed. Let's not return to the McCarthy era of the 50s!