The Republican Party should push Congress to rescind the Pledge of Allegiance rather than rabidly support the Pledge. My jumping off point is a historical article I found on the web, excerpted way below.

The Pledge is incompatible with the the GOP’s modern drive to steer us away from Nationalism (”One Nation”) and back to Federalism (a contractual agreement between Sovereign Nation-States).

The Original Pledge was an Act of the National Congress that directly pushed a particular political viewpoint on the people of the Sovereign States. It was amended in 1954 to also push a particular religious viewpoint.

According to the pro-Federalism philosophy of the modern GOP, the GOP should oppose the Pledge as a power grab by Congress in violation of principles of Federalism as well as a violation of the First Amendment.

———————-

A historian has written an interesting essay at LewRockwell.com (Excerpted below) about how the original Pledge of Allegiance (to “One Nation”) was a quite controversial concept. Are we “one nation” or are we a “Federation of Sovereign Nation-States”?

This “Nationalism verses Federalism” debate rages today.

The Republican Party talks of pushing for a return to Federalism, and a weakening of the power of the National Government. The GOP has supported polices that empower the States and reduce the influence of the central government. They have pushed for judges who will be skeptical of the authority of the National Government in conflicts between State and Federal power.

The Democratic Party generally talks less skeptically of the power of the National Government regarding issues of social justice for the masses. The Dems believe the awesome potential of the National Government should be directly mobilized to improve the lot of the masses. (The GOP believes in improving the lot of the massess too, but tends to approach the issue differently and make less use of direct federal action).

Some change has occurred in recent decades. The Federal Government has somethwat less power in some areas due to a lack of discretionary spending money. The Federal Government exercises tremendous power by attaching conditions to discretionary expenditures, so if you reduce the money available to be spent you automatically reduce the influence of the Federal Government. Entitlement programs like Social Security have not been materially reduced or eliminated, etc. But a lot of discretionary revenue sharing has been reduced.

On the other hand, the power of the National Government has greatly expanded in recent decades:

• Crime - The Feds have vastly expanded the types of conduct that triggers the authority of the National Government to investigate and prosecute and incarcerate.
• Intoxicants - The Feds have vastly expanded their police power and investigative authority in order to try to prevent the citizens of the 50 Sovereign Nation-States from altering their mood with natural and artificial substances. Reasonable people can disagree about whether the evils of prohibition outweigh the evils of the intoxicants that are being prohibited. BUT everyone agrees that Prohibition has vastly expanded the power of the Federal Government.
• Security - As technology has improved, and the terrorist threat has increased, the Federal Government has vastly expanded the quality and quantity of monitoring of the communications and activities of the citizens of the 50 Sovereign Nation-States. Our Founders would turn over in their graves if they learned that the Federal Government claimed the authority to inspect our library usage, book purchase records, and listen in to our private conversations.
• War - The National Government has assumed the power to go to war (directly and indirectly) whenever the President wants to, without clear standards on when Actions of War are constitutionally justified. This started in the 1900s, with various inverventions. The US Supreme Court blessed this vastly expansive Presidential power, because the Constitution gives the President unfettered authority to conduct foreign affairs. I hope the Iraq debacle causes us to approve a Constitutional Amendment setting some standards on the President’s discretionary war powers. (The Political Reality is that when a President wants to go to war, his Party supports and justifies his actions — that’s been our pattern. We need a Constitutional Amendment to set War-related standards that rise above politics.)
• More - Let’s stop here, but the National Government has expanded greatly in recent decades, so that we as citizens feel more like “US Citizens” than citizens of our respective 50 Sovereign Nation-States.

———————

Those of us living today are generally comfortable thinking of our homeland as One Nation (the USA), in something like the same manner the French consider France their homeland. We have grown up in the era of expanding power of the National Government.

But the USA was founded as something other than a “One Nation”- type of homeland. “The USA” was not a nation - it was a contract between Sovereign Nation-States, setting down particular rules governing interactions and cooperations between them. We call the contract our “Constitution.”

In the 1800’s, our rag-tag group of contractually-bound nation-states went to war together several times. And in 1860, the nation-states went to war against each other.

In the late 1800’s, the Pledge of Allegiance was passed by Congress. The Pledge celebrates Nationalism (”One Nation”) and not Federalism (Sovereign States in cooperation).

The GOP’s philosophy today is more Federalist than Nationalist, in rhetoric anyway. The Pledge is a very obvious call for Nationalism. To me, there is a disconnect between the GOP’s rhetoric opposing Nationalism and their rabid support of the Pledge.

The Pledge issue revolves about the words “Under God” added to the Pledge in 1954. The GOP should be rabid in the direction of rescinding the Pledge, because the Pledge not only hails Nationalism, it hails a Deity-Based Nationalism (imposing a religious philosophy on the Sovereign States in tension with the First Amendment).

The GOP should be asking: “Where in the Constitution did the Founders give the Congress the authority to declare that the Sovereign States were bound to follow a particular religious or political philosophy?” (Isn’t that just what the Congress did when it passed the Pledge?)

A Federated Republic or One Nation? by Benedict D. LaRosa

The controversy over the words “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance overshadows an old, long-forgotten issue regarding the Pledge.

When it was first published in 1892, the Pledge did not contain the words “under God.” Congress added these words in 1954 as a Cold War response to atheistic communism. Nevertheless, many Americans originally viewed the Pledge with suspicion. Why? Because of the then-foreign concept of pledging allegiance to one nation.

To Americans of the late 19th century, “allegiance” was a feudal concept denoting subservience to a master. Americans considered themselves sovereigns, not subjects. They feared that the natural supremacy of the individual over his government, as reflected by the Declaration of Independence and guaranteed in the constitutions of the United States and of the several states, might eventually be overturned by the ideas expressed in the Pledge. They, unlike so many Americans today, understood that those who exercise the instruments of government – public servants – feel more comfortable ruling than serving.

The Pledge’s words also smacked of nationalism, which Americans of that period considered, well, un-American. Their objection to nationalism seems strange today, but to Americans of 1892 it was a dangerous concept.

…

BONUS LINK: ——- Will the left and right never stop bickering over meaningless political distractions like the Pledge.