[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 89 (Friday, June 28, 2002)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6306-S6309]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        THE PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE

  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, we all know that on Wednesday, in a 2-to-1 
decision, a three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals 
held that the United States Pledge of Allegiance was unconstitutional. 
The court held that the pledge was unconstitutional because in 1954 the 
Congress had the audacity--imagine that--to include a reference to God 
in its provisions.
  Some say these are just mechanical, ceremonial provisions. Get out of 
my face. That may be what some people think, but the majority of people 
in this country I don't believe are thinking in terms of ceremonial 
language.
  I was a Member of the U.S. House of Representatives at that time. I 
am the only Member of Congress today in either body who can say that I 
was a Member of the House of Representatives on June 7, 1954, when the 
words ``under God'' were included in the Pledge of Allegiance.
  Now I see in the morning paper that the next thing these misguided 
atheists are wanting to do is to challenge the words ``In God we 
trust.''
  I was a Member of the House of Representatives on that same date, 
coincidentally, June 7, 1 year later, 1955, when the House voted to add 
the words ``In God we trust'' to the Nation's coins and currency. Every 
time you take out a dollar bill--that is a pretty popular bill in my 
lifetime, a dollar bill; here it is--on it we read the words ``In God 
we trust.'' It is all there. It is on the coins.
  I was a Member of the House of Representatives when Congress voted to 
make that the motto, and here it is, inscribed, which is said in 
marble, ``In God we trust,'' right here over this door to the Chamber.
  Over to my left are those words, ``Novus Ordo Seclorum,'' a new order 
of the ages.
  ``E Pluribus Unum,'' all in one, one in all.
  Over here, ``Annuit coeptis,'' God has favored our undertakings.
  Here are these inscriptions. Bring in your stone masons and take 
these off the walls. That is what these pernicious atheists are saying. 
They want everything to suit themselves.
  God have mercy on them. But if they have their way, we will have to 
have stonemasons come into this Chamber and chisel off these words.
  They are not going to have their way. The people of these United 
States are not going to stand for this. And the courts had better take 
notice and kind of draw back a little bit. After all, if the American 
people do not believe in it and if they do not support it, that court 
decision is not going to be obeyed.
  The courts, starting with the Supreme Court, need to take a new look 
at this first amendment. If anything will ever result in amending the 
first amendment, then continue to go down this road, I say to the 
courts. They ought to draw back just a little bit distant from going 
down the road they are presently on.
  I am proud to inform my colleagues that I was in the House when Joint 
Resolution 243, which was entitled ``A Joint Resolution to codify and 
emphasize existing rules and customs pertaining to the display and use 
of the flag of the United States of America'' was enacted. That 
resolution was approved by the House on June 7, 1954--almost half 
century ago.
  The plaintiff in the case that was just decided is a self-described 
atheist. His daughter attends elementary school in California. The 
public schools there, as elsewhere, begin each school day with the 
Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag. If this court's outlandish and ill-
conceived decision is allowed to stand, it will mean that children in 
public schools in at least nine states will no longer be allowed to 
recite the pledge of allegiance by referring to America as ``one 
Nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.''
  That is too much power.
  Specifically, the court in this case has held that the words ``under 
God'' are unconstitutional because they support the existence of God 
but deny ``atheistic concepts.'' Unbelievably, the Court has held that 
this runs counter to the intent of the First Amendment of the U.S. 
Constitution, because, according to this court, the Establishment 
Clause of the First Amendment prohibits the government from endorsing 
any particular religion, including a belief in one God--which the court 
calls ``monotheism''--at the expense of atheism.
  Take a look at this Bible, which I hold in my hand. Here it is, the 
Holy Bible. It is the King James version--King James of England. Here 
is what it says in Psalm No. 127:

       Except the Lord build the House, they labour in vain that 
     build it: except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh 
     but in vain.

  Those are the words written long before the U.S. Constitution was 
written--written by wise men in many instances, Solomon, Son of David--
long before the Constitution was written, long before the court system 
was established in these United States. Those are the words:

       Except the Lord build the House, they labour in vain that 
     build it.

  Hear me, Judges!
  In reading the court's decision, I was astonished by the tortured 
reasoning of the majority as opposed to the lucid opinion recorded by 
Judge Fernandez, the lone dissenter. In responding to the arguments of 
the majority, Judge Fernandez did not see fit to hold that the phrase 
``under God'' violates the Constitution of the United States.
  How silly, how lucidly silly.
  If the schoolchildren of America were to be required to commemorate 
to memory, as they used to be required to commit many things to memory, 
the Declaration of Independence, would that ninth circuit judge render 
such an absurd decision concerning the constitutionality of the 
Declaration of Independence?
  Let's just select three or four phrases from the Declaration of 
Independence.
  The Declaration refers to ``Nature's God.'' The Declaration also 
refers to ``the Supreme Judge of the world,'' meaning God. The 
Declaration refers to ``a firm reliance on the protection of divine 
Providence.'' This is the Declaration of Independence. It was not 
written by Congress in 1954, as the words ``under God'' were inserted 
into the pledge. This Constitution was not written then. This 
Declaration of Independence was not written then. And who wrote it? In 
the main, it was written by Thomas Jefferson, along with John Adams, 
Benjamin Franklin, Philip Livingston, and one other. But there are at 
least four or five references to ``Providence,'' to ``the Divinity,'' 
to

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``God,'' to ``the Supreme Judge of the world'' in the Declaration of 
Independence.
  Now, would the same judge render such a misguided, absurd decision 
concerning the Declaration of Independence?
  Let's see who signed that Declaration of Independence. John Hancock--
there are several signers. I will just select a few: John Hancock; 
George Wythe; Richard Henry Lee; Thomas Jefferson; Benjamin Harrison, 
who later would become President; Robert Morris, the financier of the 
American Revolution; Benjamin Rush; Benjamin Franklin; George Clymer; 
James Wilson of Pennsylvania; Samuel Adams; John Adams; Elbridge Gerry 
and Roger Sherman. What would they think? What would these signers of 
the Declaration think?
  What would the signers of the Constitution say if they could speak 
today? What would they say about this pernicious decision we have just 
read about?
  What would Roger Sherman think? What would William Livingston think? 
I am wondering, if they could speak today, what would they think? What 
would Benjamin Franklin say? What would Robert Morris think, George 
Clymer? These are also signers of the Constitution. What would James 
Wilson think? How about George Read? How about John Dickinson, what 
would he say--John Dickinson of Delaware, who signed this Constitution?
  What would George Washington think? He presided over the 
Constitutional Convention. What would he say? What would John Rutledge 
say? What would Charles Cotesworth Pinckney say? What would Charles 
Pinckney say? What would Pierce Butler say? If they could speak to 
this--I will use a word that is pretty widely used--god-awful decision, 
what would they say?
  Well, Judge Fernandez said we should recognize ``that the religious 
clauses in the Constitution were not designed to drive religious 
expression out of public thought; they were simply written to avoid 
discrimination.''
  Judge Fernandez acknowledged further, that, ``we can run through the 
litany of tests and concepts which have floated to the surface from 
time to time.'' But, he said, ``when all is said and done, the danger 
that the words `under God' in our Pledge of Allegiance will tend to 
bring about a theocracy or suppress somebody's beliefs is so minuscule 
as to be de minimis.'' He concluded his dissent by finding that there 
is nothing unconstitutional about the Pledge of Allegiance, because any 
danger presented to first amendment freedoms by the phrase `one nation 
under God' is, in his words, ``picayune.''
  Well, to that, I would say, ``Amen.''
  Mr. President, over my many years in office, I have known other 
critics, like the majority of this court, who have attacked the words 
``under God'' as they exist in the Pledge of Allegiance. They have 
implied that the Founding Fathers were essentially ``areligious'' or 
``neutral'' about religion. Some of these critics even claim the 
Founding Fathers were antireligious, that they were bent on 
establishing a completely secular state in which God has no place. 
These individuals assert that America's fundamental origins are 
basically devoid of religious meaning, and that this was the intent of 
the Founding Fathers.
  Well, nothing could be further from the truth.
  If we read the Federalist essays, if we read other documents, we know 
that the intent of the Framers was to keep the new government from 
endorsing or favoring one religion over another. It was never meant to 
prohibit any voluntary expression of religious faith. I believe that 
this court's decision is wrongheaded, destructive, and completely 
contrary to the intent of the Founders of this great Nation. Instead of 
ensuring freedom of religion in a nation founded in part to guarantee 
that basic liberty, a literal suffocation of that freedom has been the 
result. The rights of those who do not believe in a Supreme being are 
being zealously guarded, to the denigration, I repeat, the denigration, 
of the rights of the millions of people in this country who do believe.
  The American doctrine of separation of church and state forbids the 
establishment of any particular religion by the state, but it does not 
forbid the influence of religious values in the life of our Nation. 
Religious faith has always been a basic tenet of American life. This is 
evident throughout the history of America.
  The history of the first amendment in particular is one of the great 
legacies of faith bequeathed by the Founding Fathers, but it is one 
that is little understood and sometimes distorted--as it was in the 
recent court decision. In 1791, Congress passed the first 10 amendments 
to the Constitution. We refer to these 10 amendments as the Bill of 
Rights. The very first amendment recognized the importance of religion 
in American life, stating that, Congress shall make no law respecting 
an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, 
which the second phrase is just as important and has equal weight with 
the preceding clause. The purpose of this tenet was to allow religious 
faith to flourish, not to suppress it, not to hobble it.
  In fact, even earlier--before the passage of the First Amendment--
Congress had clarified its attitude toward religion when, on August 7, 
1789, it officially reenacted the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, which 
included an explicit endorsement of religion. Article III of the 
Northwest Ordinance of 1787 stated, ``Religion, morality, and knowledge 
being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, 
schools and the means of learning shall forever be encouraged.''
  At that juncture, most schools were church enterprises. Congress 
recognized this, and expected--and I want to emphasize this--expected 
that the schools would teach religion and morality.
  Against this backdrop, the First Amendment is especially 
enlightening. James Madison, the principal sponsor of the Bill of 
Rights and later himself President, was a lifelong Episcopalian who had 
studied theology at Princeton with apparent plans to enter the 
ministry. However, on his return to Virginia after college, he changed 
his mind and went into politics primarily because he was deeply 
disturbed by the persecution of Baptists and other nonconformists in 
the Old Dominion. He therefore entered politics to become an ardent 
advocate of religious tolerance.
  Madison declared that, ``the religion of every man must be left to 
the conviction and conscience of every man.'' Thus, in consultation 
with John Leland, the leading Baptist clergyman in Virginia, Madison 
hammered out the church/state principles that were eventually embodied 
in the first amendment.
  As a result, the institutions of Church and State were officially 
separated, but the exercise of religion and its influence on society 
were encouraged--not discouraged.
  One of the most perceptive observers of the early American scene was 
the celebrated Alexis de Tocqueville. De Tocqueville, in summarizing 
the condition of religion in the United States in the 1830s, wrote:

       On my arrival in the United States the religious aspect of 
     the country was the first thing that struck my attention . . 
     . In France I had almost always seen the spirit of religion 
     and the spirit of freedom marching in opposite directions.

  That is what this court would have us do in this country. But, 
continued de Tocqueville:

       But in America, I found they were intimately united and 
     that they reigned in common over the same country . . . 
     Religion . . . must be regarded as the foremost of the 
     political institutions of the country--

  Meaning this country--

     for if it does not impart a taste for freedom--

  We hear the word ``freedom'' kicked around everywhere today----

     it facilitates the use of free institutions.

  De Tocqueville grasped what millions of Americans have known, past 
and present. God has been and continues to be an intimate and profound 
participant in the ongoing history of these United States. Keep that in 
mind. God has been and continues to be an intimate and profound 
participant in the ongoing history of America.
  Remember the Scriptures: ``Except the Lord build the house, they 
labor in vain that build it.'' The American people believe that.
  Through the decades, most Americans have come to discover the truth 
of de Tocqueville's conclusion when he asserted that, ``Unbelief is an 
accident.'' Hear that, ye atheists: ``Unbelief is an accident, and 
faith is the only permanent state of mankind.''
  In the context of this heritage, then, it is not surprising that the 
United

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States--a nation that evolved out of the American Revolution--should 
be, at root, a religious nation, from the beginning, from the Mayflower 
Compact, which in at least four instances refers to God.
  Indeed, most of the men who have been President of the United States 
have been men of exceptional faith. Two Presidents other than James 
Madison John Adams and Benjamin Harrison had considered entering the 
ministry. James Garfield was a lay preacher in the Disciples church. 
And Theodore Roosevelt, Benjamin Harrison, William McKinley, and James 
Earl Carter were all Sunday School teachers at various points during 
their lives.
  Of all of the Presidents, Abraham Lincoln was among the most 
theologically astute and Biblically influenced. Paradoxically, he never 
formally joined any particular church. Nonetheless, he said the Bible--
this is what Lincoln was talking about, the Holy Bible--was ``the 
greatest gift God has given to man.'' Hear me, Judge Goodwin of the 
Ninth Circuit. This is Lincoln speaking, not Robert C. Byrd. Lincoln 
said the Bible was ``the greatest gift God has given to man.'' And he 
was an avid reader of the Bible. He kept a battered old family Bible 
with him in the White House, and his speeches were laced with Biblical 
quotations. Reporters of his day stated that his delivery reflected the 
cadences and rhythms of the King James Version of the English Bible. 
The first Bible was the Coverdale Bible, written in 1535, the same year 
Thomas Moore was executed.
  But Lincoln was not alone among the Presidents who bore public 
witness to their personal faith. Every President, from George 
Washington through George W. Bush, has included some reference to God 
in his inaugural address. I have gone through all the inaugural 
addresses. I think there might have been one President who was pretty 
weak in his references to the Supreme Judge of the world. But in most 
cases they didn't have any hesitancy about referring to providence, to 
God.
  In his First Inaugural address, Washington declared, ``No people can 
be bound to acknowledge and adore the Invisible Hand which conducts the 
affairs of men more than those of the United States. Every step by 
which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation 
seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential 
agency.'' George Washington also instituted another custom that has 
been followed by every President since, by proclaiming a national day 
of Thanksgiving in late November of 1789.
  Jefferson, specifically included in his plans for the University of 
Virginia the proposal that ``proof of the being of God, the Creator, 
Preserver, and Supreme Being of the Universe, and Author of all 
morality, and the laws and obligations these infer, will be the 
province of the Professor of ethics.''
  However, nowhere, perhaps, did Jefferson's religious faith have a 
greater influence than in the words of the Declaration of Independence. 
At one point, Jefferson wrote, ``Religion is the alpha and omega of our 
moral law.'' He also pledged that he had ``sworn upon the altar of God 
eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.'' 
In the Declaration, which he wrote, Jefferson made it clear that 
religion is not only the root of our moral law but of our political 
rights. The Declaration of Independence contains five synonyms for the 
word ``God,'' and maintains that freedom itself is a gift from God as 
an element of man's being.
  As, hopefully, we all recall, the Declaration of Independence states, 
with respect to God:

       We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are 
     created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with 
     certain inalienable Rights, that among these are Life, 
     Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. . . .
       We, therefore, the Representatives of the United States of 
     America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the 
     Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our 
     intentions. . . .
       And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm 
     reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually 
     pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred 
     Honor. . . .

  These are various and sundry excerpts from the Declaration of 
Independence.
  Based on this foundation established by Jefferson and the other 
Founding Fathers, archaeologists in future millennia will have little 
difficulty reading the evidence of the religious faith and traditions 
that have been part and parcel of American history. Every nook and 
cranny of this Capitol--and I might add, of this Capital City--provides 
such evidence. In fact, wherever one may go in this great national 
city, he or she is constantly reminded of the strong spiritual 
awareness of our forefathers who wrote the Constitution, who built the 
schools, who built the churches, who hewed the forests, who dredged the 
rivers and harbors, and who created this Republic.
  Here in the Senate, for example, the services of an ordained 
clergyman have been employed since 1789. The Senate Chaplain is the 
embodiment of a corporate faith in God and the symbol of the eternal 
judgment that we Senators recognize exists over our legislative and 
personal actions. Moreover, the institution of the Senate Chaplaincy is 
itself the result of a historical process that reveals much about the 
long development of American values.
  For example, the first prayers offered in Congress were uttered on 
September 7, 1774. At the initial meeting of the First Continental 
Congress, Samuel Adams requested that the convention begin with prayer. 
As the Revolutionary War continued, the Continental Congress issued 
calls for periodic national days of prayer and fasting, asking the 
populace ``to reverence the Providence of God, and look up to Him as 
the Supreme Disposer of all events and the arbiter of the fate of 
nations.''
  These religious expressions were not just pretense, they were not 
just ceremonial verbiage. Heavens no. Prayer and worship were held in 
high regard by the remarkable men who led the American Revolution, and 
the Chaplaincy of today's Senate is derived directly from the guidance 
provided by those great men. During the rocky sessions of the 
Constitutional Convention of 1787, the various representatives of the 
several States were locked in heated disagreement over petty 
prerogatives with little concern, apparently at that moment, for the 
national well-being. The weather had been very hot--probably as humid 
as it gets here in Washington at times--and the delegates to the 
Convention were tired and they were edgy. The debates were stymied and 
a melancholy cloud seemed to hang over the Convention.
  Suddenly, old Dr. Franklin stood to his feet and faced the chair in 
which sat GEN George Washington. His famous double-spectacles were low 
on his nose, and he broke the silence when he addressed George 
Washington. Franklin reminded the Convention how, at the beginning of 
the war with England, the Continental Congress had prayed for Divine 
protection in that very room. ``Our prayers, sir, were heard,'' he 
declared. ``They were graciously answered. . . .'' He then asked, ``And 
have we now forgotten that powerful Friend? Or do we imagine that we no 
longer need His assistance?''

  He continued on saying:

       I have lived, sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the 
     more convincing proofs I see of this truth--that God governs 
     in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the 
     ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can 
     rise without his aid?
       We have been assured, sir, in the sacred writings, that 
     ``except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that 
     build it.''

  He selected the same portion of Scripture that I picked today, didn't 
he? This is Benjamin Franklin talking. He went on to say:

       I firmly believe this: and I also believe that without His 
     concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no 
     better than the builders of Babel. . . .

  Well, today, we follow the Senate tradition of morning prayer. The 
Chaplain was among the first officers elected in the Senate upon 
adoption of the Constitution. In my volumes, ``The Senate 1789-1989,'' 
Senators will find a chapter on the Senate Chaplain. I hope they will 
read it again. To this very day, the first daily order of the business 
in the Senate is a prayer for Divine Guidance by the Chaplain.
  This, of course, was not perceived by the Framers as an attack on the 
first amendment requiring separation between church and state, for the 
simple reason that no single church has anything to do with it.
  It is not simply prayer in the Senate that reaffirms the religious 
history of the American people. Let us speak

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briefly of some of the other reminders in Washington that reaffirm the 
proposition that our country is founded on religious principles.
  On the Washington Monument, one may read three Biblical quotations on 
the 24th landing. One was donated by the Sunday school children of the 
Methodist Church of Philadelphia who contributed a stone bearing an 
inscription from the Book of Proverbs which states:

       Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is 
     old, he will not depart from it.

  Another inscription on the Washington Monument, which was contributed 
by the Methodist Church of New York, is also taken from Proverbs and 
reads:

       The memory of the just is blessed.

  That comes from chapter 22 of Proverbs, verse 6.
  And the third stone bears these words of Christ from the Book of 
Luke:

       Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them 
     not, for of such is the kingdom of heaven.

  Near the Washington Monument, of course, is the Lincoln Memorial. 
This massive shrine pays homage to the greatness of this simple and 
heroic man whose very life was offered on the altar of liberty. We know 
of his knowledge of the Bible and his gentleness, his power, his 
determination, and we know that determination of Lincoln came to us 
clearly through his features chiseled in granite by the sculptor.
  We can almost hear Lincoln speak the words which are cut into the 
wall by his side. Mr. President, we need to get some stonemasons to go 
down to the Lincoln Memorial. If this judge with his pernicious ruling 
and if the atheists are successful in having these words stricken from 
this Chamber--``In God We Trust''--and from the Nation's currency, we 
will have to have a lot of new dollar bills printed and a lot of new 
coins. We have to strike those words ``In God We Trust'' now from the 
bills if these pernicious suits by atheists are upheld by some 
misguided judges, like the one who rendered this decision. We had 
better hire some stonemasons. That might be a pretty good job, come to 
think of it. Maybe I should just retire at the end of this term--I 
would be about 89 then--and then I can perhaps get myself a job as a 
stonemason. I could go down here to the Lincoln Monument--I would not 
do it--at least I could think in terms of being a stonemason and take 
these words off that Lincoln Memorial.
  Listen to what Lincoln says, according to the inscription on the 
Lincoln Memorial. Can you just witness those stonemasons going down 
there and chipping with chisel and hammer, chipping out these words? 
Listen, these are words that are cut into the wall by the side of 
Lincoln on the Lincoln Memorial:

       That this Nation under God--

  Praise God, hallelujah, there they are. That is Lincoln, that is what 
he said.

       That this Nation under God, shall have a new birth of 
     freedom. . . .

  Hear that, judges of the Ninth Circuit. Hear that, Judge Goodwin of 
the Ninth Circuit. I have a great judge in West Virginia named Goodwin. 
He is a Federal judge. He is Judge Goodwin. But I daresay he would not 
have rendered that kind of a foolish decision. Here are the words that 
are cut into the wall by the side of Lincoln:

       That this Nation under God, shall have a new birth of 
     freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, 
     and for the people shall not perish from the earth.

  In his second inaugural address, this great President--a Republican, 
by the way. See, I do not hold that against him--in his great second 
inaugural address, great President Lincoln made use of the words 
``God,'' ``Bible,'' ``prayer,'' ``providence,'' ``Almighty,'' and 
``divine attributes,'' and then his address continues:

       As was said 3,000 years ago so it still must be said, 
     [that] ``the judgements of the Lord are true and righteous 
     altogether.''

  That was Abraham Lincoln.

  With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the 
right as God--

  This is Lincoln talking, Abraham Lincoln talking--

       With malice toward none, with charity for all, with 
     firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let 
     us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the 
     Nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the 
     brunt of the battle and for his widow and his orphan--to do 
     all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace 
     among ourselves and all nations.

  Before leaving Washington, a visitor might make a final stop at the 
National Cemetery in Arlington, VA. Here are the peaceful ranks of 
crosses, stars of David, other religious symbols reminding us that our 
Government has given its fallen men back to the God who gave them life. 
The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier stands for all those who have fallen in 
battle who could not be identified--members of all sects, faiths, and 
religions. And here, once more, we find the acknowledgment of God's 
divine power in the eloquent words:

       Here lies in honored glory, an American soldier known but 
     to God.

  Can you imagine, we may have to someday get stonemasons to go over 
there and take hammers and chisels and take those words off that 
monument.
  Thus, the connection between God and the United States of America is 
long established in the minds of most Americans. If we begin now to 
erase the connection between God and schoolchildren under the pretense 
of protecting the so-called constitutional rights of nonbelievers or 
atheists, as the Ninth Circuit did, will it not be necessary to go a 
little further, or perhaps a great deal further, in the future?
  Will we next be forced to remove the name of God from all official 
documents, historic edifices, and patriotic events for fear of possibly 
offending what is a nonbelieving minority?
  Must we do so when even the possibility of offending such a minority 
is, in the words of Judge Fernandez, picayune?
  What will the court crier say--``God save this honorable court''? He 
will have to stop there, will he not? He will have to say something 
else. Would he say, ``President Bush save this honorable court?'' Would 
he say, ``President Clinton, save this honorable court?'' One can see 
how silly such a decision was and how foolish it is to pursue that line 
in this country with all of its history.
  Obviously, in establishing and maintaining a secular government, the 
American people never intended to foster an atheistic or a faithless 
society. In this light, in closing, I recite perhaps more sincerely 
than ever the prayer that climaxes one of our greatest national hymns:

     Our fathers' God to Thee,
     Author of liberty,
     To Thee we sing;
     Long may our land be bright
     With freedom's holy light;
     Protect us by Thy might,
     Great God our King.

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