Why "Under God" Must
Remain in the Pledge of Allegiance
This article offers four points to remember when explaining to friends why
"under God" must remain in the Pledge of Allegiance.
While many people "feel" that reciting the Pledge is good, we must
help them understand why it is a good thing to do. It is up to us to help our
friends and neighbors, our children and their teachers, understand the meaning
of the Pledge.
Here are four points I suggest you make as you talk about the Pledge:
1. Thomas Jefferson explained why being "one Nation
under God" is important.
Thomas Jefferson and our other Founding Fathers understood that the government
does not give us our freedom. Our freedom comes from God, and the government
was established to protect that God-given freedom. That was their justification
for the American Revolution as stated in the Declaration of Independence.
Jefferson wrote:
"We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal;
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that
among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure
these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers
from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes
destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish
it, and to institute new government laying its foundation on such
principles…" (emphasis added)
No king or emperor, no president or congress, no court or crowd gives us our
rights. They come from God himself and are unalienable. And the Founders built America's
"foundation on such principles."
2. Abraham Lincoln explained why being "one Nation
under God" is important.
Abraham Lincoln understood that the nation's unity and freedom depended upon
being one nation under God. In the Gettysburg Address, Lincoln used the exact phrase, "nation,
under God," echoed in the Pledge of Allegiance. He began his address by
referring to the Founding Fathers' foundation in God-given rights:
"Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this
continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition
that all men are created equal. Now we are in a great civil war, testing
whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated can long
endure."
As Lincoln closes his remarks honoring the fallen soldiers at Gettysburg, he
offered this inspiring vision:
"...that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in
vain; that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that
government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish
from the earth." (emphasis added)
3. It doesn't matter that the phrase "under
God" was added to the Pledge in the 1950s.
Some people argue that "under God" was not in the original Pledge and
was inserted over 50 years later. But, that only proves it took over 50 years
to get it right!
4. The phrase "under God" does not make the
Pledge a prayer.
Some people argue that "under God" is a form of prayer, and thus it
is unconstitutional to have schoolchildren recite it. However, a careful
reading of the Pledge of Allegiance reveals that we are not pledging allegiance
to God. We are, instead, pledging allegiance to a republic. The Pledge
describes the republic as one nation under God and indivisible. In other words,
it is a statement of fact. It is a fact that our Founders established our
government on the proposition that freedom comes from God, not the state.
As both Jefferson and Lincoln attest, the American people's freedom-the freedom
of your neighbors, your co-workers, your children, and their teachers, are
because we are one nation under God. Take that principle away, remove it from
our national consciousness, and we will lose the very basis for the freedoms we
so easily take for granted.
Lincoln said it
well, "Now we are in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or
any nation so conceived and so dedicated can long endure."
In this war of ideas, people will not defend what they do not cherish, and they
will not cherish what they do not understand.
Click here to
purchase a color poster explaining the meaning of the pledge.