The History of The Pledge of Allegiance in the United States

Having taught students from other nations, and having visited other countries, I know that the idea of a Pledge of Allegiance in not peculiar to the U.S. But in the U.S. many of us do not know the long and changing history of our own Pledge of Allegiance.

Over at least 20 years now I have been hearing from some groups that the Pledge in under attack by "godless atheists" (a redundancy in terms, since atheists do not believe in God). I have heard also that "In God We Trust" is under pernicious attack by these same "Ultra Liberal - Communist inspired traitors" who want to finish the job of taking God and religion out of the public school system.

Indeed, many of these allegations are even now spread all over the Internet as if they were brand-new reporting on some nefarious plot by the ultra-Left to put the last nail in the coffin of a "God-fearing America."

As a public school teacher I can remember only one day when we did not say our Pledge of Allegiance in individual classrooms. That day was September 12th, 2001, when all our classes joined in the high school auditorium to recite the pledge in unison, from Pre-K to 12th grade, with tears in our eyes and a lump in our throats. My son and a good friend played "echo-taps" where one trumpeter plays the first round of taps and a brief moment later a second, muted "echo" is played by the second trumpeter. It is a very moving thing to witness.

I won't argue that the changes to the pledge of Allegiance haven't caused controversy during its history. Francis Bellamy, creator of the pledge. protested the changes to his original wording. Just why he did not like the changes are, to my knowledge, not recorded. He may have liked the simplicity of the wording, and perhaps he believed that lengthening it added to much to what his original idea actually expressed. We don't know, however, and so must be left guessing at his motives.

When he originally wrote the pledge, however, there were still many hard feelings, especially in the Southern states of the old Confederacy, over The War Between the States, also known as The Civil War. Healing was still going on at that late date, thus, I believe the word "indivisible" was important to him. The question of ever again dividing the Union had seemingly been put to rest after April, 1865, but even in our own times were have seen the symbols of Confederate heritage and history come back into vogue. Whether the Confederate battle flag used in some states as part of their state flags fosters an old hatred or is merely a question of heritage is beyond this particular hub. Just the same, the South was suffering in the 1880's and the question of it all being resolved in 1865 were again coming to the forefront of political movements in the South.

The KKK was still fighting the segregationist battles of Post-reconstruction, and this was a time before the KKK grabbed the U.S. flag and Christianity as themes to include people outside the south and "The Cause" into its ranks. In time, they would become an ultra-patriotic sounding organization, with hundreds of thousands of members, mostly united around the racial ideas of "White America" fighting the "sub-Human Jews and Blacks and Catholics" it saw as the "natural enemies of the White Race." But those battles were to be fought in the future, and in 1888 the battle was over the south's (arguably legitimate) anger over the post-reconstruction era, when the South suffered greatly both economically and in the lack of federal government aid to all its people, black and white alike.

With Bellamy's socialist Baptist background, and being from Boston, the heart of the abolitionist movement of the 1850's and 1860's, it was only natural that he create a pledge that fostered the ideas of his background against inequality, racism and the other social ills he saw in American society of the time.

Thus his desire, but inability, to get the word "equality" into his original Pledge of Allegiance.

And today, in public schools all across the nation, the Pledge of Allegiance is recited every school day-morning as follows: "I pledge Allegiance, to the flag, of the United States of America, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."

We do not include the ideals of "Liberty (equality) and justice for all", and many of us celebrate the inclusion of "under God". So has the original intent of the Pledge of Allegiance been changed, and if so, were these changes created to meet the challenges of a new era?

I am not specifically qualified to answer in anything other than to state, in my own humble opinion, that the answer is yes to both questions. Our pledge of Allegiance should be altered to include the word "equality" where its creator Francis Bellamy desired it should be placed, and the nature of the Pledge was indeed altered to reflect the changes of the times in America. The 1950's have often been viewed through the lens of nostalgia, whereby we were somehow a more pure nation, where everybody lived in perfect harmony and things were somehow, just right.

I suppose that, being a Caucasian who was born in those times, I could see how one segment of the nation might think that way. But where I lived we were in daily contact with people who were not "Free, White and 21" as the old saying goes. I saw plenty of injustice, plenty of inequality, and plenty of God-fearing people acting wrongly towards those of other races, creeds and ethnic backgrounds.

Unfortunately, I see the same things happening today, so I have to question those who deem that we are indeed a "one nation under God", why do these hatreds, which are most ungodly in origin and practice, still exist?

I guess I have to ask of those who really want the Pledge of Allegiance to be a part of our everyday school childrens' lives, do you truly live the Godly lives you support as expressed by the pledge, or do you believe that just by saying it, you cover all the ills we as a nation otherwise ignore? Is your anger against those who do not see the appropriateness of those two words "under God" just a knee-jerk reaction against those you see wanting to take religion out of our lives, or do you believe and act upon your beliefs to make American live up to its own Pledge of Allegiance, in word, action and thought??

I guess I am asking also - is there really a threat by godless atheists against the words "under God" in our Pledge of Allegiance, or is this just a rumor that has got out of hand? If, after all, I have been hearing about this alleged threat for more than 20 years, and yet I have yet to see any serious threat materialize, how am I to take it seriously? where is the threat, and by whom is it being made manifest?

In 1923 and 1924 the National flag Conference decided to change the words "my Flag" to "the Flag of the United States of America", a change which Bellamy protested to no avail. Under the auspices of the Daughters of the American Revolution, his protests fell upon deaf ears.

In 1954 the Knights of Columbus mounted a campaign to add the words "under God" to the pledge, and the Congress, with President Eisenhower's strong support, officially acted to include the two new words, thus giving a nuance to the pledge which it lacked before. The change was generally welcomed, mostly because of the Cold War atmosphere of the time, when the United States was seen by many as not only the bastion of freedom against the Soviet Union, itself a godless power, but also a nation of God fighting the evil forces of Communism. This was the prevailing thought at the time, and was supported by many citizens of the United States.

Over time, however, some people began to question if by including the words "under God" gave the pledge a religious overtone that might be in conflict with the idea of separation of church and state. A few people argued for the exclusion of organized religious activities in public school, and since the pledge had long been established as a morning routine in most public schools across the nation, it became a focal point of those seeking to create the idea of freedom from religion in the U.S.

So how did this interesting pledge begin, and what were the major reasons it was necessary to create it?

Source for the following information: The Pledge of Allegiance, A Short History by: Dr. John W. Bear, copyright 1992.

It may surprise many of us that the original Pledge of Allegiance was created in 1892 by Francis Bellamy, a Christian Socialist and Baptist minister. Francis used the ideas of his socialist first cousin and author Edwin Bellamy, who wrote such stirring left-wing Utopian books as Looking Backward (1888) and (1897).

Francis Bellamy was pressured to leave his Boston church because of his socialist views, but he had made a good friend in Daniel Ford, owner and editor of The Youth's Companion, a leading popular book of its day. Ford also later founded the controversial and quite Liberal Ford Hall Forum for like-thinking citizens.

Bellamy's first publication of the Pledge of Allegiance is as follows: "I pledge allegiance to my Flag and (to*) the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all." (* the word 'to' was added in 1892.)

Bellamy had wanted to include the word "equality" to the pledge but he knew that the superintendents of education and also many other people in those days were strongly opposed equality for women and African Americans.

Proponents such as the illustrious Dr. Mortimer Alder of St, John's College argued that without equality, the rest of the ideals were not as effective. He said that three great points needed to be vowed in the pledge: liberty, equality and justice for all. He believed that justice was necessary to mediate between the often conflicting ideas and goals of "liberty" and "equality."

Yet thus the Pledge of Allegiance was to be known to several generations of Americas until some changes were made in the approaching middle years of the first half of the 20th century.

I quote directly from Dr. Bear's treatis on The Pledge of Allegiance, A Short History (http://history.vineyard.net/pledge.htm)

"Bellamy's granddaughter said he also would have resented this second change.(1954) He had been pressured into leaving his church in 1891 because of his socialist sermons. In his retirement in Florida, he stopped attending church because he disliked the racial bigotry he found there.

What follows is Bellamy's own account of some of the thoughts that went through his mind in August, 1892, as he picked the words of his Pledge:

It began as an intensive communing with salient points of our national history, from the Declaration of Independence onwards; with the makings of the Constitution...with the meaning of the Civil War; with the aspiration of the people...

The true reason for allegiance to the Flag is the 'republic for which it stands.' ...And what does that vast thing, the Republic mean? It is the concise political word for the Nation - the One Nation which the Civil War was fought to prove. To make that One Nation idea clear, we must specify that it is indivisible, as Webster and Lincoln used to repeat in their great speeches. And its future?

Just here arose the temptation of the historic slogan of the French Revolution which meant so much to Jefferson and his friends, 'Liberty, equality, fraternity.' No, that would be too fanciful, too many thousands of years off in realization. But we as a nation do stand square on the doctrine of liberty and justice for all..."