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The Pledge of Allegiance may well be the most widely memorized bit of prose in the United States. In fact it is so widely known that I wonder how many people have ever stopped to consider where it came from or what it means (few I suspect). It was first written in 1892 but it’s final form did not come until 1954. Those who object to the reference to God are following in the footsteps of the daughter of the man who wrote the original version.
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
I think it is instructive that we do not pledge allegiance to the United States or its government, but to the flag and the government ideal that it represents. We are pledging allegiance to the republic that the founders established in order to protect the freedoms of all the citizens of the nation. A nation which is meant to be under God and indivisible and which should be devoted without exception to protecting liberty and promoting justice for all.
That is the kind of nation that I can cheerfully and wholeheartedly support. We must ask ourselves how close that image aligns with the realities of our nation today. Those who truly pledge their allegiance to the flag and the national ideal of good government that it represents are pledging themselves to pursue those policies in government and society which will bring us closer to the ideal represented by the flag, the one where there are 50 sovereign states which, together with the sovereign citizens of the nation, work together to promote liberty and justice for all.
4 replies on “The Pledge of Allegiance”
I’ve never understood why we pledge allegiance to a piece of cloth.
Also, you make indirect references to the author of the pledge, but don’t go into any detail. Perhaps a follow-up post would be in order, where you talk about the author’s socialist world view, his goals with creating and instituting the pledge, how the pledge salute was conducted (hint: “Heil, Hitler!”), etc.
There are several layers to peel back beyond where this post has gone. 🙂
There are always further levels to peel back. I specifically did not include any information about Francis Bellamy because I did not want what I was saying about the pledge to be skewed because of his socialist vision.
Part of the reason that I wrote the post was to show the real value that can be found in the pledge – that has nothing to do with the political views of the man who first authored it. In fact, it is a good illustration of the fact that most things can be corrupted or made valuable independent of the original intent behind them.
The point I was trying to make is that we are doing more than pledging allegiance to a piece of cloth – we are pledging allegiance to a political/social/national ideal of liberty and justice of government based on law – that’s why we don’t pledge allegiance to a leader or a party (at least not officially :-P).
The quality of any piece of work does not necessarily rest solely on the character of the individual(s) that created it. One ancient line of thought held that the developer (poet, writer, sculptor, painter, or whatever) was merely a tool used by the ‘Muses’ that were actually the source of the product. The individual might be arrogant enough to think that he was the source. Many an individual misinterpreted the work that the Muses had wrought through him; although, it was apparent to others. A developer might even intend one thing by his work, while the Muses intended and produced quite another. I think that something along these lines is the case with Bellamy’s work, which thankfully was improved due to a knee-jerk response to Godless communism.
I too have had concerns about pledging allegiance to a piece of cloth. But to those that love the ideals represented by the “republic for which it stands,” I believe that it is possible to lovingly pledge allegiance to the flag as a symbol for the ideals of “liberty and justice for all,” even if others see the flag as a symbol of something else. Ultimately, the appropriateness of pledging allegiance to this symbol is deeply tied up in what I believe in the deep recesses of my soul that this symbol represents.
Former Education Secretary Bill Bennett has written that the United States of America is like a great and beautiful tree. Upon inspection, it is clear that a few bugs infest the tree. But he argues that far too many today focus so heavily on the bugs that this is all they see when they see America; they are oblivious to the grandeur and beauty of the tree. If you look at the flag and can only see the ‘bugs,’ then it is best to refrain from pledging allegiance to it. If, on the other hand, you look at the flag and see the ‘tree,’ I believe you can in good conscience pledge allegiance to that flag and to the great republic idealized by its Founders.
Some years there are more bugs on the tree than others. That being said, I don’t believe that there have ever yet been more bugs than beauty to be seen when the whole tree is considered.