High Court to rule on the Pledge

Sometimes its seems "God" is everywhere - with the full sanction of the US government.

The national motto, "In God We Trust," is on every US coin and dollar bill. Thanksgiving has been a national day of thankful prayer since Abraham Lincoln declared it so in 1863. For two centuries, the US Supreme Court has opened its sessions with the same proclamation: "God save the United States and this honorable court." And since 1954, the Pledge of Allegiance to the US flag - the nation's ultimate expression of patriotism - has included the phrase "one nation under God."

But how does one reconcile this seeming ubiquitous government recognition of deity with the constitutional mandate of separation of church and state? That's the question the Supreme Court agreed to answer Tuesday when it took up a potential landmark case to examine the constitutionality of the Pledge of Allegiance.

At issue is a ruling by a federal appeals court panel in California that teacher-led recitation of the phrase "one nation under God" in the Pledge is an unconstitutional attempt by the government to indoctrinate public school children with religious dogma.

"We're headed into a massively controversial case," says the Rev. Barry Lynn of the group Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

Supporters of the Pledge, say that the inclusion of "God" is a permissible public acknowledgement of America's religious heritage, not an attempt by the government to proselytize.

Critics say it is a clear violation of the principle of government neutrality toward all things religious and amounts to discrimination against the nonreligious. "Those who deny the existence of a supreme being have been turned into second-class citizens by a government that continuously sends messages that 'real Americans' believe in God," says Michael Newdow, a California atheist, in a brief to the court urging the removal of "God" from the Pledge.

In a surprise move, Justice Antonin Scalia has recused himself from the case. The move comes after a formal request by Mr. Newdow for him to do so. Newdow said Justice Scalia has made public remarks about the case that raised questions about his impartiality.

The Pledge case is important because it will help establish whether government references to religion and to "God" amount to impermissible entanglement of religion and government. Excessive entanglement would violate the First Amendment's prohibition on government actions that respect "an establishment of religion." The difficulty in this area of First Amendment law, legal analysts say, is determining what is excessive and what is permissible.

In the past, Supreme Court justices have treated ceremonial references to God with a more lenient standard than the strict neutrality applied to school prayer and Ten Commandments cases. But some analysts question the vitality of this reasoning.

Indeed, the Supreme Court has never directly confronted the issue - until now. The case arises from a lawsuit filed by Newdow, father of an elementary school student in Elk Grove, Calif.

Newdow objects to his daughter being subjected to teacher-led recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance every morning under a statewide policy. He argues that the 1954 federal law that added the words "under God" to the Pledge converted it into an impermissible state endorsement of religion.

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