Federal Judge Rules Pledge in School Unconstitutional

I disagree, whether you like it or not God is a part of American History. Many of the founding fathers professed a belief in God, and our country was built on principles based on the Bible. I would also like to ask where in the Constitution does it say "seperation of Church and State". I have yet to find it. Yes, Under God may have been added, however, it was added in order to show how the founding fathers felt about our nation. Why is it such a big deal? If you don't like it, don't say it, its two words for crying outloud. I do not understand why NOW years and years after the fact, it is such a big deal. Whether you belive in God or not, its a fact that, one way or another, He is a part of our history.

BTW I was responding to Brent's statement I quoted, I didn't read the article, nor do I want to. I am disgusted that a US Federal Judge would ban a tradition and a part of our American History. Sick to my stomach.

Under God was added in the 1950's, prior to that it was not found in the pledge So don't be so sickened, it hasn't been around since the beginning of our country :wink:

Like I said I agree with the fact that it is just two words and it should not be as big of a deal as they are making it out to be... there are so many other problems to fix that bare much more importance than two words in a pledge.

Our country was based on God and Christian principles. I don't care when the words were added.

This guy is an assclown just looking for his 10 minutes of fame. This will be overturned, but schools scared to death will never re-institute it. It's a shame.

Well I disagree on that, I believe it should be put back to the way it was.

Some interesting information:






Read below, our "Founding Fathers" did not add "Under God" to the Pledge for many reasons.. the top two being:

1) The pledge was not written until September 8, 1892
2) Under God was not added until June 14, 1954

The original Pledge:



Revision 2 of The Pledge: June 14, 1923



Revision 3 of The Pledge: June 14, 1924


How it is now:




Ask yourself that.


Why is it such a big deal to you then?


I do not understand why it was added, years and years after it was first concieved :wink:



You said that Seperation of Church and State is not mentioned within the Constitution... and with that comes no mention of God....



I bet it makes the people sick to their stomachs to who truly do not believe in a god that they must hear this every morning they go to school.

Is it not their right to not have to hear this if the government requires them to go to this building everyday to get a education.

We are not replacing "under god" with "without god" we are simply taking it out of a place it never should have ended up in the first place.

Amendment 1 of the United States Constitution (1791) states:
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances"

Amendment 1 is where the separation of church and state came from. It's not plainly said, but the constitution Is open to interpretation by the Supreme Court of the Land, the Supreme Court of the United States which was established in Article 3 of the Constitution of the United States.

Article 6 of the United States Constitution states "...This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary nonwithstanding"

This is broadly where the courts get to interprit the constitution if I remember correctly. It is 1:30 AM here and I am trying to think straight, correct me if I"m wrong.
If you will, take for example Santa Fe Independent School District v. Jane Doe, individually and As Next friend for her minor children, jane and john doe, et al. (Supreme Court of the United States. 530 U.S. 290; 120 S. Ct. 2266; 147 L. Ed. 2d. 295 (2000))
This is a case that was about prayer at football games.
The Opinion of Stevens, J. (consenting) was
"... The Religion Clauses of the First Amendment prevent the government from making any law respecting the establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. By no means do these commands impose a prohibition on all religious activity in our public schools. Indeed, the common purpose of the Religious Clauses 'is to secure religious liberty.' Thus, nothing in the Constitution as interpreted by this Court prohibits any public school student from voluntarily praying at any time before, during, or after the school day. But the religious liberty protected by the Constitution is abridged when the State affirmatively sponsors the particular religious practice of prayer"
Basically, the consenting side of this case presented to the Supreme Court as an appelate case was that this before game student led school sponsored prayer was unconstitutional because it violated the rights of the other citizens at the game who do not wish to take part or endorse this prayer.
However, if we read the dissenting opinion by Chief Justice Rehnquist, with whom Justice Scalia and Justice Thomas join...
"The Court distorts existing precedent to conclude that the school district's student-message program is invalid on the face under the Establishment Clause. But even more disturbing that its holding is the tone of the Court's opinion; it bristles with hostility to all things religious in public life. Neither the holding nore the tone of the opinion is faithful to the meaning of the Establishment Clause, when it is recalled that George Washington himself, at the request of the very Congress which passed the Bill of Rights, proclaimed a day of 'public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed by ackowledging with grateful hearts the many and signal favors of Almighty God.'

I say, we should look back to our founding fathers, men who had prayer before each meeting of the first Congress, and see what their desire for this country was. True, this country has changed greatly in it's lifetime, but it's still the home of the free. It's still the place where little johnny can believe in what he wants and susie can believe in what she wants and it's all ok. Just before taking all mentions of God out of this country, we need to look at how far our country has come thus far removing God. The way I see it, the decay of this government is imminent at our current rate. Sure it isn't in the near future, but it's still going to happen. The way I see it, the more of God and christianity we take out of this country, the further decay it falls into. Just watch the news and see who you pray to before your next big test...

The way I see it, let's worry about other things before the ACLU pulls out of their "You hate blacks" stand in NO and head to washington to fight this. We have to nuke NO first to take them out..duh

Oh my...
Karlton said he was bound by precedent of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which in 2002 ruled in favor of Sacramento atheist Michael Newdow (search) that the pledge is unconstitutional when recited in public schools.

That is total BS. No judge is bound by precedent. The doctrine of stare decisis (fancy term for precedent) is based upon a judge believing the same as a previous judge and basically trying to save time by just ruling precedent and calling it done.
If the judge does not believe with the previous ruling, he does not have to follow it. If the earlier case is not followed, it is not setting precedent. As my law book puts it "The doctrine of stare decisis has this flexibility because society changes, the law changes and the earlier judge may have rendered an incorrect decision".


*sidenote*
I found this rather funny, while reading up on Administrative law, I found this embedded randomly in the text.
"Envision, if you will, elves. Elves reproduce rapidly. If you have ever seen a movie or other program involving elves--there are always a whole bunch of them in any one location."
Talk about catching you off guard, I guess there's humor in every book.
*/sidenote*

The judge wanted to make that ruling, but didn't want to be responsible for it. The previous case was thrown out because the guy didn't even have custody of his son.

Well, those people shouldn't use our money then Brent. At my school, people who didn't want to say the pledge didn't have to.

This is one of those things that I couldn't care less about. With so many things happening in the world this is the least of my concerns.
My opinion: This being a country of freedom, we do not need to be imposing our beliefs on others. The name of God probably should not be there, being that there are so many people in the US that do not believe in God but do believe in pledging allegiance to the flag. Do I loose any sleep over it? NO.

Eh I do not think its fair to say someone should not use our money to get a education because they do not want to hear something that should not be there in the first place.

They have a right to push for this not to be in there because it simply should not be in there.

I agree with you JEB007 though and have said that before, it is insane why we are taking on this type of stuff and we face so many other problems in this country.

I fail to see how having that phrase in the Pledge is establishing religion . It is simply affirming the role God played in the founding of our country , an historical fact which we , even atheists , should not forget . Our country upholds the atheist's right to BE an atheist because of that fact .

Who's talking about education Brent?

If you haven't looked at a dollar bill recently, it says "IN GOD WE TRUST"

There are many who would have that removed also ! But they are willing to use dollars anyway .

Exactly. They want "under God" removed, so they refuse to say the pledge and cause a scene.

I don't see any of these same people at Wal-Mart going "OH MY! this says GOD! on it! I'm not using this!" *gives to salvation army guy outside*

That never happens.

It should be removed from there too imo :wink:

I was referring to the very topic of this thread with the education remark seeing how they say the pledge everyday in school.

Again, I am not saying you are wrong and that these people do not do these things.

That is besides the point and not what I am talking about.

And it should be removed whether or not they are complaining about it or not is mute. If they want to be hypocrites let them but it remains my opinion that these things should not be where they are

They try to make a point but hyprocritize (is that a word?) themselves by only bitching about certain issues, while the 'problem' is in other places as well.