UNDER GOD
by
EDWARD CHAVEZ JR.
Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of
Master of Arts
Department of Religious Studies
CASE WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY
August 2014
CASE WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY
SCHOOL OF GRADUATE STUDIES
We hereby approve the thesis/dissertation of
Edward Chavez Jr.
candidate for the degree of Master of Arts.
Committee Chair
William Deal
Committee Member
Peter Haas
Committee Member
Timothy Beal
Committee Member
Mark Turner
Date of Defense
April 29, 2014
*We also certify that written approval has been obtained for any proprietary
material contained therein.
Table of Contents
Introduction
5
Section I: The Pledge of Allegiance of the
United States of America and its History.
8
Section II: The Uses and Meanings of the Word ‘Under.’
15
Section III: A Cognitive Approach to Understanding ‘Under.’
21
Section IV: Cognition and Religion.
27
Section V: Pledging and Intentions.
36
Section VI: Implications.
41
Appendix
47
Bibliography
56
1
List of Tables
Table 1: Linguistic Transformation of the Pledge of Allegiance
32
2
List of Figures
Figure 1:
27
Figure 2, Example 1:
27
Figure 2, Example 2:
27
Figure 2, Example 3:
27
Figure 2, Example 4:
27
Figure 3:
37
Figure 4:
37
Figure 5:
38
Figure 6:
38
3
Under God
Abstract
by
EDWARD CHAVEZ JR.
Since the inception of the Pledge of Allegiance, the government of the United
States of America has had to work with its citizens to define and extrapolate the
meanings found within. When the phrase ‘under God’ was introduced in the 1950s,
discussion was broadened to include the relationship between church and state. In
an effort to understand the meaning behind the oath, this thesis will reach into the
field of cognitive linguistics to show that the wording of the Pledge, specifically the
use of ‘under,’ is ambiguous and as a result ought to be omitted. This thesis explores
each use of the word, honing in on the ideas of subjugation and verticality and
finally shows that the wording has led to an unequal distribution of power within
American society and that the wording of the Pledge voids the oath if the reciter
does not believe in a God.
4
Introduction
“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to
the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible,
with liberty and justice for all.”1
Red Skelton, a popular American entertainer and comedian who flourished in
the middle of the last century, took center stage at CBS Television on January 14,
1969.2 Red, having starred in motion pictures, television shows, and radio
broadcasts, drew attention with a portion of his monologue just days after the Soviet
Union launched two spacecraft, Venera 5 and Venera 6, towards Venus. He began in
normal comedic fashion, discussing his childhood and impersonating one of his
secondary school teachers, Mr. Laswell, pausing to let the audience’s laughter fade. 3
Red then recollected of a time when Mr. Laswell spoke to Red’s seventh grade class
after the class had just finished reciting the Pledge of Allegiance.4 Skelton expressed
that his teacher was aware of the class’s growing indifference toward the Pledge and
in an effort to rejuvenate the children’s appreciation for the oath, Mr. Laswell
offered his view of the Pledge and recited it for the class with notation. 5
Red quoted, as he removed his hat and patriotic music began playing in the
background:
“I: me, an individual, a committee of one. PLEDGE: dedicate all my
worldly goods to give without self-pity. ALLEGIANCE: my love and my
devotion. TO THE FLAG: our standard, Old Glory, a symbol of
freedom. Wherever she waves, there’s respect because your loyalty
Our Flag, (Washington: Joint Committee on Printing, 2007), 45.
Red Skelton, "Pledge of Allegiance," Archive.Org, accessed April 14, 2014,
https://archive.org/details/PledgeOfAllegiance.
3 Ibid.
4 Ibid.
5 Ibid.
1
2
5
has given her a dignity that shouts freedom is everybody's job. OF
THE UNITED: that means that we have all come together. STATES:
individual communities that have united into forty-eight great
states. Forty-eight individual communities with pride and dignity and
purpose all divided with imaginary boundaries, yet united to a
common purpose, and that's love for country. AND TO THE
REPUBLIC: republic, a state in which sovereign power is vested in
representatives chosen by the people to govern. And government is
the people and it's from the people to the leaders, not from the leaders
to the people. FOR WHICH IT STANDS ONE NATION: meaning, so
blessed by God. INDIVISIBLE: incapable of being divided. WITH
LIBERTY: which is freedom and the right of power to live one's own
life without threats or fear or some sort of retaliation. AND JUSTICE:
the principle or quality of dealing fairly with others. FOR ALL: for all,
which means it's as much your country as it is mine.”6
Upon finishing his story, Red invited the children in the audience to recite the Pledge
with him as he rested his hat over his heart while a drum roll sounded. When the
children finished, he added “since I was a small boy, two states have been added to
our country and two words have been added to the Pledge of Allegiance: 'under
God.' Wouldn't it be a pity if someone said, 'That is a prayer,' and that would be
eliminated for schools, too?” The audience applauded, trumpets sounded loudly and
the camera panned out into darkness.7 The Pledge of Allegiance as told by Red
Skelton gained enough popularity to be listed on Billboard’s Hot 100 and has
received numerous awards.8
Red Skelton’s performance and the attention it received indicate an ongoing
debate about the intent of the pledge. The wording of the Pledge of Allegiance of the
United States has raised two objections: the first, which is discussed in Section I, is
Ibid.
Ibid.
8 Wesley Hyatt, "1967-1970: "We Had No Concept of That Show Being Cancelled","
in A Critical History of Television's The Red Skelton Show, 1951-1971 (Jefferson, North
Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2004), 113-114.
6
7
6
that when people recite the oath, they are pledging their allegiance to a flag, which is
an inanimate object. The second is that the reciter invokes God for the nation as a
whole. Early American leaders held that the church and the state should remain
separate such that the government would not endorse a particular religion. Thomas
Jefferson, a founding father and third President of the United States, wrote, “our
rulers can have no authority over such natural rights, only as we have submitted to
them. The rights of conscience we never submitted, we could not submit. We are
answerable for them to our God.”9 Jefferson believed that if government established
or endorsed a particular religion, the acts and measures government could take
against such opponents would be analogous to religious slavery.10 In the current
revision of the Pledge, a phrase exists such that, when uttered, God is invoked. Is this
government taking a stance on religion? Could this be viewed as just the sort of
religious slavery Jefferson warned against?
This thesis analyzes the use of the phrase ‘under God’ found in the Pledge of
Allegiance of the United States of America by providing the history of the Pledge,
giving key uses and meanings of the word ‘under,’ showing how the Pledge
constructs cognitive identities from the key uses, relating the cognitive identities to
religious aspects, and supplying the inferred results of what can be meant when one
recites the Pledge of Allegiance. Ultimately, I will prove, through cognitive
linguistics, that the phrase ought to be removed from the Pledge.
9
Thomas Jefferson, Notes of the State of Virginia (Boston: Lilly and Wait, 1832), 166.
Ibid.
10
7
Section I: The Pledge of Allegiance of the United States of America and its
History.
Lee Canipe, a scholar of religion whose interests extend into American
culture, writes that it was the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 that
reawakened the civil religious spirit in America.11 It is a spirit that has not been seen
since the early 1940s and for a time, there was a staggering sense of unifying
religious nationalism reminiscent of the era the ‘under God’ amendment was
introduced.12 Canipe notes that in August 1942, Congress declared a composition
written by Francis Bellamy fifty years prior, a Baptist Minister from New York, as
the official Pledge of Allegiance of the United States of America.13 As written in the
Youth’s Companion, an American children’s magazine, the Pledge read “I pledge
allegiance to my Flag and to the Republic for which it stands; one nation indivisible,
with liberty and justice for all.”14
In the aftermath of World War II, the United States emerged as the world’s
superpower to be challenged only by the communist nations of the Soviet Union and
China.15 The stage was set for a clash between communism and democracy and
stories of various Allied countries selling secrets regarding weapons of mass
destruction did little to relieve tension.16 This state of national anxiety led to the Red
Lee Canipe, "Under God and Anti-Communist: How the Pledge of Allegiance Got
Religion in Cold War America," Journal of Church and State 45, no. 2 (2003): 305.
12 Ibid.
13 Ibid., 310.
14 “Under God,” Time, May 1954, 101.
15 Canipe, 310.
16 Ibid.
11
8
Scare becoming a common subject of conversation in the home.17 By 1951, the
Roman Catholic men’s fraternity, the Knights of Columbus, began inserting the
phrase ‘under God’ into the Pledge of Allegiance as a way to assert the necessity for
divine guidance in the nation’s affairs.18 By April 1953, the Knights had caught the
attention of Congressman Louis Rabault, a Democrat from Detroit, who began
lobbying for the Knights as he saw religion, specifically the invocation of God, as a
convenient and useful way to resist communism.19
In February 1954, an ‘under God’ amendment was proposed in the Senate,
which was not meant for a specific religious purpose but rather was to be used as an
ideological weapon to combat communism.20 The revised Pledge reflected
Republican Senator Homer Ferguson’s belief that military strength was not
sufficient to defend the U.S. from what he viewed as a communist threat.21 The
thought of the era was that the belief in God highlighted the major difference
between Democracy and Communism.22 Ferguson is quoted in the Congressional
Records of the Senate;
“I believe this modification of the pledge is important because it
highlights one of the real fundamental differences between the free
world and the Communist world, namely, belief in God. Our Nation is
founded on a fundamental belief in God, and the first and most
important reason for the existence of our Government is to protect the
God-given rights of our citizens.”23
Ibid.
Ibid., 314.
19 Ibid., 315
20 Ibid.
21 Ibid., 316.
22 "Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag," Congressional Record 100, sess. 2 (1954): 1600.
23 Ibid.
17
18
9
By June 1954, both the Senate and House of Representatives voted by an
overwhelming majority for the insertion of ‘under God’ into the Pledge of
Allegiance.24 Regarding the ramifications, Matthew Cloud, a Juris Doctor with special
interests in history and political science, asks whether or not the insertion of God
into a national oath is a tolerable acknowledgement of religion or an
unconstitutional act of Cold War propaganda.25
Cloud writes that the constitutionality of the amended Pledge has been
challenged before but most notably through the court cases of Minersville School
District v. Gobitis, West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, and Elk Grove
Unified School District v. Newdow.26 Minersville School District v. Gobitis, a case
emerging in 1938, raised the issue of whether or not requiring students to salute
and recite the Pledge of Allegiance was a violation of religious freedoms that was
supposed to be guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States.27 The school
district required both their students and teachers to salute and recite the flag daily
as a demonstration of their patriotism.28 The issue arose when Gobitis’ children
refused to partake in the demonstration, as “they claimed that it violated their
religious beliefs as Jehovah’s Witnesses.”29 The children were expelled from the
Canipe, 319.
Matthew Cloud, "One Nation, Under God: Tolerable Acknowledgement of Religion
or Unconstitutional Cold War Propaganda Cloaked in American Civil
Religion," Journal of Church and State 46, no. 2 (2004): 311.
26 Ibid., 324-332.
27 Carl Reynolds, "Minersville School District v. Gobitis," BYU Prelaw Review 12, no. 1
(1998): 71.
28 Ibid.
29 Ibid.
24
25
10
district and the father was cited for a truancy violation against the state’s
attendance law.30
When the case appeared in court, the school board argued that the
compulsory salutation was lawful and therefore expulsion was within the scope of
punishment, the expulsion did not violate any rights, that the children’s belief was
unfounded, and that it has no influence on what the students may think of God.31
Gobitis’s argued that forced participation was unconstitutional; the expulsion
questioned whether one was supposed to obey scripture or the government’s
mandate. Gobitis interpreted the school board’s actions as indicating a larger issue
that the government was now able to dictate which religious beliefs were false.
Gobitis also believed that the expulsion and violation stripped him of his liberty and
property without any form of due process.32 The court ruled against Gobitis and the
Jehovah’s Witnesses perspective in defense of compulsory recitation stating that, in
essence, refusing to recite the Pledge of Allegiance was unpatriotic and went against
national unity and security.33
However, in the West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, the
Supreme Court removed compulsory recitation of the nation’s oath in public
schools.34 Brought to the court by a Jehovah’s Witness again, Barnette’s side argued
that the salutation and recitation of the Pledge went against their religious
conviction, as set forth in the biblical book of Exodus, prohibiting them from making
Ibid., 72.
Ibid., 72-73.
32 Ibid., 73-73.
33 Ibid., 74.
34 Canipe, 324.
30
31
11
an oath to an object.35 The case appeared in 1942 before three judges, which
allowed for an immediate appeal to the Supreme Court based on the outcome.36
The judges ruled against compulsory recitation and issued the board a
“permanent injunction prohibiting the state from compelling students to engage in
the flag salute and from expelling students who declined to take part in the flag
salute ceremony.”37 It was deemed that compulsory salutation violated religious
freedom in relation to the First Amendment, which prohibits the United States from
composing a law respecting the establishment of religion, and the Fourteenth
Amendment, which prohibits any law from diminishing any citizen’s right to life,
liberty, or property, without due process.38 Additionally, the Jehovah’s Witnesses,
after the Gobitis trial, saw an increased amount of animosity and argued that the
attacks confirmed that there was a flaw in the ruling in the Gobitis case.39 The
Barnette case did not result in the controversy the Gobitis case did. It was cited in
few later cases until the ‘under God’ addendum came into existence. The revised
Pledge of Allegiance shifted the focus from the issues of salutation and to the
recitation of the Pledge.
The revision of the Pledge changed recitation on a fundamental level. It was
no longer about pledging to a symbol but was now a declaration of faith. Citizens
Ibid.
Warren Sandmann, "West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette," in Free
Speech On Trial: Communication Perspectives on Landmark Supreme Court Decisions,
ed. Richard Parker (Tuscaloosa, Alabama: The University of Alabama Press, 2003),
105.
37 Ibid.,
38 Ibid.
39 Ibid.
35
36
12
were now declaring a relationship with the divine, while simultaneously invoking a
direct connection between the United States of America and God. The contradiction
here is that through recitation, the oath-giver displays a relationship with God, and
yet in the 1960s and as Red Skelton mentions, the government “struck down prayer
recital in public schools.”40 But can the Pledge be viewed as a declaration of faith
post-addition? Moreover, who is to say that it is not a declaration of faith before the
addition? The Pledge, even before the insertion of ‘under God,’ has all the elements
of a declaration; there is a ritualistic tone where all salute a given object and
presuppose faith in country, but it is not until after the insertion that the reciter
presupposes a nation-wide faith in God. It is at that moment, and as I will explain
later, that the reciter transcends the act of patriotism and enters into a spiritual
realm. Is recitation then not a form of worship, and if so, then why is it not deemed
as prayer in schools?
After Barnette, the daily act of pledging allegiance in schools became
standard with little question until September 11, 2001. The events, and those that
followed, of September 11 precipitated the trial of Elk Grove Unified School District v.
Newdow and brought controversy back to light. Newdow, a father, argued that the
recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance in the classroom violated his daughter’s right
to the freedom of religion. Commenting on this case, Cloud points out that the policy
in place during Newdow’s debate was that each class was to recite the Pledge once a
day.41 In short, the question of whether or not forced participation, or required
40
41
Cloud, 331.
Ibid., 332.
13
volunteerism, was contested.42 Cloud points out that perhaps some, but not all,
schoolchildren will object to the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance, making the
utterance of the oath willfully mandatory. This is a contradictory notion that plays
on child psychology and polarizes children into in-groups and out-groups.43
In 2002, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit found that
compulsory recitation of the pledge “violated the Establishment Clause by
impermissibly coercing a religious act.”44 However, in 2004, and in a unanimous
court decision, the Supreme Court voted in favor of Elk Grove Unified School District
for the reversal of the outcome of the Ninth Circuit.45 As a result, the court refused
Newdow’s opinion that he had the freedom to instill his beliefs in his daughter free
from governmental interference.46
Theistic indoctrination through the Pledge problematizes the notion of
patriotism and allows for the questioning of whether or not the government has a
hidden religious agenda. The oath presupposes a belief in God and that the divine
has a relationship with the United States. If the child has no concept of a God from
home, then this idea is implanted at school, which to a child seems to be safe and
truthful environment. However, if the parents, or parent in Newdow’s case, are open
atheists and wish to raise their children in a religiously free or religiously different
environment, then one can see how the Pledge of Allegiance can be more than
Ibid.
Ibid.
44 Charles Russo and Ralph Mawdsley, "Elk Grove Unified School District v.
Newdow," in Christianity, Education, and Modern Society, ed. William Jeynes and
Enedina Martinez (Information Age Publishing, 2007), 93-94.
45 Ibid., 93.
46 Ibid., 99.
42
43
14
problematic. It can be undermining, confusing, and detrimental to a child’s idea of
authority.
Who is right, the parents’ who say one thing or the government, which
dictates another? Regardless of the person’s belief in God, the question becomes
whether or not the government should or should not sponsor a particular religion
or religious belief, especially in a public setting such as a school. But are not the
views of government just the manifestations of the ideologies produced by the
public and the words the public uses? As we will see, the wording of the Pledge,
specifically ‘under God,’ carries with it ambiguity as to what exactly is meant when
one recites the Pledge of Allegiance of the United States of America. Moreover and
hereafter, I will use the word ‘divine’ interchangeably with ‘God’ for diversity and
because if, as the First Amendment suggests, there is to be no law establishing
religion, then God ought to be understood as an encompassing term for all religious
higher powers.
Section II: The Uses and Meanings of the Word ‘Under.’
At least some of the controversy of the Pledge is attributed to linguistic
ambiguity, and as I will show, ‘under’ is an ambiguous word. According to WordNet,
Princeton University’s online lexical database for English, there are ten different
uses for the word ‘under.’47 It can be defined as both an adjective and an adverb and
there are two and eight uses for each, respectively.48 The importance of the
following uses and examples is twofold; the first is to enhance the reader's
"WordNet," Princeton University, accessed October 30, 2013,
wordnetweb.princeton.edu.
48 Ibid.
47
15
understanding of the word and show just how diverse ‘under’ is, the second is to
construct a foundation for the argument and set the parameters by which the term
‘under’ will be analyzed.
The first use, which can be found in the Appendix, defines ‘under’ as eliciting
a profound sense of covering or existing beneath a given object or area. By
representing the nation as being covered, below, or beneath a spiritual being, a
spatial dynamic is created. In contrast, by representing the nation as being of a
different status or in a different state, a social hierarchy is structured. In the former,
there is a nation, or body of people, below the divine that exists in a realm located in
the universe, whereas in the latter, the nation is of a lower class or viewed
differently as a result of its perceived state.
A close review of the uses and meanings offered by WordNet49 reveals that
the use of the word ‘under’ in the Pledge of Allegiance is neither an adjective nor an
adverb but rather a prepositional phrase used as an adjective. Cognitive linguistic
Mark Turner parses ‘under God’ in the phrase ‘one nation under God’ as an
adjectival prepositional phrase as it describes which nation or which kind of
nation.50 He notes that ‘one nation’ is an appositive to ‘the republic for which it
stands’ and as a result ‘under God’ cannot be an adverb as it does not modify
‘pledge’ or ‘stands’, which are the only two verbs within the Pledge.51 Unless there is
some clear phrasing indicating how or where the flag stands, ‘under God’ remains an
adjectival prepositional phrase.
See Appendix.
Mark Turner, e-mail message regarding ‘under’, January 15, 2014.
51 Ibid.
49
50
16
WordNet displays the diversity and ambiguity of ‘under’ as it lists a variety of
meanings and uses of the word even though it does not concern the precise part of
speech we are looking to analyze. Thus, WordNet is still relevant even if the site only
lists adverbial and adjectival uses for ‘under.’ The lexicographers for the database
openly admit to only including “open-class words” such as nouns, verbs, adjectives,
and adverbs.52 This means that adjectival prepositional phrases, like ‘under,’ as well
as determiners, pronouns, conjunctions, particles, and other varieties of
prepositions, are excluded from WordNet.53 But again, it is the meaning of the word
that we are focused on analyzing, and for this purpose, WordNet offers a set of uses
that fits what I set out to do.
I will explicate all uses of ‘under’ listed through WordNet in the Appendix.
Moreover, I will also include discussion of ‘under’ from the Oxford English
Dictionary and American Heritage Dictionary in the Appendix to clarify the history
and meanings of ‘under.’ Here, I will focus my argument heavily on Uses 6 and 9, as
they are the most pertinent to the argument.
Use 6: (Adverb) Under: in/into a state of subordination or subjugation.54
Use 6 describes ‘under’ as used to identify a person, place, or thing as a
subordinate or subjugated in some way, shape, or form.55 The prime examples for
such a use elicit the idea of control, as in, ‘get the car under control’ or ‘get your kid
under control,’ but it is not limited to just this. Additionally, as raised by Turner, one
"Frequently Asked Questions: Database," Princeton University, accessed November
1, 2013, http://wordnet.princeton.edu/wordnet/frequently-asked-questions.
53 Ibid.
54 “WordNet”.
55 “WordNet”.
52
17
can be under the banner of a certain nation-state or even under the protection of a
given government.56 Regardless though, these two uses still fall within the bounds of
use 6, as there exists a degree, no matter how minuscule, of subordination required
to fight under or to be protected by a person or system.
Additionally, pledging to a god implies giving god authority. This sets up the
ordering of a social hierarchy where the divine is presumably a higher rank, if not
the highest rank, of celestial beings, as raised in Uses 4 and 7. This suggests that
there may be other beings out there beside god. These beings may be more powerful
that god or it may be that god is the most powerful. By the rubric of Catholic
theology, as the ‘under God’ amendment came from a Catholic organization, there
exists God, angels, demons, and the souls of saints and the souls of humans.57 It is up
to God then to issue the orders or dole the punishments to humanity, the souls of
humans, the angels, and the demons, as God sees fit. Moreover, this means that
humanity is no longer a part of just human affairs; humanity is raised to the celestial
level in that mankind fights God's battles and may or may not join in God's
successes. Mankind may also submit, consciously or unconsciously, to forces meant
to undermine God's authority and as a result can be seen as a manipulable and
pliable force. But for the sake of discussion, let the parameters be limited to focus on
just the relationship between the United States and God sans the celestial court.
Mark Turner, "Cognitive Linguistics Theory I" (Lecture, Cleveland, OH, November
25, 2013).
57 Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church (Washington, D.C.: USCCB
Publishing, 2006).
56
18
As ‘one nation under God’, there is more connoted than just a simple division
in rank. The notion of power is also applicable in this situation. By pledging to God,
one assigns the divine power. Is there an extent to how much power God is given
though? Are Americans able to take power back? Or does the act of pledging void
any possibility of future self-governance? Once again returning to Jefferson, at what
point would this subjugation be considered religious slavery? Probing further, who
would be in violation, a God or the government? Government is the entity that
propagated the need for God in the first place.
Use 9: (Adverb) Under: down below.58
Use 9, as exemplified by ‘get under quickly,’ functions as a direct command
more than a statement. This can be applied to many situations. For example, for
primary and secondary schools, in the event of a tornado, students are instructed to
shield themselves under their desks. In the event of rain, some are instructed to get
under an umbrella or overhang. In the event of the cold, one may even be instructed
to get under the blankets. Central to these examples and in the Pledge is the
construction of a location oriented spatial system.
Returning to the relationship between God and man, God is presumed to be
watching over the earth, though this does not necessarily mean that the divine is
protecting Earth. God may see the day-to-day actions of the beings on this planet
and do nothing to interfere or it may be that the divine is so far above humanity that
God is unaware of human presence altogether. Much like the sun disappears once it
passes under the horizon, so too may humanity disappear as a result of distance or
58
WordNet.
19
location. God may cease remember our existence without some form of object
permanence. There is simultaneously a real relationship with God as well as a giving
and a taking from this relationship. As a result, there must be some spatial
proximity.
In order to respond to the possible objection that proximity and the existence
of god may not be required, I will examine the Pledge as it currently stands. To
begin, let us first look to the Pledge as given by the government. The government
acknowledges that it is one nation under God, (and note that the divine is named
with a capitalized G, not a lowercase g.) This implies two notions, that there exists a
divine being, and that the government is referring to a specific deity. In the former,
Gilles Fauconnier, a cognitive linguist, writes that the mere naming of a given idea
implies its existence.59 The idea of God is conceptualized and entrenched into
human thought essentially giving life to Him.60 Similarly, St. Thomas Aquinas, an
early Church philosopher and theologian, made the argument in his Summa
Theologica that, with less technical jargon and cognitive reasoning than Fauconnier,
God exists because the word ‘God’ exists.61
Given the capitalization of ‘God’ by the government; ‘God’ is denoting a
particular divine being. God in the Pledge stems from the Knights of Columbus who
employ Aquinas’s proof to not only strengthen their convictions but also ground
their belief system. Regardless of war or terror, the Knights remain steadfast in their
Gilles Fauconnier, Mappings in Thought and Language (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2003), 21-22.
60 Ibid.
61 Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica: Volume I - Part I (New York: Cosimo Inc.,
2007), 11.
59
20
beliefs, but what of the nation? Per the logic of Aquinas and Fauconnier, the Pledge
imposes the truth of the existence of God by its specific inclusion and continued use
of the phrase ‘under God.’ As a result, the issue Newdow and others have had with
the Pledge since the Pledge’s last revision in 1954 is the use of the word ‘God.’ Why
is ‘under’ important then if the burden lies with the use of God? ‘Under’ is crucial to
understanding how God fits into the equation. Due to the ambiguity of the word, it
elicits a variety of meanings, and ultimately relationships Americans are able to
have with the divine. When pledging my allegiance, I may have a much different
intention in mind than someone who is pledging next to me. It is for this reason that
‘under’ is crucial to the conversation. What does it mean to pledge allegiance if
people may be pledging with different beliefs?
Section III: A Cognitive Approach to Understanding ‘Under.’
Human language has a unique capacity to deliver multiple meanings and
concepts in a single word. Each of the aforementioned uses stems from a different
thought process and, when uttered, provokes a new frame. Frames being the way
we mentally represent and categorize experiences, depending on the context in
which it is used. What follows are some of the cognitive theories that can be
identified and applied to Uses 6 and 9. Again, this is not to say that these are the only
theories that exist from this series of uses, but rather, given the scope these are the
most useful in order to understand the way ‘under’ is used in the Pledge.
Use 6: (Adverb) Under: in/into a state of subordination or subjugation.
In the 2012, Marvel Studios released The Avengers, a movie designed to
showcase many of Marvel’s superhero’s working together to save the world from
21
Loki, a legend of Norse mythology and brother to Thor. There is a line in The
Avengers that highlights what ‘under’ illustrates in use 6. In the movie, Loki speaks
to a crowd he has silenced as they begin, slowly, to kneel before him. He states, “Is
not this simpler? Is this not your natural state? It’s the unspoken truth of humanity,
that you crave subjugation. The bright lure of freedom diminishes your life’s joy in a
mad scramble for power, for identity. You were made to be ruled. In the end, you
will always kneel.”62 Do humans feel a pull towards subjugation? Are we sheep who
desire being led? And if so, why do humans feel so inclined to a lifestyle that
seemingly goes against the social standard, that is, to garner success and lead others
into the future.
In situations of subjugation and subordination, there exist states of
opposition and force, which allows for interesting interpretations when applying
force dynamic thought. Leonard Talmy, a cognitive linguist, writes that force
dynamics are “how entities interact with respect to force.” 63 Within the frame of
force dynamics, there are notions of exertion, resistance, overcoming force(s),
blocking, and the removal of the blockage. 64 Talmy goes on to discuss that he bases
his method within the idea that language uses fundamental notional categories to
The Avengers, directed by Joss Whedon (2012; Burbank, CA: Marvel Studios,
2012), DVD.
63 Leonard Talmy, "Force Dynamics in Language and Cognition," in Toward a
Cognitive Semantics (Cambridge, MA: MIT, 2000), 409.
64 Ibid.
62
22
structure and organize meaning. 65 He compares the way the language behind force
dynamics organize notions of psychology and physics in mental spaces.66
Talmy writes that there is a steady state of opposition between two forces
underlying all force dynamic patterns.67 In steady-state opposition there is an
agonist and an antagonist where the agonist is the entity of focal force and the
antagonist is the element of force that opposes the agonist.68 In Talmy’s force
dynamic diagrams, each entity and element is given a visual representation. The
agonist is represented as a circle, whereas the antagonist is represented as a
concave figure.69 Each entity and element has an intrinsic tendency towards either
action or rest.70 Intrinsic tendencies, too, can be represented visually according to
Talmy. Intrinsic force tendencies toward action are represented by the
mathematical greater than symbol.71 Intrinsic force tendencies toward rest, then,
are represented by a bolded dot.72
In steady-state opposition, opposing forces have relative strength. Language
dictates that the entity manifests its tendency and if it is able to overcome the
opposing force, then the entity is stronger.73 Conversely, if the entity manifests its
tendency and is overcome by the opposing force, then the entity is weaker. Being
part of the force dynamic diagram, strength is also represented visually through
Ibid., 410.
Ibid., 411.
67 Ibid., 413.
68 Ibid.
69 Ibid., 414.
70 Ibid.
71 Ibid.
72 Ibid.
73 Ibid.
65
66
23
symbols. The stronger entity is represented by the mathematical positive symbol
whereas, as will be used here for clarity, the weaker entity is represented by the
mathematical negative symbol.74
As is dictated by their relative strengths, the opposing force entities yield a
resultant. Therefore, the resultant of the force interaction is either a call to action or
rest.75 Like the force tendencies, resultants are represented in the same manner as
the tendencies but stricken through and placed beneath the agonist.76 There also
exists a shifting-state force dynamic pattern, which is in contrast to the steady-state
model, where an entity may either enter or leave a state of impingement causing the
resultant to change.77 This is represented in the same visual manner with the
exception of the resultant. The resultant would appear, in a shifting-state pattern,
below the agonist, as before, but with a slash on the resultant line separating the
before and after states of activity.78 While resultants are significant, it is the
connection between agonist and antagonist that is most important. There are
routine and unavoidable interpretations that come from the use of ‘under’ and I will
supplement this idea with diagrams and close analysis after applying them to the
‘under God’ discussion.
Use 9: (Adverb) Under: down below.
In reading the force dynamic language of Use 6, the reader may find that
certain words and wording elicit a mapping, with a degree of motion, in mental
Ibid
Ibid.
76 Ibid., 415.
77 Ibid., 417.
78 Ibid.
74
75
24
spaces due to their motive nature. An image-schema, as Mark Johnson, philosopher
and cognitive linguist, writes, “is a recurring, dynamic pattern of our perceptual
interactions and motor programs that gives coherence and structure to our
experience.”79 A verticality schema, then, “emerges from our tendency to employ an
UP-DOWN orientation in picking out meaningful structures of our experience.”80 He
notes that humans utilize the verticality schema thousands of times per day, in
activities such as standing, perceiving trees and tall buildings, and even in “forming
a mental image of a flagpole”.81
As it pertains to language, verticality schemas manifest in what Johnson and
his associate, George Lakoff, a cognitive linguist, title orientational metaphors.
Orientational metaphors exist as a subset of structural metaphors, that is, in
situations “where one concept is metaphorically structured in terms of another.”82
In contrast, Lakoff and Johnson define orientational metaphors as metaphorical
concepts that organize a system or systems of concepts with respect to each other.83
The vast majority of orientational metaphors involve spatial orientation such as UPDOWN.84 UP-DOWN orientations, as well as IN-OUT, FRONT-BACK, and others,
Mark Johnson, preface to The Body in the Mind: The Bodily Basis of Meaning,
Imagination, and Reason (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987), xiv.
80 Ibid.
81 Ibid
82 George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, "Orientational Metaphors," in Metaphors We
Live By (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1980), 14.
83 Ibid.
84 Ibid.
79
25
occur as a result of physical and cultural experiences and can vary depending on
specific cultural contexts.85
Lakoff and Johnson provide ten instances of verticality, or UP-DOWN
orientations, but note that these instances are suggestive rather than definitive.86
They write that:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
happy is up whereas sad is down
conscious is up whereas unconscious is down
health and life are up whereas sickness and death are down
having control or force is up whereas being subject to control and
force is down
more is up whereas less is down
foreseeable future events are up
high status is up whereas low status is down
good is up whereas bad is down
virtue is up whereas depravity is down
rational is up whereas emotional is down
unknown is up whereas known is down.87
The discussion of orientational metaphor is key to the discussion of the
spatial orientation of the divine, but it is also dynamic because it seeks to identify
the physical bases of the social uses of ‘under.’ Moreover, orientational metaphor
will aid in the discussion of and enhance the application of force dynamic patterns
as they erect spatial diagrams to extrapolate meaning; orientational metaphors
further extrapolate meaning from the spatial pairing.
Ibid.
Ibid.
87 Ibid., 14-20.
85
86
26
Section IV: Cognition and Religion.
Use 6: (Adverb) Under: in/into a state of subordination or subjugation.
Roles must now be assigned to the objects in the force dynamics. For the first
steady-state dynamic, let the agonist represent the United States of America and the
antagonist represent the divine, or in this case, God. This is diagrammed visually in
Figure 1. The United States is represented by the circle on the right and God as the
concave figure on the left. With respect to force tendencies, the United State can
either act or rest. For Figure 1, the intrinsic force tendency of the United States will
be to rest whereas the divine will wish to act. This situation, with the United States
as agonist and God as antagonist, can be represented a total number of four ways. In
Figure 1, the United States rests but it may or may not be strong enough to
overcome the divine exertion towards action. Moreover, the United States may in
fact wish to act when God wishes to rest. Some situations may arise when God has
the power to quell the United States actions and others when the divine stands
powerless and is overcome. These different patterns have different outcomes and
can be seen visually in Figures 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, and 2.4
27
.
What do these diagrams represent? Force dynamic patterns allow for the
mapping of ideas. Take, for instance, our four examples above. Use 6 of ‘under’ does
not mean that the subjugator is omnipotent and can stop the subjugated or
subordinated every time, though many would like to think the opposite is true of the
divine. Take, for instance, Andy Dufrane from Shawshank Redemption.88 He is a
prisoner serving a life sentence who decides that he has had enough and plans to
liberate himself.89 Surely Andy is subject to the wishes of the people, prison, and
warden after being convicted but that does not mean that they can prevent him
from escaping. The same thought holds true for the United State and God. Though
God may try to motivate or deter the United States, God may not always have the
necessary strength.
In Figure 2, Example 1, the United States wishes to rest but is being acted
upon by a much stronger force willing the nation to act. As a result the nation acts
but not of its own volition. The United States can then attribute its action to God. An
example of this has already been laid out above, where there was no real need to
insert ‘under God’ into the Pledge of Allegiance but some thought, as though divinely
inspired, that God was willing the nation to provide resistance to Communism and
that God should be at the forefront of the impending altercation. The resultant was
that the divine was included in the Pledge and the nation is God's subordinate.
In Figure 2, Example 2, one finds the divine wishing to act but unable to find
Shawshank Redemption, directed by Frank Darabont (1994; Burbank, CA: Warner
Home Video 2007), DVD.
89 Ibid.
88
28
the necessary strength to motivate action in the United States. As I will outline in
greater detail later, this is particularly applicable in relation to war. When a nation
hears about treacherous acts and conquest, what is to be done? Early in World War
II, the United States was hesitant to become involved with the global affairs of the
moment. It was not until the attack on Pearl Harbor occurred that war was
imminent for the United States. But what if the attack on Pearl Harbor never
happened? Would the United States have continued to sit under the guise of
neutrality especially given the catastrophic loss of life? The United States had
sufficient power then to help combat injustices but remained uninvolved until the
fighting was literally brought home.
Many use the Bible as a way to advocate pacifism, but similarly, another
interpretation of the Bible may support violence if it used to defend the persecuted.
In this particular instance, no one can easily claim that God wanted or did not want
the United States to join the war, but if there was such a fight that called for the
attention and aid of the United States and the nation disregarded such a threat, it
could be represented visually using force dynamics. The resultant would be a call to
rest, but what are the bigger implications of not taking action? Would it be sinful to
God for not having stopped the persecution of innocent? Would there be an
expectation for some form of divine retribution or at the very least fear of judgment
for having not acted?
In Figure 2, Example 3, the reader finds the United States wishing to act but
unable to find the necessary strength to overcome the divine's will to rest. Though it
is a simplified version of the argument, Newdow’s trial is a relatable example.
29
Newdow desired to change the way government, and ultimately Americans viewed
and recited the Pledge. He continued to be a supporter against the phrase ‘under
God’ but in the end was unable to change the minds of those who have the ability to
revise the Pledge. Regardless of how much Newdow desired to try and act, the
divine will to rest overcame Newdow’s effort. The resultant of the situation happens
to be then that though the Newdow wished to change the wording through action,
God's will to rest and remain overcame him.
In Figure 2, Example 4, the reader finds the divine wishing to rest but a much
stronger force whose desire is to act is acting it upon. At the turn of the century, the
United States was caught up in a war that became very unpopular to the American
people. Some began referring to the War on Terror as the War of Terror, a war for
the acquisition of oil, and a meaningless waste of American life. Many used the Bible
again to support the war effort, but more and more are using it a means to talk
about pacifism and nonviolence. The result of such thinking gained much traction
but has been unable to gain enough popularity to end the war abroad. The resultant
for such a diagram is action and has the same implications as example 2. The United
States can be perceived as going against God's will and as a result may fall out of
favor with God. Worse, the United States may even be guilty of breaking the second
of God's laws for man: the prohibition against using the lord’s name in vain.
Looking back to the history of the Pledge of Allegiance, the reader may
notice that God is not mentioned in earlier revisions of the Pledge. This changes the
diagram completely. The subject of the Pledge then becomes "I". "I" is pledging their
allegiance to a flag that is unassociated with God. When applying the Pledge then, "I"
30
would stand as the antagonist while the United States would come to be analogous
as the agonist. Initially it would require a group of people the create forces that
would allow for the creation of a nation. There is no other entity mentioned or
referenced in this early form and as a result there is nothing else to include. In
Figure 3 the representation for such a situation looks very similar to Figure 1, but
here there is opposition between the self and the country and not the country and
the divine. There are similar examples but they would lack any frames alluding to
sin or the divine and would merely represent the ongoing struggle between citizen
and state.
Use 9: (Adverb) Under: down below.
Through the lens of image schemas, three words emerge in the Pledge of
Allegiance that carry with them a degree of action. They are easily identifiable using
orientational metaphors instead of force dynamics. These words are ‘pledge,’ ‘stand’
and ‘indivisible.’ A fourth word, ‘under,’ may not immediately elicit action, but is
pertinent to the discussion of force and held within motive frames. We must first
dissect and restructure the Pledge of Allegiance in order to understand and apply
schematic theory. This feat has garnered little, if any, interest outside of what to add
or remove or how to better implement the Pledge in American life.
From the outset, viewing the Pledge of Allegiance of the United States of
America it appears as though words were inserted and excised without taking into
consideration the clarity of the structure. The reader can observe this in the
conversation regarding adjectival prepositional phrases. As a result, the meaning of
31
the Pledge is lost, or at the least unclear. Table 1 seeks to utilize linguistic
transformations for the purpose of clarifying the oath.
Table 1.
P0
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to
the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible,
with liberty and justice for all.
P1
I pledge allegiance: to the republic for which the flag of the U.S.A.
stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for
all.
P2
I pledge allegiance: to one nation under God for which the flag of the
U.S.A. is a symbol of, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
P3
I pledge allegiance: to one indivisible nation indivisibly beneath God
for which the flag of the U.S.A. is a symbol of, with liberty and justice
for all.
Pf
I pledge allegiance: to the flag of the United States of America, which
stands for universal liberty and justice and one indivisible nation
indivisibly beneath God.
Analyzing the table, the current revision of the Pledge of Allegiance is listed
as P0, which represents the initial form of the Pledge; it is the starting point and
foundation for this transformation. The current revision is used in place of previous,
or even the first, revisions. The reason for this is that the notion of orientational
metaphor in this thesis revolves around the use of ‘under,’ which was not instated
until sixty years ago. During the first transformation, from P0 to P1, there are three
steps taken; the first is that “I pledge allegiance” was removed via a colon as it is
essential to the oath and does not change from Pledge initial to Pledge final, that is,
from P0 to Pf. The second is that “it” was removed. When reciters gives the oath, they
pledge not only to the flag, but also to the republic for which the flag stands.
Therefore, real allegiance is being pledged to the republic, as the republic is able to
32
accept commitment whereas a flag cannot. Third, the United States of America was
abbreviated to U.S.A., in order to shift the focus of the statement to the flag instead
of the country.
In the second transformation, the “republic” is replaced by “one nation under
God”. Through the given language, the reader can view that both “one nation under
God” and “indivisible” are descriptors of the republic and not the flag. It seems also
that “one nation under God” is placed after the phrase regarding the republic as a
way for either the government or its citizens to define what the republic is. In the
third transformation, the meaning of “indivisible”, an adjective, is applied to both
“one nation” and “under God”. Due to the language, it is unclear whether the “one
nation”, “under God”, or both, is being described as indivisible. Moreover, in order
for the oath to be comprehensive and maintain the meaning of the Use 9, “under”
was replaced with “beneath”.
All three of these transformations culminate into the final revised form of the
Pledge. It begins as in P0 with “I pledge allegiance” and is followed by “to the flag of
the United States of America”. The U.S.A. was unabridged as a way to return to some
of the original language used. Additionally, “to the flag” was returned to its P0
position as there is precedent, seen in the Gobitis and Barnette cases, that when
uttered, the reciter is pledging to a flag, not a republic, or a nation. Moreover, this
flag is a symbol, which “stands” for two ideals. The first is that the flag is a
representation of the nation’s desire for universal liberty and justice, or as it was
written in P0, “liberty and justice for all”. The second then is that the flag “stands” for
“one indivisible nation indivisibly beneath God”. The importance of such a
33
transformation is twofold; the first is to untangle the knotted language used and
derive a form less open to interpretation, the second is to show how and where
exactly the flag “stands”. A reciter may garner clarity from recitation, but rarely if
the Pledge simplified for reflection. The Pledge’s meaning is hidden
Two examples of verticality emerge in Pf. The first is the idea of a flag standing,
which elicits an UP connotation as, according to Lakoff and Johnson, humans often
lay horizontally to sleep whereas when they are awake, they often stand, or are
vertical.90 In contrast, the nation is not only permanently tethered to the divine, but
exists beneath God. In this portion, the Pledge elicits a DOWN orientation. This UPDOWN dichotomy highlights a fundamental flaw that connects schematic theory
with the subjugation of American citizens. However, to recognize the flaw, the
reader must first understand interpretation and power.
Language, understanding, and understanding language are vital in the
interpretation of any set of data, especially when the interpreted data is so tightly
nested within power relationships and politics. In the case of the Pledge of
Allegiance, specific interpretations and even specific linguistic choices are used to
justify actions, thoughts and perspectives and ultimately to legitimize certain
hierarchies. Any act of interpretation of the Pledge of Allegiance is necessarily
ideological.
Over the last sixty years, newer generations of Americans have experienced the
day-to-day recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance in schools across the country. They,
and Newdow as an example, may interpret that the language the United States is
90
Lakoff and Johnson, 15.
34
pushing is Christian, or at the very least monotheistic. The interpretation then is
that the government has a religious agenda and is forcing this agenda on children
and imposing unconstitutional values on peoples across the board.
According to the New York Times, the government in the past has said that
‘under God’ and many other seemingly overt religious symbols are just that,
symbols.91 The Bush Administration acknowledged such symbols as a patriotic part
of America’s religious past, that religious monotheists founded the United States and
these representations of U.S.’s founding pose no threat to the supposed separation
of the Church and state.92 But even though they may have said one thing, another
idea may have been implied. Even President Eisenhower acknowledged such
symbols in an open letter to the Knights of Columbus in 1954, writing, “these words
will remind Americans that despite our great physical strength we must remain
humble. They will help us to keep constantly in our minds and hearts the spiritual
and moral principles which alone give dignity to man, and upon which our way of
life is founded.”93 However, the government’s interpretation must answer what
exactly is being approximated, how the ideology is being translated, and to whom
the interpretation is acceptable. If it fails to answer these three questions, then it
fails as an interpretation. While the Bush Administration addressed what was being
approximated and how it was being translated, it inaccurately supposed for whom
which group the interpretation would be acceptable. It is highly unlikely that
Linda Greenhouse, "One Crucial Issue in Pledge Case: What Does 'Under God'
Mean?," New York Times, Mar. 22, 2004.
92 Ibid.
93 Dwight D. Eisenhower, letter to Supreme Knight Luke E. Hart, August 6, 1954.
http://www.kofcmuseum.org/en/resources/Pledge_Allegiance.pdf
91
35
anyone who accepts such a Pledge would ask for an interpretation of why ‘under
God’ is acceptable.
Power, like ideology, is challenged and resisted through interpretations,
through understandings, through language. Philosopher and theorist Louis
Althusser writes that the “realities of the class struggle are ‘represented’ by ‘ideas’,
which are ‘represented’ by word”.94 These ideologies are tools of understanding and
awareness.95 Ideologies, in regards to politics, are used as “weapons, explosives or
tranquilizers and poisons”.96 Conflicts may even be summarized as the argument of
one ideology against another.97 And depending on which ideology survives the
conflict, power is attributed to the believer who comes out victorious.
Section V: Pledging and Intentions.
Use 6: (Adverb) Under: in/into a state of subordination or subjugation.
Through the years, the United States of America has seen a shift in the ways it
delineates enemy and ally. Like the weather, there is a constant changing of powers
that enter and leave states of pressure. Restating shifting-state force dynamic
patterns, these diagrams map entities that either enter or leave a state of
impingement. The diagrammed representation is the same visually with an
augmented resultant. History, including the history of the Pledge of Allegiance, can
be depicted as a shifting-state force dynamic pattern. It began as is seen in Figure 3
with the introduction of the nation and then the Pledge by man and evolved to
Louis Althusser, Lenin and Philosophy and Other Essays (New York: Monthly
Review Press, 1971), 8.
95 Ibid.
96 Ibid.
97 Ibid.
94
36
include the divine when man faced an ideology that threatened his way of life. This
too can be represented visually.
Focusing again on the United States as the agonist and the divine as the
antagonist, there are any number of examples that can be chosen to represent the
different opposing dynamics that the United States and divine have had, are having,
and will have. Therefore, it is necessary to focus purely on the diagram and the
implications for the future as the future has yet to take shape. In Figure 4, one can
see the agonist on the right; to the left, the antagonist enters as under God is inserted
into the Pledge. Beneath the agonist there is the resultant line that can contain the
resultant resting then acting, acting then resting, resting and the continuation of
resting, and acting and the continuation of acting depending on the force tendencies
of the agonist and antagonist and their relative strengths. Here, I use the resultant
line as a temporal space holder to demonstrate its transitioning nature.
37
No one knows what the future will hold for humanity, but in this era of
change, where the media can report on stories happening across the globe as the
news is breaking, ideologies and beliefs are spreading at an incredible pace. As can
be seen in Figure 2, Example 4, the United States is already at war with foreign
countries and foreign religions at that. It is not hard to imagine an Islamic State
entering the scene and playing antagonist to a predominantly Christian American
agonist, represented visually in Figure 5. What then? As a result of the insertion of
under God in the Pledge of Allegiance it is no longer a war of nation-states but an
ideological war of religions, both invoking their portrayal of the divine and fighting
for religious influence to influence the other.
To what end should this continue? Should the United States fight regardless
of what every citizen pledges or should the United States take note of what is
happening in the global political realm and adapt to avoid theological conflict? As
was stated above, under God was once inserted to the Pledge of Allegiance, is it
beyond removal or is it a feat that with sufficient force can be reversed? If it were
taken out America would lose its antagonist and then what would be left, the United
States opposing the “I”s yet again? Or would another belief, demonstrated by Figure
6 and like communism, come and take its place, binding national thought with selfidentity securing and preserving the American way for generations to come?
38
Use 9: (Adverb) Under: down below.
Figure 6 gives a clear illustration of an UP-DOWN schema, where God is going
UP into the unknown and the unknown is coming DOWN for the United States to
come to know. Moreover, this future ideology is located at the top of the diagram,
which, as Lakoff and Johnson note, exemplifies the theory that foreseeable future
events are UP. And herein lies the problem, the flaw that took so much background
information to arrive at; this future ideology is both UP and DOWN, much like the
under God portion of the Pledge of Allegiance. Given Pf, the flag stands beneath God.
The flag is both UP and DOWN and the meaning is contextual depending on how the
wording is written and by whom the wording is written by.
If the flag is UP, then everyone is happy and content and living in unity with
God. We are conscious, healthy citizens who have control over our country and can
clearly see into the stream of future events. We are a good, virtuous, and rational
nation ready to take on the unknowns the world has to offer. We are united through
a common theme and sentiment and all align as the government suggests it ought to.
However, if we look at the converse, the flag is after all under God. As a result, we
are subjects and subjugated by the will of God. We are sick, depraved citizens
headed down a path of death and destruction. We are unconsciously led down a
path by government where we have less freedom of choice and exist as a lower
status to government officials. Discussion of interpretation and power are necessary
if this information is to be dissected and in order to dissect the information, we must
return to the history of the Pledge of Allegiance.
39
Returning to ideological theory, American citizens fall into one of three
camps, those who support the Pledge, those who oppose the Pledge in some facet,
and those who are indifferent. Little can be gleaned from those apparently
indifferent given that they do not voice their opinion. The argument then reduces to
which side holds the best and most persuasive interpretation of the meaning of the
Pledge. In the trials of Gobitis, Barnette and Newdow, the argument is that there is
something implicitly invasive about this national oath. They have interpreted that
the Pledge trespasses on their right to the freedom of religion. However, it was also
argued by the courts, and senators at the time ‘under God’ was introduced, that it
was for the good of the nation and that those who oppose the Pledge are
misunderstanding the true meaning, and as a result, are misinterpreting.
The group that was able to successfully push for the inclusion of under God
seated themselves atop the social hierarchy. They were joined by their supporters
and have continued to exist as the dominant class legitimated by the detractors
inability to successfully remove the addendum. Even in such language, the dominant
class is UP whereas those who do not support them are DOWN, under their rule and
under God.
40
Section VI: Implications.
Having given uses and shown the cognitive and religious aspects of each, the
reader can see that by using the word ‘under,’ the statement is rather vague and
ambiguous unless context is given. When ‘under’ is uttered in the Pledge of
Allegiance in context of the Pledge’s history, the reciter may understand that the U.S.
has God’s protection. However, this history of the Pledge is not common knowledge.
What then in the general public to say? Do they continue in the tradition set forth
during the Cold War era or do they review, edit, and establish a new tradition for
future generations?
There are three possible paths that may lead to a solution for this dilemma.
The first is to do nothing. The second is to review the Pledge of Allegiance and to
edit the segment, interjecting wording that is clearer and more accurately portrays
what U.S. citizens believe about their relationship to the divine. Or, third, are
Americans to remove the segment altogether?
An examination of the first path might indicate that the wording is fitting,
that the Pledge of Allegiance is delightfully ambiguous and that ambiguity reflects
the varied perceptions and beliefs the nation has with the divine. Such a position
would assure, however, serious pushback against a Pledge that includes ‘God’ as a
central term. Moreover, unless the supporters of this path vocalize their opinions
regarding this option, the nation will continue to recite an ambiguous Pledge as well
as the issues linked to the vow directed at a flag. This path may lead to the
development of a new tradition as well as mitigate some of the political tensions
currently dividing the nations. In the future, should issues of citizen loyalty emerge,
41
the Pledge will again likely be scrutinized. Moreover, if Americans leave the Pledge
as is, sooner or later someone with some public visibility may begin to ask what
exactly it is the government seeks with a mandate tied to the Pledge.
The variety of symbolic phenomena linking the divine to government is
staggering, but only the Pledge forces citizens to vocalize a belief in God. Through
vocalization, the Pledge forces citizens to either pledge their allegiance or do
nothing while others offer their allegiance causing an in-group and out-group
dynamic. Those who do are seen as patriots and as proponents of national unity,
whereas those who do not are seen as opponents and dissenters of the American
way. There are other more subtle symbols and rituals put in place but the
government but those who recite the Pledge only notice those who believe they
have a choice to opt out of the Pledge ritual.
Exploring the implications of the capitalist economy on the Pledge of
Allegiance may also offer a new perspective. The United States thrives on the buying
and selling of goods and yet every form of tangible American currency contains the
words “In God We Trust” yet again presupposing a belief in the divine and forcing
the salesperson or buyer into accepting this phrase. Whereas there is an ownership
regarding voice and uttering oaths, nonverbal actions often go unnoticed.
While it may be unwise to boycott currency in an attempt to change the
system, the government will not stop someone from choosing not to use money.
However, if a protester refuses to recite and salute the flag during the Pledge, then
the protester will garner attention. The insertion of God on American coinage is
coercive and forces the question of where the Establishment Clause’s boundary lies.
42
Even if there is no punishment, other than poverty, for those who refuse to use
money that names God, the lack of punishment, like those who refuse to pledge face,
still leads to the establishment of religion. If there is to be change in the system, then
this change has to start from a reasonable point. If the pledge is left as is, then all
symbols and rituals will be left as is.
Proponents of the ‘under God’ addition attained power. The warding off of
communism legitimated this power and the addition of ‘under God’ legitimated the
conviction that communism was indeed a threat to Democracy and disguised
communist sentiment as a subordinate to the American way of life. ‘Under God’
created social change that was internalized and may have been a reason for the
McCarthy trials. On this front, the power was, and is, challenged and resisted. The
interpretation of what the pledge has come to represent has changed and the
language has come to mean something other than what it was intended to mean. It
has become a struggle between monotheists and “others”. ‘Under God’ imagery
contradicts the rights guaranteed by the First Amendment. It has become a battle
between God and the godless, as it was meant to during the Cold War, but now it is a
battle that rages on against national unity. Thus Americans are faced with a
dilemma; what is at stake if ‘under God’ is kept or omitted from the Pledge of
Allegiance?
The question diverges into possibilities. The first being that ‘under God’ is
taken out of the Pledge of Allegiance and the second being that ‘under God’ is left in
the Pledge. An understanding of the former is that ‘under God’ violates the First
Amendment, which is mentioned above as the prohibition of the establishment of a
43
national religion, and therefore the phrase ought to be removed. This would give
power to the subordinate atheists, polytheists, and others and legitimate their
beliefs in that they could elicit such social change. The interpretation of the latter is
that the addition supports an ideology, the aims of which were to bring a nation
together against a godless threat. If that ideology should be threatened then the
unity too would be at risk. The interpretation gave immense power to the United
States, motivating a people to believe that they were the representatives of God the
almighty and that it was His will and his guidance that ended the Cold War era, a
sentiment again reminiscent of Uses 2 and 6. The omnipotent God interpretation
also gave power to Christians especially. If the ‘under God’ addition were to be kept,
the Christian majority would maintain hold of the power and of the government.
Thus, the second path offers a possible solution. If the Pledge is examined
today and revised, it can better suit the needs of the current nation and be tailored
to the questions that have been raised over the past sixty years. This option would
mean that the divine is kept in the Pledge but could be invoked in new, and more
specific ways. Assuming that the relationship America has with the divine can be
garnered from the use of under, then revisions may be implemented such that the
Pledge reads as the following:
Use with Use 6:
“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for
which it stands, one nation under God’s rule, indivisible, with liberty and justice for
all.”
Use with Use 9:
44
“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for
which it stands, one nation metaphorically under God, indivisible, with liberty and
justice for all.”
But neither of these two revisions really fixes the current issues seen in the
judicial system. And though these are only two of the ten meanings elicited by
under, if the same explication was down for the other eight, potential controversies
would continue to emerge. As a result, all of the notions of ideology, interpretation,
and power, need to be discussed clearly in the public. The Cold War is over, but the
threat of nuclear holocaust and biological warfare still lingers in the minds of
Americans. And with the attacks of September 11, Americans know all too well that
home soil is no longer safe. As if that was not enough, the media has too often
portrayed Islam in an orientalist way.
The nation is no longer fighting a war against a godless ideology, but rather
the United States is going up against a group with a religious identity. If the current
revision of the Pledge of Allegiance is kept, then we as a nation risk waging a
religious war reminiscent of the crusades where it is my God against your god and
may the best god win. Moreover, aside from the issue of salutation, if we are to
remain a nation that values its diversity and who have, as Thomas Jefferson
suggests, the right to conscience, then how can we as citizens employ this right if we
are limited to a declared allegiance to a particular god? If I am an open atheist, is my
oath invalid? If I am a polytheist, am I to pick just one deity to whom I must pledge
my allegiance? If I am a Jehovah’s Witness, am I to abandon my religious convictions
so that my government can be assured that I am a patriot? And with the current
45
political climate, if I am a Muslim who prays to the same God as a nation the United
States is fighting, am I then claiming through the Pledge that my nation is their
nation, as they are both under that same divine being? Or, if these reasons are not
enough, if I am a Christian, do I really desire others, namely those who do not
believe as I do, to offer the same oath to my God without fully meaning it? This not
only means they are using my God’s name in vain, a clear breaking of one of God’s
commands, but I am openly allowing them to do so, thus becoming an accomplice in
the process.
In light of these conflicts, the reasonable conclusion is to remove ‘under God’
from the Pledge, returning it to a form Red Skelton was more familiar with. This
does not change the personal meaning any reciter may interpret in the Pledge but
rather allows the citizens of this nation to give an oath of allegiance they can stand
behind. Red’s teacher, Mr. Laswell, may still believe that this one nation is “so
blessed by God”, but it is his own personal belief and not the endorsed belief of the
government.
46
Appendix
The Appendix is split into three sections. The first contains the other eight
uses as listed on the WordNet site with discussion and a break down of what each
usage represents. Following are the definitions found in the Oxford English
Dictionary illuminating the time periods that ‘under’ developed and evolved. Finally,
the entry for ‘under’ in the American heritage Dictionary has been included to offer
supporting information for the WordNet uses.
WordNet
Use 1: (Adjective) Under: located below or beneath something else.98
The most common phrase elicited by this use is “underwear”. Relating this
use in some way to the divine, it is interesting, as a thought experiment, to imagine
that the United States of America is an under “part” or “piece” that exists and lies
beneath an outer divine façade. This relationship presents an intriguing and much
more personal and potentially controversial spatial pairing. The U.S. need not be the
underwear, but rather imagine that America is the under structure of a human body,
where Americans control how the body moves, acts, and reacts. The divine would
then be stretched over this corporal figure, in essence moving as a result of
American intervention and not vice versa. Many believe that as a result of their
Christian identity, they make up the body of Christ, but how often is this
represented as the driving force of God and not God as the driving force of
humanity?
Use 2: (Adjective) Under: lower in rank, power, or authority.99
98
“WordNet”.
47
The Pledge, when recited, could allude to the belief that Americans are God’s
right hand; the second to God and the ones who will act for God in God’s absence.
This notion will be raised later, for now though, it is an interesting concept to
contemplate especially in light of Use 1. In the first use, Americans may see
themselves as acting as God beneath a divine veneer. Here, American’s act as God
only insofar as God permits them or when God is away.
Use 3: (Adverb) Under: down to defeat, death, or ruin.100
The statement, ‘the company went under’ typically indicates the failure of a
business. When one says, ‘the nation went under, it can be gathered that the state
has run into hard economic times or it has been captured. By invoking the divine,
this use suggests something similar to Use 6, where there exists some form of divine
authority or divine power that forces humanity, or America, into a state of
subordination. This notion plays into Use 2, where America can be viewed as an
entity of lower rank with less power. America, assuming that it is the country that
has come under God’s control, may have overstepped certain bounds. Or, it may
have been simply that God sought conquest of the United States for no other reason
than to lay claim to the territory.
Use 4: (Adverb) Under: through a range downward.101
One of the many more popular American pastimes that have surfaced over
the years is attending the circus. Circuses are places of amusement for adults and
children alike, but every now and then these caravans of magic and mystery will run
Ibid.
Ibid.
101 Ibid.
99
100
48
specials allowing little ones free admission so long as a parent or guardian
accompanies them. Often the featured advertisement will provide catchy wording in
some artistic font in a myriad of colors and reads “Children six and under will be
admitted free.”102 The advertisers have created a range, six to zero, and have
described it in a way where a bar has been set and only those beneath the six-yearold mark may enter freely. Though this use has a quantitative nature, there is still
some value in using it as a thought experiment.
Imagine that there is a hierarchy of celestial beings in which humanity is
included. It follows that humanity, without omnipotence, would fall below God in
rank, as is suggested in Use 2. Additionally, Use 4 dictates that there is something
that exists in a specific set of data. Specifically, this data is ordered in some manner
of importance where presumably the quantity three is listed before seven in the
given sequence. If the sequence is ordered where higher numbers hold greater
value, then three would be inferred as existing beneath seven as a human would
exist under a god.
Applying this to the aforementioned, humanity ought to be inferred then as
existing under God in a sequencing of celestial beings. The issue here becomes
where exactly on the spectrum of heavenly hosts this “one nation” falls. Is the United
States of America a close second or is it bringing up the rear? Presumably then,
other nations who have some sort of celestial centrality may exist above the United
States and therefore are of a higher rank, power, and authority. To recite the Pledge
of Allegiance in this light seems to go against the American social norm, that is,
102
Ibid.
49
submitting the excellence of other nations above the United States. Additionally, as
this use does not provide a limit, it may suggest that God, the being under whom the
U.S. exists, is not the alpha of celestial beings, a belief that can be traced back to
early Gnosticism.
Use 5: (Adverb) Under: into unconsciousness. 103
Often when patients go into surgery, the doctor of the procedure places them
into a state of unconsciousness, or rather “puts them under”, so that the patient does
not feel the effects during the actual operation. How is this relevant to the ‘under
God’ conversation? It could be that Americans, let alone humans, have been placed
into an altered state such that we are unconscious to the actual world around us,
much like the film The Matrix. Or it could be that I am undergoing a mystical
experience in that I have been rendered unconscious, or have been put under God.
Applying this to the Pledge, it may be that the nation is experiencing a mystical
group event such that all Americans have been put under God and are unaware of
the situations happening across the globe.
Use 7: (Adverb) Under: below some quantity or limit.104
Though similar, there is a significant difference between the use described
here and that of Use 4. This use is meant to define a quantity below a given limit,
whereas Use 4 is merely a quantity below an arbitrary value. Here, there is a ceiling
and the parameters are given. Above, there may be parameters, but they are not
explicitly given. If a person had the opportunity to go to an amusement park as a
103
104
Ibid.
Ibid.
50
child, she would know the dismay caused by signs posted at the beginning of the line
that dictate how tall the rider must be. There are, however, often sections of
amusement parks tailored to smaller children. Often these rides, instead of having
height requirements, post height limits. It may read, “You must be under three feet
tall to ride”.
This is a prime example of a downward range as suggested in Use 4, but
there are precise parameters on just how tall the child can be. Unlike above, where
children over six will obviously still be admitted for a nominal fee, a child over three
feet tall will be barred from taking part in the diversion. Applying this thought to the
Pledge of Allegiance, ‘one nation under God’ sets up a limited, downward range. The
same imagery is created that exists within Use 4, that being that the United States of
America exists below or beneath God, save one exception; that God is the supreme
deity that exists in the universe due to the language of the use.
Use 8: (Adverb) Under: below the horizon.105
The use here is often used to describe an astronomic event in which an
object, discussed with respect to a spatial orientation, crosses an arbitrary point of
reference. It is the only use that names a defined concept as being a point of
reference. The moon fell under the horizon as the sun came up. The sun went under
the horizon, as the boats became silhouettes in the distance. The stars rained down
until they were gradually swept under the horizon. Each example points to an
imaginary line that is created by the the mind, the depth at which the eye can see,
and the location of the observer.
105
Ibid.
51
In relation to religion, ‘one nation under God’ becomes one nation that exists
beneath God in the sense that God is an arbitrary moving point of reference. The
United States could be passing under God’s vigilance day in and day out, used as a
metaphor to illustrate God’s constant presence. Or, a message of hope as even after
dusk, dawn comes, the fact of the matter is that this use, as in Use 1, creates a
physical structure in which God and America exist beyond a social relationship. Use
8 is the first use in a string of three that continues the discussion of Use 1 but from
an alternative part of speech.
Use 10: (Adverb) Under: below, further down.106
Finally, Use 10 comes as the last use in both the series of uses and set of
location-orientated devices. Though the use here illustrates location orientation, it is
quite distinct from the two that precede it. Whereas the others set up positioning
based on a perceived boundary or object, Use 10 is based solely in text. To use this
thesis as an example, the reader would find the history of the Pledge of Allegiance
under, or below the heading of Section I, the uses of all of the various uses of ‘under’
under, or below the heading on the Appendix, and so on and so forth. ‘Under’ is used
as a referential mechanism that aids the reader or researcher in locating data. How
does this relate to the Pledge debate and ultimately to the government and God
dilemma? If the United States is to permit an oath where its citizens express that it is
‘one nation under God’, and the use of Use 10 is elicited, then the citizens, and in the
end the government, is making a declaration that America is synonymous with God
and is actively defining itself as God.
106
Ibid.
52
Oxford English Dictionary
The timeline of ‘under’ as provided by the OED shows when each WordNet
use emerged and how different forms of ‘under’ came into existence.
1. Under, as a preposition, emerged in 825 and was used much like Uses 8 and 9
in that it denoted a spatial positioning in reference to the heavens, a god, or
the stars and sky.107
2. Under, as an adverb, emerged in 900 and continued use of Use 9 but also
began to include Use 10 in that it denoted information below writing108
3. Under, as an adjective, emerged in 1300 and denoted existing on a lower
level both physically and socially and being below a certain amount, as
suggested in Uses 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, and 7.109
4. Under, as a prefix, emerged in 1382 and denoted the use of Use 2 in that
words similar to understudy where now formed.110
5. Under, as a verb, emerged in 1504 and denoted the casting or depress of an
object or person, as elicited in Uses 3 and 6.111
6. Under, as a noun, emerged in 1600 and was used to related a state of
inferiority, as suggesting in Use 6, but also saw the use of underwear as in
Use 1.112
Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2014, http://www.oed.com/.
108 Ibid.
109 Ibid.
110 Ibid.
111 Ibid.
112 Ibid.
107
53
7. Under, as a prefix, evolved in 1876 to incorporate the compounding of more
words, like underground, as can be garnered by Use 9.113
American Heritage Dictionary
Under as a prefix114:
1. Located beneath or below, such as underfoot as in Use 1.
2. Subordinate, such as understudy, as in Use 2.
3. Less in size or quantity, such as undersized115, as a variation of Use 7.
Under as a preposition116:
1. Existing in or shifting to a lower position, as in Uses 1 and 9.
2. Existing below a surface, as in Uses 1, 8, and 9.
3. Beneath guise of, not seen in WordNet.
4. Below a comparable size, as in Use 4.
5. Below needed amount, as in use 7.
6. Of inferior rank, as in Use 6.
7. As a subordinate, as in Use 6.
8. Subject of supervision, as in Use 6.
9. Having or receiving the effects of something, as in Use 5.
10. Experiencing an obligation, as in use 6.
11. Existing within the group, such as Use 10.
12. Being processed, not seen in Wordnet.
Ibid.
American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th ed. (Boston: Houghton
Mifflin, 2014), Ahdictionary.com.
115 Ibid.
116 Ibid.
113
114
54
13. As a result of, unseen in WordNet.
14. With the permission of, as in Use 6.
15. Planted, as in with seed, as in Use 9.
16. Powered or propelled by, as can be interpreted by Use 6.
17. During a temporal period, unseen in WordNet.
Under as an adverb117:
1. In or into a lower physical location, as in Use 9.
2. Covered, as in Use 9
3. Less that required amount, as in Uses 5 and 7.
4. To be rendered unconscious, as in Use 5
5. In or into ruin, as in Use 3.
Under as an adjective118:
1. Located or below or beneath, as in Use 1.
2. Lower in rank, power, and/or authority, as in Use 2.
3. Less than required amount, as in Use 7.
117
118
Ibid.
Ibid.
55
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