Legal News

Pledge of Allegiance, Replete with ?God? Reference, Upheld by 9th Cir.

By Ashby Jones

Darn. The Ninth Circuit on Thursday came a mere one vote away from giving us something to write about for months and months and months.

But alas, the vote came down 2-1 in favor of upholding the reference to God in the Pledge of Allegiance. Click here for the AP story; here for the LAT story; here for the opinion, in all of its 193-page glory (though most of it consists of Judge Stephen Reinhardt’s dissent).

“The Pledge of Allegiance serves to unite our vast nation through the proud recitation of some of the ideals upon which our Republic was founded,” Judge Carlos Bea wrote for the majority. He was joined by judge Dorothy Nelson. Bea noted that schools do not require students to recite the pledge, which was amended to include the words “under God” by a 1954 federal law.

The lawsuit was essentially a reprise of an earlier lawsuit, in which the Ninth Circuit ruled for plaintiff/activist Michael Newdow in finding that the Pledge violated the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause. The U.S. Supreme Court reviewed the lawsuit and reversed it, but on standing grounds.

So Newdow filed an identical challenge on behalf of other parents who objected to the recitation of the pledge at school. In 2005, a federal judge in Sacramento decided in Newdow’s favor, prompting the appeals court to take up the case again.

Newdow, a doctor and attorney who founded a group called the First Atheist Church of True Science, told The Associated Press he would ask the appeals court to rehear the case. If it rejects that request, Newdow said he’ll appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

But whether the Supremes will take it up is another matter. Because it’s the third opinion upholding the pledge, it’s not like the court is facing a circuit split. The law, in other words, is on its way to becoming fairly well settled.

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on March 12, 2010 (boomark / email).