New school year, same old scarey propaganda.....

Rex Curry

As an attorney, I am asked if students can be forced to say the pledge of allegiance in government schools. Another school year has started, and it is important to educate children about their right to refuse.

Government schools deserve a failing grade for not teaching students about their right to refuse and about the horrid history of the Pledge. There are still some oddball states where government schools are required by law to begin each day with a robotic chant of the Pledge, after students hear the ringing of a bell, like Pavlov's lapdogs of the state.

Most students never learn that the Pledge's original salute was a straight-armed salute, and it was the origin of the salute of the National Socialist German Workers' Party (Nazis). It is a myth that the salute is an old Roman salute. Most students never see the eye-popping historic photographs. http://members.ij.net/rex/pledge2.html

I am helping in a court case before the U.S. Supreme Court that might restrict farther the government's pushing of the Pledge: Wonschik v. U.S. http://www.supremecourtus.gov/docket/03-10249.htm

Wonschik is bigger news than was the washout case of Elk Grove v. Newdow.

The history of the Pledge is suppressed because it is unlibertarian. The Pledge was written in 1892 by Francis Bellamy, a self-proclaimed National Socialist, who wanted a government takeover of education to produce an "industrial army" (a Bellamy term) for the authoritarian vision in his cousin Edward Bellamy's book "Looking Backward." The Bellamy cousins promoted national socialism worldwide for decades. It resulted in racist and segregated government schools that lasted through WWII into the 1960's, setting a horrid example for hate-spewing groups worldwide.

In the 1930s, the National Socialist German Workers' Party passed laws that required everyone to pledge allegiance, similar to many U.S. laws that have tried to require school children to recite the pledge. Jehovah's Witnesses believed that people who enjoy reciting government pledges are people who worship government. Jehovah's Witnesses were officially banned for refusing to join the raised palm salute of the National Socialist German Workers' Party in schools and at public events. Many of the German Witnesses were imprisoned in concentration camps.

The National Socialist German Workers' Party had adopted the U.S. salute, forced people to perform it, and then state governments in the U.S. followed the National Socialist German Workers' Party in forcing people to perform the salute created by a National Socialist in the U.S.

In the 1940's, Jehovah's Witnesses refused to recite the pledge of allegiance in government schools on the grounds that it constituted worship of government. They hoped for a different response than they had met from the National Socialist German Workers' Party. In 1940, in Minersville School Board v. Gobitas, the Supreme Court ruled that a government school could expel those children for refusing to salute the flag. Three years later (1943), in West Virginia Board of Education v. Barnette the Supreme Court reversed itself and decided that school children may not be forced to stand and salute the flag.

The original Nazi-style salute to the U.S. flag is exposed in startling graphic art with: "All in favor of a Pledge of Allegiance raise your right hand" at http://members.ij.net/rex/pledgewonschik.html

After the Nazi's demonstrated full blown socialism, the U.S. flag salute changed to the modern hand over the heart.

The U.S. pledge of allegiance was written in 1892 by a socialist, to promote socialism in the most socialistic institution -- government schools. The author, Francis Bellamy, belonged to a religious socialist movement known as "Christian Socialism," and belonged to a group known for "Nationalism," whose members wanted the federal government to nationalize most of the American economy. He saw government schools as a means to that end.

The Barnette case held that students cannot be forced to recite the pledge or salute the flag in government schools. One admirable result of the Gobitas case and every Supreme Court case regarding government schools is that many people remove their children from government schools. And that is the real solution to the pledge debate and all other issues: reduce government and remove government from education. The separation of school and state is as important as the separation of church and state.

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Rex Curry is published worldwide as a libertarian and a lawyer with a degree in journalism. http://RexCurry.net is the only site on the internet that collects and displays historic photographs of the original Pledge of Allegiance. Rex collects historic photos that show how socialism has harmed the U.S., and his hobby is also photography and graphic art, displayed on the website. His predecessors helped settle Key West back when Florida's government was virtually non-existent. The Curry Mansion (historic home of Florida's first capitalist millionaire) is still on the local tour.

Rexy@ij.net