Published on Friday, March 7, 2003 by CommonDreams.org

Pledging Allegiance, Declaring Independence

by Caroline Arnold

Last month a San Francisco Court of Appeals refused to reverse the 2002

ruling of a lower court that the phrase "under God" in the Pledge of

Allegiance is unconstitutional. Attorney General John Ashcroft

immediately leaped to the defense of "under God".

"For centuries our nation has referenced God as we have expressed our

patriotism and national identity in our Declaration of Independence,

[and] Constitution ....," he said, and added that the Justice Department

would "spare no effort to preserve the rights of all our citizens to

pledge allegiance to the American flag."

Those three syllables, "under God" were added in 1954 to divide us

"godly" Americans from "godless" communists. They also divided us into

those for whom "under God" was wrong, unnecessary or trivial, and those

who believed those words were right, necessary and important.

Fifty years of not resolving that rift has tended to obscure a more

important question: Why indoctrinate our children with an orthodox

religious belief? Does reciting that bit of catechism encourage thinking,

questioning, civil discourse, respect for others, and the development of

individual conscience?

Pledges of this sort work -- at preventing thought, reducing

responsibility and promoting compliance. The fact that many people, and

many of our elected officials, have latterly been proclaiming that the

Pledge is some kind of indispensable Holy Writ suggests that the

indoctrination has worked quite well.

But indoctrination is not compatible with liberty, and we do our nation

harm to teach our children to recite blind oaths of patriotism and rote

references to God. We are not a holy empire, with monolithic

authoritarian belief systems. We’re a democracy, with room for diverse

beliefs and individual consciences. Should we be cultivating docile,

obedient subjects bound to a single code of belief, or trying to generate

thoughtful, independent, and conscientious citizens free to choose their

own beliefs?

Especially today, with our schools underfunded, our teachers underpaid

and under-respected and too many of our children poor, hungry or without

health care, is making schoolchildren recite their allegiance to flag and

God the best we can do for them, and for our nation?

A better exercise for schools would be to take five minutes each day to

study some of the fine thoughtful prose of the Declaration of

Independence or Constitution and relate it to current national events.

Actually, as our own "nation under God" is preparing to kill people and

destroy life and resources worldwide, perhaps it is time for all of us to

study that great testament to "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of

Happiness" -- the Declaration of Independence. I particularly commend

attention to the "long Train of Abuses and Usurpations" of King George

III that convinced the 1776 Congress that it was "their Right, ....their

Duty" to declare independence and "provide new Guards for [our] future

Security."

It's instructive to look at these Abuses and Usurpations ask if any of

these shoes fit any of our present political princes. (This is not the

entire list, but they are all direct quotations.)

"He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for

the public Good."

"He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing

Importance, ..... and he has utterly neglected to attend to them."

"He has obstructed the Administration of Justice ...."

"He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the Tenure of their

Offices."

"He has erected a Multitude of new Offices, and sent hither Swarms of

Officers to harass our People ...."

"....depriving us, in many Cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury "

"He has plundered our Seas, ravaged our Coasts ..."

"He is, at this Time, transporting large Armies .... to complete the

Works of Death, Desolation and Tyranny, already begun with circumstances

of Cruelty and Perfidy, scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous Ages,

and totally unworthy of the Head of a civilized Nation."

Draw your own conclusions. The signers of the Declaration of Independence

reached one -- "A Prince, whose Character is thus marked by every act

which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the Ruler of a free People" --

and they declared themselves Free and Independent of King George.

The signers also made a pledge: "...we mutually pledge to each other our

Lives, our Fortunes, and our Sacred Honor."

What should happen when a ruler pledges other people's Lives -- not his

own -- other people's Fortunes -- not his own -- and his nation's Sacred

Honor to change another nation's regime?

Should we not declare ourselves Free and Independent of such a ruler, and

pledge our Lives, our Fortunes and our Sacred Honor to "provide new

Guards for [our] future Security"?

Also note to whom the signers made their pledge. Not to God.

To each other.



Caroline Arnold (csarnold@neo.rr.com)served 12 years on the staff of

Senator John Glenn, and now chairs the Kent Environmental Council in

Kent, Ohio.