Tuesday, May 5,1964 University Daily Kansan
Court Asked to Ban 'Under God' Pledge
ALBANY, N.Y. — (UPI) — The Court of Appeals, highest legal tribunal in New York state, was asked yesterday to order the phrase "under God" deleted from the pledge to the flag when recited in public schools in the state.
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The suit against the State Education Department was brought by Joseph Lewis, president of the "Freethinkers of America," an organization aimed at maintaining separation of church and state.
Martin Scheiman, counsel for Lewis, said the reference to God was just as much a prayer as the 22-word regents prayer prohibited by the U.S. Supreme Court two years ago.
JOHN JEHU, representing the Education Department, argued that the pledge is an historical matter and that there is no difference between reciting it as part of a history class or using it as a pledge.
Last month, Charles A. Brind, legal counsel to the State Education Department, said pupils in public schools must recite the pledge of allegiance to the flag daily unless they refuse on religious grounds.
At that time, Brind said "the purpose of the pledge and salute is not their repetition by rote. The purpose, of course, is to remind the
pupils of principles on which our nation is founded, symbolized by the flag."
Lewis, a resident of the Westchester County hamlet of Purdy's, was a parent of children attending school when the case first entered the courts seven years ago.
Jehu told the court that what it is being asked to do cannot be done because it stems from an act of Congress which changed the verbage of the original pledge to include the phrase in question which was taken from Lincoln's Gettysburg Address.
HE NOTED that no compulsion was used in either case and that a child may be excused from reciting the pledge.
Chief Judge Charles S. Desmond disagreed, observing that when a child puts up his hand to recite the pledge using the words "under God" he is giving an affirmation of a deity.
Desmond said President Lincoln undoubtedly used the phrase "under God" in his historic address as "an affirmation of a diety."
He told newsmen that if the Court of Appeals rules against him, he will carry the case to the U.S. Supreme Court.
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