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1 1 (July 20, 2006)

handle is hein.crs/crsahxv0001 and id is 1 raw text is: Order Code RS21250 Updated July 20, 2006 The Constitutionality of Including the Phrase Under God in the Pledge of Allegiance Henry Cohen Legislative Attorney American Law Division Summary On June 26, 2002, a three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit had held that the 1954 federal statute that added the words under God to the Pledge of Allegiance violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. The panel also held that a California school district policy requiring teachers to lead willing school children in reciting the Pledge each school day violates the Establishment Clause. A modification issued on February 28, 2003, eliminated the holding regarding the federal statute but retained the ruling holding that the California statute coerces children into participating in a religious exercise. On June 14, 2004, the Supreme Court reversed the Ninth Circuit's decision, finding that Newdow lacked standing to challenge the school district's policy in federal court. This report summarizes the case and congressional action in response to it (H.R. 2389, which passed the House on July 19, 2006, and S. 1046). Background. On June 22, 1942, Congress codified the Pledge of Allegiance with no reference to God.1 On June 14, 1954, Congress amended the Pledge by adding the words under God.2 Subsequently, California enacted a statute requiring appropriate patriotic exercises to be conducted in every public elementary school each day and providing that recitation of the Pledge would satisfy this requirement.3 After the Elk Grove Unified School District implemented a policy requiring its elementary school classes to recite the Pledge every morning, an atheist father of a second-grade student objected. Although his daughter was not required to participate, he contended that she was compelled to listen to her teacher and classmates recite the under God phrase each 1 See P.L. 623, Ch. 435, § 7, 56 Stat. 380 (1942). 2 See P.L. 396, Ch. 297, 68 Stat. 249 (1954). The Pledge is currently codified as 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. 4 U.S.C. § 4. ' See Cal. Educ. Code § 52720 (1989).

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