Alum's Pledge at center of heated debate

Bellamy

n August of 1892, Francis Bellamy, Class of 1876, penned an oath to commemorate the new Columbus Day holiday, an oath that is today at the center of a heated debate.

Bellamy's original version read, "I pledge allegiance to my Flag and to the Republic for which it stands--one Nation indivisible--with liberty and justice for all." Today the ubiquitous Pledge of Allegiance includes 31 carefully chosen words, including the two currently under debate after the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the inclusion of the phrase "under God" is unconstitutional.

This is not the first debate centered around the Pledge's wording. In 1923, the first National Flag Conference voted to add "the flag of the United States" to ensure immigrant children understood to which nation they were pledging their allegiance. In 1942 the Supreme Court ruled in favor of members of the Jehovah's Witnesses whose children refused to salute the flag because their religion forbids them to pay homage to symbols.

And in 1954 Congress added the phrase "under God," setting the stage for the current controversy.

Bellamy, an ordained Baptist minister who left the clergy to pursue a career as a writer, editor, and advertising executive, died in 1931, well before the Pledge could find itself much of an issue in a court of law or in the courts of public and political opinion.

But as Hendrick Hertzberg noted last July in The New Yorker: Bellamy "wouldn't have liked the politics behind 'under God,' but the phrase itself probably wouldn't have bothered him. . . . As an editor and rhetorician, though, Bellamy would notice that the phrase has been inserted in the wrong place. It should be 'one nation indivisible, under God.' . . . For a white guy from Boston, Bellamy had a pretty good sense of rhythm."

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