[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 41 (Thursday, March 13, 2003)]
[House]
[Page H1877]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          ONE NATION UNDER GOD

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Renzi) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. RENZI. Madam Speaker, on March 10, our children who attend public 
schools in the jurisdiction of the Ninth Circuit Court, including my 
home State of Arizona, were told not to start their day with the real 
Pledge of Allegiance. An absurd ruling made by the Ninth Circuit Court 
of Appeals last June held that the 1954 Federal act that added the 
words ``under God'' to the Pledge of Allegiance violated the 
Establishment Clause of the first amendment.
  Madam Speaker, our great Nation rests upon the wisdom of our Founding 
Fathers. Our Founding Fathers created a Nation based upon spiritual 
beliefs, and yet judges continually misinterpret this founding 
principle by citing the Establishment Clause.
  So what really is the Establishment Clause? Within our Constitution, 
the Establishment Clause was created to protect American citizens 
against religious persecution, so that the government would not impose 
one religion, the government religion, so that a government or king 
would not impose his own spiritual or personal beliefs.
  The Establishment Clause was not created by our Founding Fathers to 
sterilize this Nation, to not allow this Nation to utter the name of 
God. Just the opposite. The Constitution of the United States of 
America, written by our Founding Fathers, states this clearly in 
Article VII, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and 
eighty-seven.
  So how ridiculous is it that the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals can 
prohibit our teachers and children from reciting the Pledge of 
Allegiance in the public schools of nine western states, when the 
Constitution itself speaks of God?
  Using this perverted logic, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals must 
now find our Constitution unconstitutional. This holding is a new low 
for our Nation, a low that will harm our children.
  A good teacher, Mr. Byron Bolen, who teaches American government in 
Round Valley, Arizona, is concerned that we are undermining our 
national traditions and taking focus away from our Founding Fathers by 
not allowing the real Pledge in our classrooms. He believes this issue 
has become more an issue not of separation of church and state, but an 
issue that directly negates the patriotism that our children need to 
learn towards their country.
  As a teacher in the First District of Arizona, Mr. Bolen asked me how 
far our courts will go to sterilize and remove God from our classroom 
and public places.
  Our Founding Fathers created a Nation based on truth and morality and 
a love for democracy based upon a person's desire to conform to laws 
which they revere. Our good natural tendencies as human beings is to 
repel from evil and to be drawn towards goodness.
  When hippie generation judges impose their own sterile secular 
beliefs on the American people, they are establishing their agnostic 
beliefs on Americans.
  To go one step further, on February 28 the Court of Appeals in the 
Ninth Circuit refused numerous requests by our President, the Congress 
and local school districts to overturn their prior decision.
  Twice now this court has ruled that reciting the real Pledge of 
Allegiance is unconstitutional. Yet in the House of Representatives we 
start our day with the real Pledge of Allegiance. Our institution 
writes and debates our laws only after we recite the real Pledge of 
Allegiance. We must act to allow our children to start their day the 
way we start our day here in the House.
  Therefore, I call upon the Supreme Court to review this case, to 
review it expeditiously, and allow our children to honor our Nation by 
reciting the real Pledge, and let them start their school day the way 
we start our day.

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