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C H A P T E R 2 A Case of First Impression In his suit, originally filed in March 2000 in Sacramento federal court, Michael Newdow argued that both the California law that requires schools to conduct “appropriate patriotic exercises” (section 52720 of the state’s Education Code) and the Elk Grove and Sacramento School Districts policies requiring elementary school students to say the Pledge to start each school day violated the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution . These policies were clear attempts by district officials to indoctrinate Newdow’s then five-year-old daughter with “religious dogma.” Newdow argued that he, not the government, had the right to instruct his daughter about religion. Every day, his daughter had been “compelled to watch and listen as her state-employed teacher in her state-run school leads her and her classmates in a ritual proclaiming that there is a God, and that ours is “one Nation under God.” Even though the Pledge had been challenged on three previous occasions, Newdow believed that his was a “case of first impression” or “a novel, new or undecided interpretation of law that comes before a court” (www.legalexplanations.com, 2005). Newdow was the first person to name the president and Congress in a Pledge case. Elk Grove School District superintendent David Gordon contended that Newdow’s daughter had not been coerced into saying the Pledge; district policy allowed her to “opt out,” or sit quietly while the Pledge was recited . Newdow would argue that he did not have to prove that his daughter was coerced. In 1992, the Supreme Court ruled in Lee v. Weisman , 505 U.S. 577 (1992), that students who had to listen to a benediction given at their high school’s graduation ceremonies had been coerced into hearing religious dogma. In his daughter’s classroom, the coercion was even more “forcefully present,” since her teacher led a daily recitation of 25 the Pledge. Newdow discussed the “opt out” provision with his daughter’s teacher and principal, but concluded it would be impossible for her to “opt out” without feeling like an outsider. Newdow did not, as many journalists would later suggest, question the government’s motivations for or its right to encourage patriotism. He objected to the government’s inclusion of “religious dogma” to achieve that goal. A Call for Change In his complaint, Newdow summarized for the court the Pledge’s history. A brief, more objective summary will suffice for our purposes. Written as part of preparation for marking the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus’s now debated discovery of America, the Pledge first appeared in the popular Boston-based children’s magazine The Youth’s Companion . Francis Bellamy, a socialist and former Baptist minister, in 1892 wrote the Pledge, which originally read: “I Pledge allegiance to my Flag and to the Republic for which it stands: one Nation indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for all.” Author Susan Jacoby (2004) notes that Bellamy was removed from his minister’s post in Boston for “preaching against the evils of capitalism” (p. 287), a message that today’s journalists, many of whom work for large corporations with a vested interest in sustaining capitalism, might ignore or marginalize. Bellamy also was a firm believer in the separation of church and state. Jacoby speculates that he would have been “horrified” at the government’s decision to add “under God” to the Pledge. In fact, the Pledge was originally intended to reflect the commitment of our public schools to assimilate the growing number of immigrants, Jacoby writes. Journalists who covered Newdow’s suit in 2002 would repeatedly note that Bellamy was a socialist, and that he was fired for expressing his socialist beliefs, but they failed to explore his belief in separation of church and state (other than brief discussions of the Pledge as a “completely secular document” [Dobbs, 2003]—discussions precipitated by supporters of Newdow) and, perhaps more important, the original purpose of the Pledge. “His Pledge was a call for change in a nation dominated by robber barons and big business,” said CBS News reporter John Blackstone (2002). Blackstone’s characterization was a bit off the mark: Bellamy wanted to make children of immigrants feel welcome in their new schools. Blackstone interviewed Peter Dreier, a professor of politics at Occidental College, who added that Bellamy sought to “promote a national sense of fairness, equality, an egalitarianism and opportunity.” This is 26 Taking on the Pledge of Allegiance [3.138.141...

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