PART THREE – The Particulars
Centerpiece to the
historical argument is the notion that the nation was “founded on a fundamental
belief in God.” For example, page 12 of
the Justice Department text reads,
“The relevant legislative
history confirms that Congress added the words "under God" to the
Pledge of Allegiance for the permissible, secular purpose of acknowledging our
nation's religious heritage. For example, the House Report accompanying
Congress's 1954 revision of the Pledge explains that "from the time of our
earliest history our peoples and our institutions have reflected the
traditional concept that our Nation was founded on a fundamental belief in
God," referring to many of the same historical references to God the
Supreme Court noted in Lynch…”
The quote amounts
to more obfuscation, the kind that is easily created compared to the labor
required to expose it for what it is.
First, the notion that the “under God” phrase was added to the pledge to
fulfill a “secular purpose of acknowledging our religious heritage” is about as
coherent as stating that a bottle of moonshine was added to the daily diet to
promote sobriety. How could the words “under God” possibly ever fulfill a
secular purpose? By definition secular
purposes have to do with things worldly and temporal. The term “God” belongs to the classification
of non-substantial and supernatural beings.
Along with “god” or “gods”, the term “religious”, the antonym to
secular, has its denotative roots in these same things. The words “under God” have a purely
religious purpose. That is, imbed a
monotheistic ideology in the Pledge and thereby conscript the nation to it! Even if the statement possessed coherent
meaning, which it does not, why should the pledge be
used to force acknowledgment of “religious heritage” versus some other aspect
of the Nation’ heritage? The notion
that God is a “secular deity” and therefore somehow immune from exploitation as
biblical and thus a religious and doctrinal deity, is to court a schism from
reality.
Originally, the
pledge existed in government statute as a pure statement of nationalism. Based on the manifest intent of the Sixth
Article and the First Amendment it transcended specificity to either the secular
or religious. The theocratic implication
is that the contribution of “religious heritage” (biblical heritage) is
superior to whatever else went into the Nation’s founding and therefore is
deserves top seed. Undoubtedly, the
people and institutions biblicalism have always assiduously extolled the
importance of their religious heritage just as vigorously as they have
proclaimed the existence of “God”. It
does not follow that all people and institutions have “reflected” or otherwise
advocated matters of “religious heritage.”
It may be politically convenient for the theocrats to vigorously and
persistently assert that the nation was founded on a belief in God. However,
bald-faced strength and persistence of assertion is no proof of anything, other
than one’s willingness to so assert. To
the contrary, the Declaration of Independence informs us that the Nation was
founded above all else on a fundamental belief in human rights. The bottom line
is that appeals to “religious heritage” and claims about the role of “belief in
God” at the foundation of the Nation, is an interpretation of American history
designed in the serve of theocracy alone. The implied view is by no means as well
supported by the historical facts or as universally accepted as the theocrats
would dearly want us to believe.
The founders of
this nation were not all of biblical persuasion. There were atheists, heretics,
and apostates among them and those that subscribed to other religious
persuasions, some of which were a genre quite different from biblicalism or
monotheism. They were people raised up
in the legacy and promise of the Enlightenment, who knew more about the nature
of the secular world and of religion than the Bible could ever possibly
impart. They knew about the legacy of
Athens, the home of Socrates and birthplace of democracy, and the legacy of
enumerable other old world cultures that had contributed to the best lawmaking
of human kind. They embraced the
philosophies and the arts and sciences well beyond the prescriptions and taboos
of religious dogma. They were artists
and craftsmen, scholars, scientists, engineers, businessmen, industrialists,
medicine men, teachers, and warriors, as well as people of the land, and there
were Native Americans as well as immigrants who took a hand in standing up this
Nation and its sacred Constitution.
Many of the immigrants from the old world came
to escape the strangling grip of theocracy dominated governments. The kind of government largely supported and
sustained by corrupt biblical aristocracies. The founding fathers and mothers
built the Constitution on a profound legacy of knowledge about the nature of
civilization and the ingredients of just and fair civil law. A legacy of history’s lessons painfully
accumulated over the course of the ages, and all too often in spite of the
obstructive dogmas of the biblical faith.
Only by virtue of all these other heritages and the people who stood in
unyielding advocacy of same, was our nation and its Constitution stood up at
all! So how can the theocrats make
special claims for their “heritage” or expect special dispensation before the
common ground of our nationalism? The self-evident answer is that in all
legitimacy they cannot, and should not continue to enjoy such privilege!
The accessible truths supporting this non-biblical
slant on American history ought to be sufficient evidence against the selfish
claims of the theocrats. Is
it just coincidental that nowhere in the binding law of the Constitution is any
reference to “God” found? Is it
coincidental that the Sixth article specifically mandates “no religious
test”? Is it coincidental that the
First Amendment mandates “no law respecting an establishment of religion”? As before, the answer to these questions
ought to be self evident to anyone of reasonable honesty.
All the baggage of
“religious heritage” imported from the old world is not sufficient
justification for the theocrats to claim special superiority of contribution. Nor does their baggage justify any special
dispensation to subvert the Constitution and use government authority to impose
their ways, ceremonial or otherwise. It’s
the worst kind of political irresponsibility to sanction blatant undermining of
the Constitution in the service of overblown claims about “religious
heritage”. Nor are theocracy’s overt
efforts to extort a broadening of license in government affairs ever justified
by “facts” of concession unilaterally created in the past by some politician or
government worker. The
evolving trends in Washington toward matters of “faith-based” social welfare
reform ought to be sufficient proof that theocracy is an insidiously dangerous
adversary to the solvency of the Constitution and to the basic civil rights of
the people.
The historical
facts that debunk the theocrat’s claims are many. Still, because it’s often claimed as
justification, the issue of “God” in the Declaration of Independence requires
special attention. Only four phrases in
the whole document allude to supernatural influences. These are “their Creator”
and “nature’s God”, which appear in the opening paragraphs, and “Supreme Judge
of the World” and “divine Providence”, which appear in the closing
paragraphs. The former two are most
often seized on to support claims about a fundamental belief in God.
The
notion of “God” as a singular omnipotent supreme being is ecumenical to the
biblical claim. If the Declaration of
Independence truly supported the foundational claim, then why didn’t Thomas
Jefferson just say “God” or perhaps “the Creator” instead of saying “their
Creator” and why did he say “nature’s God” rather than simply saying “God” or perhaps “the God”, or “our God”, or
almighty God, or “under God”?
“But it does me no injury for my
neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor
breaks my leg.” (Thomas Jefferson, 1782)
If the presence of phraseology like “the
Supreme Judge of the World” and “Divine providence” intended to imply the
monotheistic idol of old testament theocracy, then it would have been
stipulated as such. In addition,
although several interpretations of the Declaration’s meaning are possible, a
pantheon of supernatural entities each having different roles in the affairs of
the world is as viable as any other. In
view of these rather telling issues about the meaning of the Declaration’s
phraseology, the claim that it affirms an exclusive belief in a singular
supernatural being, or that biblical deity is that being, becomes strained
beyond tenability. This observation is
not trivial. Even the nation’s highest
court has sometimes ascribed “proof” where none actually exists. For example, page 6 of the Justice Department
appeal, contains the following commentary
“However, the Court was careful to
point out that nothing in its ruling was "inconsistent with the fact that
school children and others are officially encouraged to express love for our
country by reciting historical documents such as the Declaration of
Independence which contain references to the Deity or by singing
officially espoused anthems which include the composer's professions of faith
in a Supreme Being."
The court’s usage of the phraseology “the
Deity” and “Supreme Being” is pungently biased in its intended meaning. As demonstrated above, there is no
phraseology identical to “the Deity” or “Supreme Being” anywhere in the
Declaration of Independence that justifies the court’s referencing it in
support of their decision. Regardless of
how personal sentiment may sway one’s interpretation, it should be indelibly
clear the Declaration does not specifically identify a deity called “God”. Although the Declaration and other historical
documents do contain phrases that entertain the notion of higher powers, it
does not substantiate a universal preference for monotheism as the above quoted
commentary asserts. Exactly what
historical documents or songs was the Justice referring to that employ terms
like “the Deity” or “Supreme Being”? It
wouldn’t be a surprise to find out that none exist!
Notability also, documents like the
Declaration of Independence, although cherished for their historical value, are
not the binding law of the land.
Whereas, by ratified mandate, the Constitution is the binding “supreme
law of the land” (Article Six) and nowhere within is there any acknowledgment
or affirmation of God. Affirmation of,
belief in, or allegiance to God, does not stand as a historically valid
obligation of citizenship or public office, nor is it an
historically validated article of nationalism.
Neither does it stand as something that the government has the right to
prescribe as a matter of legal statute.
These telling issues notwithstanding, what the Declaration of
Independence does unambiguously substantiate, is a fundamental belief in
liberty and equality, both secular and religious, and thus a fundamental belief
in human rights. This is an altogether
different and transcendent kind of belief!
The Department of Justice appeal and the textual evidence of past court
rulings cited are full of holes, deficiencies, and misattributions of
fact. Just about every paragraph
possesses errors of fact, denotation, or reason and interpretation.
Working
through the Justice Department’s wicket of words, one the confronts unabashed
spin-doctoring that was inspired by previous court rulings and the political
biases sometimes surrounding the court’s chosen mode of analyzing the merits of
a case. One of the ploys that the
Justice Department appeal hung on was the contention that the Ninth Circuit
Court ruling deviated from previous rulings, some handed down by the Supreme
Court itself. According to the appeal,
the present judgment deviated from established judicial precedents in the
analytical criteria used and the conclusion arrived at, and therefore was
improper.
All
the issues about “religious heritage” that occupied the first nine pages of the
appeal were in support of the claim that the present judgment violated
precedent by using the endorsement and Lemon tests rather than the “historical
test” as previous and higher court rulings had preferred. The present narrative identified many reasons
for finding “religious heritage” appeals to be objectionable. Still, the Justice Department appeal
attempted to consolidate justification for the so-called “historical
test”. This was prelude to attempting to
devalue if not invalidate the other tests as applied in the present
ruling. Page 9 of the appeal
states,
“The panel majority was wrong to hold that it
need not follow Lynch and County of Allegheny because those decisions failed to
apply the "endorsement" test. This Court is not free to disregard the
Supreme Court's clear dictates merely because a panel of this Court believes
the Supreme Court did not fully think through an issue, or because the panel
disapproves of the Supreme Court's mode of analysis in a particular case. Moreover, in County of Allegheny, the Supreme
Court specifically noted that Congress's addition of the words "under
God" to the Pledge satisfies the endorsement test. As the Court explained,
"Our previous opinions have considered in dicta the motto and the pledge,
characterizing them as consistent with the proposition that government may not
communicate an endorsement of religious belief."
Transcendent of prior rulings, the
assertions embodied in the above stated quote defy logic. What gives? Does anyone else get the feeling that his or
her intelligence is being insulted? One
need not be a rocket scientist or a lawyer to comprehend that the words “under
God” rather explicitly communicate a religious belief and consequently a
government endorsement of same! This
takes the present writing full circle to the critique with which it began. Where the theocrats and their lawyers and
politicians are concerned, there are far too many among them who brazenly seek
to convince themselves and others that the words of the Constitution and the
phrase ‘under God’ mean things altogether different from what they actually
do.”
The
footnotes on page 11 of the Justice Department appeal contain the following.
“With
respect to the endorsement test, the majority also was wrong to hold that the
words "under God" in the Pledge are "identical, for
Establishment Clause purposes, to a profession that we are a nation 'under
Jesus,' a nation 'under Vishnu,' a nation 'under Zeus,' or a nation 'under no
god . . ." Slip op. at 9123. The Supreme Court specifically rejected this
notion in County of Allegheny, where the Court struck down a Christmas display
at a county courthouse because it included a "patently Christian message:
Glory to God for the birth of Jesus Christ." 492 U.S. at
601. The Court recognized an "obvious distinction" between
that reference and the "references to God in the motto and the
pledge," id. at 603, which the Court regarded as
being, in this context, a "nonsectarian reference to religion by the
government." Ibid. See also id. at 630-631 (O'Connor, J., concurring) (references to
"God" in ceremonial acknowledgments of our country's religious
heritage permissible because of their "nonsectarian nature" and
longstanding existence).”
All other issues notwithstanding, the Court’s
prior rejection of the present ruling’s mode of analysis (as stated in the
Justice Department appeal), could only be relevant if substantiated that “God”
the deity, occupies a uniquely superior and exclusionary status among all other
deities including Christ, Vishnu, Zeus and the rest. The profound trouble with the explicit
monotheistic assumption is that it has no basis in fact. The belief that there is but one singular
almighty Supreme Being and that “God” is that being, are assumptions about the
nature of the cosmos and the existence of supernatural beings that are
un-provable and thus are strictly matters of religious faith. Moreover, appeals to ceremonial deism and
civil religion are equally as bogus.
There were no deists among those who campaigned for inclusion of “under
God” in the pledge. Everyone involved
were biblical in their religious persuasion. It was therefore clearly a
movement to establish God the biblical deity in the pledge. The establishment clause does not say “no law
respecting an establishment of sectarian religion”. It says more inclusively “no law respecting
an establishment of religion, period! Undoubtedly,
some of the Nation’s historical notables did occasionally employ the term god
in their speeches and writings without specificity to the biblical deity,
Jefferson’s god of nature, the deist god, or anything else. That was their right, but it does not follow
that such instances cumulatively amount to an historical precedent that should
trump the Constitution. The prevailing
sentiment among the Constitution’s framers was that religion was a private
matter, one best left to the conscience of the individual, not the state. This
latter sentiment is eminently more representative of the American history and
tradition about matters of religion.
.
Clearly, we do not all agree to our personal
ground of faith being invested in the assumptions of an “under God” ideology. There are citizens that embrace alternative
metaphysical views, either ascribing the same exalted status to some other
deity or embrace an ideology of multiple deities, but nevertheless all sharing
in the status of the devine.
Monotheistic notions of deity are ancient, but so are pantheistic,
polytheistic, agnostic, and atheistic notions.
They are all part of the soul of the species, all modes of ideation
about the inscrutable nature of the cosmos and the ultimate mysteries of
life. As an intellectual or theological
dogma, each one carries its own inherent limitations and thus the potential for
severe cultural conflict if government mandated. Notably though, if history carries any
reliable message at all, the totalitarian tendencies of monotheism ultimately
foster violently repressive cultural circumstances. Witness the reality of Islamic fundamentalism
in Afghanistan and other parts of the Middle East as an inescapable case in
point. Allow monotheism of any
persuasion the authority of state and it will ultimately act to extinguish any competing
authority, either religious or secular, thus inflicting severe damage on the civil,
religious, and spiritual liberties of the people.
The framers of the Constitution were wise
enough to know that allowing any religion to dominate government and civil law
would surly breed corruption and foster tyranny. In view of the historical circumstances in
which the Constitution arose and the specific import of the Sixth Article and
First Amendment, it should be clear that the framers intended no exception for
biblicalism or any other form of monotheism.
Considering these things, as well as whatever alternative personal
reasons one may have, many citizens justly do not want “under God” or any other
religious artifact corrupting this nation’s official Pledge. The courts do not have the right to shirk off
our legitimate grievances, neither in the service of a popular religious
faction or their own preferences. Even
if the existence of “God” or any other deity could be proven, which it can’t,
there still would be no legal basis to subvert the mandates of the Constitution
in its service.
Clearly, the imposition of the phrase “under
God” on the pledge, is a prejudicial endorsement of a specific deity (God), a
specific religious ideology (monotheism), and a specific existential relation
to it (under). The words do not lie;
the wording of the present pledge is in blatant violation of the Supreme Law of
this nation. The insidious encroachment
of biblical theocracy over the past century is slowly but relentlessly crushing
constitutional law into a state of impotence.
The manifest presence of legislation designed to extinguish separation
between religion and government by investing government money and authority in
a takeover of our welfare system by “faith-based” organizations, and the
Supreme Court’s recent favoritism toward school vouchers, and monuments to the
laws of Moses are glaringly obvious cases in point. In a very tangible way, the presence of the
phrase “under God” in the current pledge amounts to an ultimate symbolic
contravention of constitutional law, one that has paved the way for a flood of
transgressions in all three branches of government.
The
final arm of the Justice Department appeal focused on the issue of personal
injury itself. Being only a dilettante
in matters of law, it’s difficult to comprehend the underlying criteria
required to establish proof of “personal injury”, or even its necessary
relevancy to the present case. The
Justice Department’s position was that regardless of the objective merits of
the case against the Pledge, the majority ruling was invalid because Newdow had
no standing to challenge a federal statute in the first place. They contend that proper standing did not
exist because information had surfaced concerning a dispute between Newdow and
his daughter’s mother over matters of parental custody and their daughter’s education. On page 17 of the Justice Department’s
appeal, the following text is found.
At best, Mr. Newdow can only have
standing to bring this case, if at all, based on his claimed right "to
direct the religious education of his daughter." Slip op. at 9114. That is
a claim that is, however, properly directed at state defendants, and does not
provide any basis for striking down the federal statute. As Judge Fernandez
correctly noted, 4 U.S.C. 4 merely sets forth the words of the Pledge; it does
not compel anyone to do anything. See Slip op. at 9131 n.1. Finally, as to Mr. Newdow's
"parental" standing, we note that on August 5, 2002, Sandra Banning,
mother of Mr. Newdow's daughter, moved to intervene in this case and submitted
a declaration advising the Court that she has sole legal custody of the
daughter, that she wishes for the daughter to recite the Pledge in school, and
that the daughter wishes to recite the Pledge in school. This evidence may call
into question whether Mr. Newdow has standing to challenge a policy allowing
his daughter to recite the Pledge in school.
This is not an attempt to address the details
of Mr. Newdow’s personal claims to injury, or the associated domestic
adversities undergone by himself and his family. Without the necessary detail of reliable
information, it would take the discussion into an un-wieldable mode of
speculation about events in the aftermath of the ruling and the potential for
culpable factions. Nevertheless, the
more general issue of proof of injury and other alleged requirements for legal
standing deserve more than a passing glance.
As with the rest of the Justice Department
appeal, the quote above is full of obfuscation.
If an individual citizen cannot challenge a federal statute, then
exactly who can? It appears that the
Justice Department is contending that federal statutes, which are lower order
law relative to the Constitution and its Amendments, are somehow mystically
beyond the reach of challenge via the First Amendment right of petition. That would certainly be convenient in terms
of reducing the caseload in the nation’s courts. With the First Amendment right to challenge
the products of congressional lawmaking null and void, the judicial arm of
government would have no basis to rule on the constitutionality of
anything. Evidently, some autocratic
personalities in Washington desire things to be exactly that way. If they prevail then say goodbye to
individual rights and the balance of powers within government.
Second, as per his dissenting opinion in the
majority ruling, Judge Fernandez demonstrated a curious gift for overlooking
the obvious by stating that the statute in question “merely sets forth the
words of the Pledge; it does not compel anyone to do anything”. Well, it most certainly does! It compels
every politician, ordinary citizen, and their children to choose between
standing for a pledge that tangles issues of allegiance to nation with those of
allegiance to a religious belief!
Further, the statute compels the United States government and its
functionaries to peddle a religious ideology regardless of whether anyone is
“officially” compelled to take the pledge or not!
Why in the first place is it necessary, as
the Justice Department appeal contends, for Newdow’s claim of personal injury
to stand in order for the ruling against the statute to stand also? The “Catch 22” knotted into the Justice
Department appeal is that if the First Amendment right to challenge a federal
statute can be grid-locked to extinction, then the issue of “personal injury”
becomes academic anyway. The whole
appeal amounts to an advocacy that any lawmaking, no matter how defective,
should go beyond challenge regardless of whether personal injury can be legally
substantiated or not. It is tantamount
to saying that a federal statute, no matter how dangerous and ill conceived, is
unassailable until at least a train wreck is caused by it, while on the other
hand, it should remain unassailable even if a train wreck does occur. Is this not just another batch of theocratic
and or judicial moonshine? The twisting
of the issues notwithstanding, the following concluding section pursues the
matter of injury to the bottom.
PART FOUR