By By Buddy Bynum / editor
June 30, 2002
The two federal judges in California who ruled against the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance deserve the criticism they are receiving. They are lucky.
Had they lived in Mississippi, they'd likely be tarred, feathered and run out of town on an under-utilized Amtrak rail. Their membership in the local Kiwanis Club might be revoked. They might be banned from community development club meetings. They might be shunned from any public event where the Pledge is routinely recited as a statement of our patriotic oath. They might never be asked to visit an elementary school.
They probably wouldn't care.
But I do. Because their ruling isn't political. It's personal. At least for me.
Some others jumped at the political opportunity. Witness the response of the state Democratic Party:
Seems that some Democrats still haven't accepted the fact that President Bush won the election.
Under God'
Be that as it may, in 1954 Congress added the words "under God" to the Pledge that had already been slightly altered from the original penned in 1892 by Francis Bellamy, a Christian socialist and Baptist minister. His original Pledge read as follows:
Dr. John Baer, in an excellent history on the writing of the Pledge published in 1992 by the Annapolis, Md., Free State Press Inc., said Bellamy in his sermons and lectures described in detail how the middle class could create a planned economy with political, social and economic equality for all.
The Pledge was published in the Sept. 8, 1892, issue of The Youth's Companion, the leading family magazine and the Reader's Digest of its day. Its editor had hired Bellamy in 1891 as his assistant when Bellamy was pressured into leaving his Baptist church in Boston because of his socialist sermons.
Baer writes that in 1892 Francis Bellamy was chairman of a committee of state superintendents of education in the National Education Association. As its chairman, he prepared the program for the public schools' quadricentennial celebration for Columbus Day in 1892. He structured this public school program around a flag-raising ceremony and a flag salute  his Pledge of Allegiance.'
He considered placing the word, "equality," in his Pledge, but knew that the state superintendents of education on his committee were against equality for women and African Americans. The words "justice" and "equality" have different meanings.
New state law
Tomorrow, as state Rep. Greg Snowden reminded me, a new state law takes effect requiring that every school class in Mississippi begin the day with a recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance. Any student or teacher who objects to reciting the oath of allegiance is to be excused from participating without penalty.
The act also requires that a U.S. flag be displayed in each public school classroom at all times when school is in session and that each school district provide student instruction in the proper etiquette toward, correct display of and respect for the flag. The instruction will be a part of the district's fifth-grade social studies curriculum or history curriculum.
While the California ruling is not binding on Mississippi, it is noteworthy that here in our state the spirit of patriotism remains strong. And at least some tentative steps are being taken to help restore a measure of respect for American icons.