Many people think the battle over the words “under God” in our Pledge of Allegiance is over.  They remember that some extremist judges struck the words down saying they violated the now deified “separation of church and state,” but they also vaguely remember the Senate passing a resolution in support of the Pledge and the more than 100 House members gathered outside the Capitol reciting the Pledge of Allegiance in a spectacular show of support.

That display made us feel really good, but there’s just one problem: it did nothing to protect the Pledge of Allegiance.

That was June 26, 2002, believe it or not, and still there has been no resolution on the lawsuit that started the whole controversy.  Worse yet, we are still waiting for our lawmakers to back up their rhetoric and pass a bill protecting our religious freedoms by protecting the words “under God” in our Pledge.

While nothing is done to protect the Pledge, the forces attempting to remove any mention of God from the public square keep going and going and going like the Energizer bunny.

“We the people” are partly to blame for this because we’ve let them get away with it.  We allowed ourselves to believe that our representatives had listened to our outcry and that the matter would be taken care of when that decision came down.

What a foolish thing to think.  Some say curiosity killed the cat; I’m thinking it was the cat’s naiveté.

But we are not an irrational people, and we have to learn from our mistakes.  It is clear we cannot stay “asleep at the wheel,” blindly trusting that those men and women elected to carry out the will of the people will do the right thing.  We have to stand up and protect our religious freedoms or we will continue to loose them bit by bit.

The Pledge of Allegiance case is one of those bits, and we need to demand that it be protected.

The Pledge of Allegiance case involved devout atheist Michael Newdow, who brought suit against everyone he could think of: the United States, Congress, the President, the State of California, Elk Grove Unified School District and its superintendent, and the Sacramento City Unified School District and its superintendent.  Newdow alleged that the fact that his daughter had to hear the teacher-led Pledge of Allegiance in school with the words “under God” was a violation of the Establishment and Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.  He argued that it violated his right to direct his daughter’s religious education. 

A magistrate judge examined the arguments and concluded that, as we all know, the Pledge is constitutional.  The District Court took a look at Newdow’s argument and agreed with the magistrate judge’s dismissal of Newdow’s capricious complaint.

But the enemies of God in public life got what they wanted in the end — to bring the claim before the iniquitous United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.  Leaning on the Ninth’s liberal record, and its reputation as the most overturned appellate court in the country, Newdow hoped they would validate his arguments and do the absurd: declare the Pledge of Allegiance unconstitutional.  That would definitely get him before the Supreme Court.

And he was right. 

The Ninth Circuit reversed the holding of the district court, saying Newdow had standing to challenge a practice that interferes with his right to direct his daughter’s religious education and that the words “under God” on the Pledge were a violation of the Establishment Clause.

At the same time, we also learned that Newdow’s daughter and her mother, who had complete legal custody, did not want any part of the suit because they were Christians and did not have a problem with the Pledge of Allegiance.  Still, “under God” was out now.

It is also interesting to point out that Newdow’s arguments are so extreme that even the Ninth Circuit had to dispense with some of them like rubbish.  For example, the court points out that he was not only suing the school district where his daughter goes to school, but he was also trying to sue a neighboring district, because his daughter might go there in the future.

Sure, go and sue Wal-Mart because you may fall at one of their stores some day.

Another argument that reveals the frivolous nature of Newdow’s claim is the bravado of his prayer for relief.

Newdow asks the district court to order the President of the United States… to “alter, modify or repeal” the Pledge by removing the words “under God”’ and to order the United States Congress… “immediately to act” to remove the words “under God” from the Pledge.

With all of Mr. Newdow’s degrees and titles, it would not be credible to think that this was done out of ignorance of the law.  I’m sure he’s heard that we have three separate branches of government.  No, this purposeful disregard for the law shows complete disrespect for the Constitution and makes a mockery of the court.

The result was that the court actually had to devote some of its valuable time to giving Mr. Newdow a refresher course in basic civics.

The President… is not an appropriate defendant in an action challenging the constitutionality of a federal statute.  See Franklin v. Massachusetts … (observing that a court of the United States “‘has no jurisdiction of a bill to enjoin the President in the performance of his official duties’” … Continued...