posted on December 8, 2006 09:54:20 PM new
Backstory: Is America pledging less?
By Chris Gaylord, Correspondent of The Christian Science MonitorThu Dec 7, 4:00 AM ET
A familiar "Good morning" rings over the Hansen School loudspeaker, calling the children of Claire Lund's first grade class to their feet. Ms. Lund reminds her pack of 6- and 7-year-olds to place their pint-sized paws over their hearts, face the stars and stripes, and pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America.
It's a slice of Americana: Little kids mangling big words as they're introduced to the patriotic principles of liberty, allegiance, and an indivisible republic.
It's also an American ritual: Every morning, kids from kindergarten to high school recite the 31-word salute.
Or do they?
A generation ago, it was nearly impossible to get through the American public school system without learning the oath - and equally impossible to forget it after so much practice.
Today, though, ask kids if they know the pledge and you're increasingly likely to get a blank stare. Veronica Baccki, a talkative second-grader in a Needham, Mass., public school flies through "of the United States of America" just fine. But then there's a long pause. She stares at the ceiling with her mouth open, then gives an embarrassed smile and covers her eyes, working to summon the next line.
"We learned what the pledge means, but it was a while ago and I forgot," she says, regaining her confidence after finally puttering to the pledge's end. "Some people in my class forget the words too. They look at the signs in the front of the room with words on it. Even some fifth-graders [who lead the rest of the school] will sing it and forget."
But fifth-graders aren't the only big kids scratching their heads. Ask the under-30 crowd to recite the pledge, and you might get an embarrassed petering out at around "... for which it stands."
So is the pledge fading into folklore? Waning like the words of the national anthem?
"Certainly since the Vietnam War, the pledge has decreased in influence and meaning," says Bruce Schulman, a professor of modern American history at Boston University. "A lot of 20- and 30-year-olds can't even recite it now."
There are no numbers to prove the pledge is waning. In fact, since 9/11 more state and town laws actually require students to say the Pledge of Allegiance than ever. But anecdotally, Professor Schulman says he's noticed the pledge's importance diminish over time.
While still pithy and patriotic, "the pledge now takes a compulsory nature and doesn't have as much meaning as it did, maybe, 15 years ago," he says. "[For] those 20-year-olds that do remember the words, I bet it's something like remembering the lyrics to a song that was popular in high school."
Ambushed with a request to recite the pledge, Sarah Garrison, a 22-year-old Los Angeles movie production assistant, breaks into slow, nervous laughter just after " ... and to the Republic."
"I'm kinda surprised at myself," says Ms. Garrison, who attended Texas public schools. "We said the pledge a lot - maybe not every day, but a lot. And yet, now, I'm reaching, but there's nothing there." To her credit, she recalls the entire oath after a few minutes, but her memory still takes a little nudging.
That young adults are struggling to string together the pledge is no surprise to Scot Guenter. Over several years of teaching a course on patriotism at San Jose State University, in California, he's found that his undergraduates have absorbed little about American civil traditions. Few know the words to the national anthem. Even fewer know any other patriotic songs. Almost all of the students said the Pledge of Allegiance in grade school, but he says the number drops off sharply by junior high.
"My suspicion is that the Vietnam War is about when people began questioning rituals like the pledge," says Mr. Guenter. "And as that generation emerged as today's teachers and principals - and parents - they likely brought with them that questioning."
Why recite the pledge? Why every day? Are we proud of America?
At Bainbridge High School, a suburban Seattle public school, these questions go not to the administration, but to students. Social studies classes use the pledge to ask what it means to be an American.
"It generates pretty good discussion," says Bainbridge associate principal Dean Fritts. And while he thinks legislation compelling kids to pledge allegiance is "dumb, bad lawmaking," the pledge offers a shared starting point to discuss patriotism.
"For the most part, I think our students see the pledge as reaching for the American ideal," he says. "There are students who have knee-jerk ... liberal reactions toward it, and there are teachers who I have to talk to because they think those students who refuse to say the pledge are ... disrespecting the beauty of this country."
Debates over the salute, local and national, can be particularly prickly - even winding up before the Supreme Court on several occasions. Serious supporters see it as a sacred tradition - the spoken equivalent of the flag to which they pledge.Extreme opponents call it the indoctrinization of God and country on impressionable youth.
But, these are the fringes. The wane of the pledge from American life is more tied to indifference than passion, says Barbara Truesdell, assistant director of Indiana University's Center for the Study of History and Memory.
"It used to be we'd hear it at town meetings and public gatherings," she says. Now, "it's just not a part of daily life."
The decline is perhaps most apparent in the classroom - particularly blue-state high schools.
"I don't know of any high schools in the area in which the pledge is recited daily. It isn't here," admits a superintendent of a largely liberal suburban Boston school district who asked not to be named because of how contentious the subject can be. "If I insisted on it being recited here - which is not my plan or desire - my career would begin a quick and flaming descent."
But what about the laws in Massachusetts - and more than 40 other states - mandating the pledge?
The actual letter of Bay State law demands students say the pledge every morning. It even imposes a $5 fine on teachers who refuse or forget to lead the students for two weeks. But this law has been unenforced since 1977, the year the current wording was passed, says Kathleen LeBlanc, a legal officer with the state Department of Education. That's because forcing students, or teachers, to say the pledge violates a different American institution: the First Amendment.
Simply put, if students don't want to say the pledge, they don't have to. They can sit quietly at their desks or, in some schools, may continue their conversation over the rest of the class. If a teacher doesn't want to say it, he doesn't have to. A student volunteer can lead the pledge, or the principal can recite it over a loudspeaker.
All that Massachusetts public schools have to provide is the opportunity to say the pledge daily.
How much kids learn about the pledge is all at the discretion of their individual teachers, says Hansen principal Bill Griffin, as he leads a visitor to Ms. Lund's class.
The Canton schools have said the pledge every day "for as long as I can remember," says superintendent Irene Kaplan. She hasn't discussed the pledge with other superintendents. She assumed saying it daily was a given. "It's a tradition. We say it in every grade. We're consistent," she says. "We're patriots."
While Lund's first-graders have been saying the Pledge of Allegiance for two months, she says this fall day is perfect for a visitor because, "just yesterday I went over the meaning of the pledge with the class. Now they know what all the words mean."
Well, maybe not all the words. "Indivisible" takes them a few tries. One boy in an oversized rugby shirt confidently reminds the group it means "freedom." A ponytailed classmate eagerly raises her hand to correct him: "It means you can't be seen."
posted on December 8, 2006 10:30:19 PM new
I always thought that the "Pledge" was the silliest thing!
No matter what words were used...it smacks of ..of...Communism...being forced to recite meaningless babble....all hail the motherland...and click your heels...brown uniforms....
And why school children?
Don't they know they're Americans? Their parents forgot to tell them?
If they say it for five days but don't say it on the 6th and 7th day is their citizenship revoked for those two days?
Are there any adults besides linduh who get up in the morning, face the flag, and recite the "Pledge"?
Does that mean they're not Americans any more? Does it mean they don't have to pay taxes?
I was born American. I don't have to renew my vows...
Maybe kids in school should be LEARNING something instead of memorizing a jumble of words they don't understand, or need to.
posted on December 9, 2006 09:25:49 PM new
I agree, Mingo. It's meaningless babble, and it hasn't been around that long--maybe, what, 50-75 years? Certainly it's not from our forefathers! I don't even like to salute the flag any longer because it smacks of jingoism and reminds me of the Hitler Youth or such. So much of what we do "patriotically" is just rote, and for sure shouldn't be compulsory.
posted on December 10, 2006 06:19:28 AM newHistory: The Pledge of Allegiance
Thursday, June 27, 2002
By Paul Wagenseil
The Pledge of Allegiance was written in 1892 by Francis Bellamy, a Baptist minister in Boston who was prominent in the Christian Socialist movement of the time.
Bellamy was also an official in the National Education Association, the teachers' union, and he created the Pledge as part of a school flag-raising ceremony to mark the 400th anniversary of Columbus' arrival in America.
Bellamy's original words were:
I pledge allegiance to my Flag and the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
He considered adding the word "equality" to stand with "liberty and justice," but he reasoned that the implication of equal rights for women and blacks would be too controversial.
The first draft of the Pledge was published in the Sept. 8, 1892, issue of The Youth's Companion, a popular family magazine. Daniel Ford, the Companion's publisher, had hired Bellamy after Bellamy had been forced from the pulpit for his socialist sermons.
The Pledge was reprinted on leaflets and distributed nationwide, with later versions repeating the preposition "to" before "the Republic."
Twelve million schoolchildren recited it for the first time one month later on Columbus Day, Oct. 12, 1892.
From that point on, the Pledge was used by schoolchildren to salute the flag, though only in an unofficial capacity for several decades.
The original gesture when reciting the Pledge was not the current right hand held over the heart, but the "Roman salute" — a movement of the right hand away from the heart until it pointed away from the body. That fell out of favor when the Fascists in Italy and later the Nazis in Germany adopted the same salute.
In 1924, concerned that immigrants would actually be saluting the flags of their home countries, the American Legion and Daughters of the American Revolution pressured the National Flag Conference to replace the words "my flag" with "the Flag of the United States of America." Bellamy, still alive, was not happy about the change.
The Pledge now read:
I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
In 1942, soon after America entered World War II, Congress officially endorsed the Pledge of Allegiance and instituted the current hand-over-heart gesture. One year later, however, the Supreme Court ruled that schoolchildren could not be forced to recite the Pledge.
In 1954, under pressure from the Knights of Columbus and other religious groups, Congress officially added the words "under God" to the Pledge, so that it currently reads:
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.
Several variations of the Pledge are in use by groups espousing differing social and political principles.
Pro-life activists sometimes add the words "born and unborn" to the end of the sentence, while liberals will often add Bellamy's original "equality."
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Sources: Dr. John W. Baer, The Pledge of Allegiance: A Short History; The American Legion.
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posted on December 10, 2006 01:52:49 PM new
maybe helen could recommend that to all her muslims friends....you know, the ones that don't abide by ANY rules but their own.
Give that info to them helen...before they get a chance to SLIT YOUR THROAT.
"While the democratic party complains about everything THIS President does to protect our Nation": "What would a Democrat president have done at that point?"
"Apparently, the answer is: Sit back and wait for the next terrorist attack."
