Reciting the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag each morning was an important part of our school day in the little one-room (public) school where I spent the first eight years of my academic life back in the 1930s. This was in a Mennonite community in Minnesota where God was an ever-present factor in our lives, although never in the public schools.
Francis Bellamy of Boston, an associate editor of The Youth’s Companion, wrote the Pledge in response to President Benjamin Harrison’s request for patriotic exercises in schools in 1892 to mark the 400th anniversary of the discovery of America. The original wording was modified in 1923 and 1924 by the National Flag Conferences of the American Legion.
In 1942, Congress made the Pledge of Allegiance part of the official code for the use of the flag, then in 1954 added the words “under God.”
Doesn’t it seem logical that this matter could be put before Congress to eliminate those words, or that the appeals court could amend its decision to allow use of the pledge without the reference to God, rather than to deny today’s children the privilege of paying their respect to our flag – and our country – as we did?
Granite Falls
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