Welcome to Hank’s Place —
Despite the efforts of the media, it’s all right to be a patriot. In fact, it’s commendable. Especially as we remember the horrific attack upon the United States 20 years ago. It’s time to re-embrace our nation’s pledge of allegiance.
The pledge expresses allegiance to the flag of the United States and the Republic of the United States of America. Such a pledge was first composed by Captain George Thatcher Balch, a Union Army Officer during the Civil War and later a teacher of patriotism in New York City schools.
“We give our heads and hearts to God and our country; one country, one language, one flag.”
Balch was a proponent of teaching children, especially those of immigrants, loyalty to the United States. Totally awesome!
His pledge was revised by Francis Bellamy, a Baptist minister, in 1892, to say, “I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.” Bellamy said, “At the beginning of the nineties (that’s the 1890’s) patriotism and national feeling was at a low ebb. The patriotic ardor of the Civil War was an old story. The time was ripe for a reawakening of simple Americanism and the leaders in the new movement rightly felt that patriotic education should begin in the public schools.”
“The true reason for allegiance to the flag is the Republic for which it stands,” Bellamy stated. He then reflected on the sayings of Revolutionary and Civil War figures, and concluded “all that pictured struggle reduced itself to three words, one Nation indivisible.”
It was first published for a National Public School celebration of Columbus Day, by James Upham who has been quoted as saying, “If I can instill into the minds of our American youth a love for their country and the principles on which it was founded, and create in them an ambition to carry on with the ideals which the early founders wrote into The Constitution, I shall not have lived in vain.”
But what about “Under God” you ask? During the Cold War era, many Americans wanted to distinguish the United States from the atheism promoted by Marxist-Leninist countries. Sound familiar? Louis Albert Bowman, an attorney from Illinois, was the first to suggest the addition of “under God” to the pledge. He was chaplain of the Illinois Society of the Sons of the American Revolution. He said that the words came from the Gettysburg Address, where Lincoln said, “that the nation shall, under God, have a new birth of freedom.”
“Under God” was officially adopted in 1954 following a sermon by pastor George MacPherson Docherty of the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church (that was Abraham Lincoln’s church) based on the Gettysburg Address, entitled “A New Birth of Freedom.” He argued that the nation’s might lay not in arms but rather in its spirit and higher purpose. He noted that the Pledge’s sentiments could be those of any nation: “There was something missing in the pledge, and that which was missing was the characteristic and definitive factor in the American way of life.” He then cited Lincoln’s words “under God” as the defining words that set the United States apart from other nations.
Following its adoption, President Eisenhower said: “From this day forward, the millions of our school children will daily proclaim in every city and town, every village and rural school house, the dedication of our nation and our people to the Almighty…. In this way we are reaffirming the transcendence of religious faith in America’s heritage and future; in this way we shall constantly strengthen those spiritual weapons which forever will be our country’s most powerful resource, in peace or in war.”
Is it any wonder God DOES have His hand upon America and will rescue her?! This special day, as an American, a patriot, recite the pledge of allegiance, honor God — and COME ALIVE!
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