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One Nation Under God?

© Brian Tubbs

**EDITOR'S NOTE: My apologies to the readers of this article for its length. This is a controversial and complex issue, and I wanted to wrap up this series, given the lapse in time since Part One was published online. In spite of its length, however, I hope you find it thought-provoking and see fit to add your comments in the discussion area.

On February 7, 1954, the Reverend George Docherty blasted the Pledge of Allegiance in a sermon, attended by members of the national press corps as well as by the President of the United States. "Apart from the mention of the phrase 'the United States of America,'" thundered Docherty, "[the Pledge] could be the pledge of any republic. In fact, I could hear little Muscovites repeat a similar pledge to their hammer-and-sickle flag in Moscow."

This was all Dwight D. Eisenhower needed to hear. With the Cold War in full swing and Senator Joseph McCarthy looking everywhere for communist insurgents, Eisenhower was more than receptive to Docherty's message. The President subsequently endorsed Docherty's sermon and breathed new life into a year-long campaign by the Knights of Columbus, a Roman Catholic men's group, to add "under God" to the Pledge.

Taking his cue from the President, Republican Senator Homer Ferguson of Minnesota sponsored a bill to add "under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance. It was approved as a joint resolution and signed by the President on Flag Day, June 14, 1954. At the signing ceremony, a proud Cold War Commander-in-Chief declared: "From this day forward, the millions of our schoolchildren will daily proclaim in every city and town, every village and rural schoolhouse, the dedication of our nation and our people to the Almighty."

That is how the Pledge of Allegiance came to be what it is today, and that is why two members of a three-judge panel of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found it so objectionable this past summer.

The first part of this series (published earlier this year) explored the case itself and the reaction to the Ninth Circuit Court's ruling, which was later stayed indefinitely. This article turns its attention to the origins of our country, specifically to the men (and women) that established our Republic and gave us our Constitution and Bill of Rights.

Before such an examination of the Founders can take place, one must consider how relevant their opinion is in the first place. After all, the late Supreme Court Justice Charles Evans Hughes boasted that, while the U.S. is under the Constitution, the Constitution itself is "whatever the judges say it is."

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