The Pledge of Allegiance is once again in the news. David Habecker, a council member in Estes Park, Colorado, has decided not to stand to say the Pledge because he has a problem with the addition of "under God" to the original version. As a result, there is a recall effort under way. Habecker would be on more solid ground if he had refused to say the Pledge because of its socialist origin. Let me explain.
The earliest version of the Pledge of Allegiance was written in August, 1892, by Francis Bellamy, a newspaperman, who wrote for Youth’s Companion magazine. The original Pledge appeared in the September 8th issue of the magazine and was first recited in public at a Columbus Day program on October 12, 1892, the 400th anniversary of Columbus’s discovery of America. To celebrate the anniversary in a big way, Chicago held the World Columbian Exposition. This was before Christopher Columbus became politically incorrect.
Francis Bellamy, the author of the original Pledge was a Baptist minister. He was the first cousin of Edward Bellamy, author of the socialist utopian novels Looking Backward (1888) and Equality (1897). John W. Baer, author of The Pledge of Allegiance: A Centennial History, 1892–1992, writes that "it never would have occurred to Francis Bellamy to put ‘under God’ in the Pledge, at least according to what he had to say at the time." While Bellamy preached sermons on topics such as "Jesus the Socialist" and "The Socialism of the Primitive Church," over which he lost his pulpit at Bethany Baptist Church in Boston, he believed that religion belonged only in the family and church.
Bellamy believed that universal public education was the great equalizer and remedy for national unity. He saw the Pledge, as it was originally conceived, to by a way for immigrants to adopt a new national identity. "Our fathers in their wisdom knew that the foundations of liberty, fraternity, and equality must be universal education," Bellamy wrote in a speech. Consider this frightening manifesto from Bellamy:
The free school, therefore, was conceived as the cornerstone of the Republic. Washington and Jefferson recognized that the education of citizens is not the prerogative of church or of other private interest; that while religious training belongs to the church, and while technical and higher culture may be given by private institutions–the training of citizens in the common knowledge and the common duties of citizenship belongs irrevocably to the State.
Of course, at the time, public schools were generally Protestant, a carry over from the Puritan heritage of the colonies. With the rising tide of immigration, Roman Catholics became a growing segment of the population. If they sent their children to public schools, they would get Protestant indoctrination. I can remember the first time I attended public school after five years of Catholic elementary schooling. Bible reading and prayer were still said in public schools when I entered the 6th grade in 1961. The Lord’s Prayer was said every morning. But to this Catholic boy, the "Our Father" ended in a way different from the way I had learned it. This Protestant line had been added: "For Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen."
In order to counter the Protestantism in the public schools, Catholics built their own parish schools guided by Catholic doctrine. Catholic kids who did not go to Catholic school had to go to catechism classes on Saturday morning. To Bellamy, this was not what America was all about. He wanted a national religion that was civic in nature and socialist in principle.
As we’re beginning to see, the Catholics understood the problem, but as the public schools got more secular, that is, less Protestant, Catholics felt it was safe to send their children to what they believed were religiously neutral schools. Boy, were they wrong!
The biggest problem we face as a nation is not whether "under God" is in the Pledge and said in government schools, but the fact that Christians continue to send their children to government schools in the first place. Christian groups are wrangling over "under God" in the Pledge when God has been persona non grata for decades. It’s my dream that one day public schools will be sold to Christian schools for pennies on the dollar. I hope I live to see it happen.
[1] Quoted in Terry Mattingly, "The Pledge of Conformity" (July 3, 2002). www.tmatt.gospelcom.net/column/2002/07/03/?printable=2
Gary is a graduate of Western Michigan University (1973) and earned his M.Div. at Reformed Theological Seminary in 1979. Author of countless essays, news articles, and more than 27 book titles, he also hosts The Gary DeMar Show, and History Unwrapped—both broadcasted and podcasted. Gary has lived in the Atlanta area since 1979 with his wife, Carol. They have two married sons and are enjoying being grandparents to their grandsons, Calvin and Paul. Gary and Carol are members of Midway Presbyterian Church (PCA). 
American national socialists (including Edward Bellamy), in cooperation with Madame Blavatsky and the Theosophical Society, popularized the use of the Swastika (an ancient symbol) as a modern symbol for socialism long before the symbol was adopted by the National Socialist German Workers Party (Nazis) and used on its flag. http://rexcurry.net/book1a1contents-swastika.html
See also http://rexcurry.net/45th-infantry-division-swasti…
The Bellamys influenced the National Socialist German Workers Party and its dogma, rituals and symbols (e.g. robotic collective chanting to flags; and the modern use of the swastika as crossed S-letters for "Socialism" under German National Socialism). Similar alphabetical symbolism was used under the NSDAP for the "SS" division, the "SA," the "NSV," et cetera and similar symbolism is visible today as the VW logo (the letters "V" and "W" joined for "Volkswagen"). http://rexcurry.net/bookchapter4a1a2a1.html
The Bellamys wanted the government to take over all food, clothing, shelter, goods and services and create an "industrial army" to impose their "military socialism." See the video documentary at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BssWWZ3XEe4
It is the same dogma that led to the socialist Wholecaust (of which the Holocaust was a part): ~60 million killed under the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics; ~50 million under the Peoples' Republic of China; ~20 million under the National Socialist German Workers' Party. http://rexcurry.net/socialists.html
Today, the flag symbolizes authoritarianism in the USA. The historical facts above explain the enormous size and scope of government today, and the USA's police state, and why it is growing so rapidly. They are reasons for minarchy: massive reductions in government, taxation, spending and socialism.
The Pledge of Allegiance was the origin of the Nazi salute (and the swastika -although an ancient symbol- was used to represent crossed S-shapes for "socialism" under the National Socialist German Workers Party).
Francis Bellamy (cousin of author Edward Bellamy) was a socialist in the Nationalism movement and authored the Pledge of Allegiance (1892), the origin of the stiff-armed salute adopted much later by the National Socialist German Workers Party. See the work of the symbologist Dr. Rex Curry. http://rexcurry.net/pledge2.html
See the image at http://rexcurry.net/pledge_of_allegiance.jpg
The early American stiff-armed salute was not an ancient Roman salute. That is a myth debunked by Dr. Curry, who showed that the myth came from the Pledge and from various facts including that Francis Bellamy grew up in Rome, N.Y., not Rome, Italy, and thereafter the Pledge salute was repeated in early films (some showing fictional scenes of ancient Rome). The reasons above and more led to the American stiff-armed salute being picked up later by German socialists and the National Socialist German Workers Party (under the influence of Adolf Hitler and the U.S. citizen and Harvard grad Ernst Hanfstaengl, a confidant of Hitler) and by Italian socialists under Benito Mussolini (who discovered the salute while he gained power as a socialist journalist writing for socialist newspapers, and later became an ally of the National Socialist German Workers Party). http://rexcurry.net/pledgerome.html
Francis Bellamy never used the term "Roman salute" when describing his pledge's salute and he was not influenced by Jacques-Louis David's painting "Oath of the Horatii." One reason why Francis Bellamy never used the term "Roman salute" in any way is because the concept of the "Roman salute" did not exist when Bellamy wrote his pledge and for decades thereafter. http://rexcurry.net/roman-salute-oxford-english-d…
Francis Bellamy clearly explained that his pledge began with a military salute that was then extended out toward the flag. In practice, the second gesture was performed palm-down with a stiff-arm when the military salute was merely pointed out at the flag by disinterested children forced to do Bellamy's programmed chanting daily in government schools. That is how the straight-arm salute developed from Francis Bellamy's Pledge of Allegiance and its use of the military salute (and how the USA's Pledge salute led to the Nazi salute). http://rexcurry.net/pledge_military.html
That the concept of the "Roman salute" did not exist when Bellamy wrote his pledge (and for decades thereafter) also means that the concept of the "Roman salute" did not even exist when Jacques-Louis David lived and painted "Oath of the Horatii" and thus David was thinking of a real or imagined "Roman salute" when he painted the Horatii, nor did David ever use the term "Roman salute." The Horatii lie (that the painting was the origin of the "Roman salute" myth) first appeared on Wikipedia, deliberately fabricated by a liar to cover-up Dr. Curry's discovery that the Pledge was the origin of the Nazi salute. In the painting, 3 brothers are reaching for weapons (and the two figures in back are reaching with their left hands). The same liar who created the Horatii lie had, until he was debunked, previously claimed that the stiff-armed salute was an actual ancient Roman salute, and he posted the lie that Roman statues displaying "adlocutio" (a gesture made by a person speaking) showed "ancient Roman salutes." The newly substituted Horatii lie has been mindlessly repeated by many people (as the adlocutio lie was repeated and still is) because wakipedia glorifies itself as an encyclopedia, even though it is merely an anonymous bulletin board where anyone can post anything. http://rexcurry.net/pledge_of_allegiance_videos_i…