These are dark times. American democracy, Americans, America itself, is under threat. Not from a dangerous invader or foreign actors, but from our own duly elected president and his enablers. Our government institutions seem to be failing us, the Democratic party is failing to raise any meaningful opposition, and while blue states are throwing up every roadblock to fascism they can, Republican legislatures and governors seem to have abandoned “states rights” to embrace every aspect of the regime’s evil. Where are we to turn?
To ourselves. And, more specifically, to the promises we have made and oaths we have sworn.
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic, for which it stands, one nation, under God, with liberty and justice for all.
Every one of us has said this promise. Did you mean it? Did you ever think what it means? You have promised allegiance — faithful fellowship — to a flag. To a piece of cloth? That’s silly. But a flag is more than a piece of cloth. It is a symbol and a rallying point. Flags were first used as battlefield signals, so soldiers knew where their leader was and where they should be headed. Pledging allegiance to a flag is not just making a promise to the cloth; it is making a promise to everyone else who has also made that promise. That’s what “allegiance” means: loyalty to a group or cause. What group? The group of all of us who have also made this pledge. This promise means, as the military folks say, “I got your six.” By pledging to a flag, we are showing allegiance not to any one person, but to all Americans.
And to the Republic. Republic. Now, there’s been some nonsense from the right about trying to redefine “republic” to mean something undemocratic. The Soviet Union did that first. All their puppet states in the Cold War called themselves “People’s Republics” or the like. But in the pledge, it means our nation of checks and balances, of federalism, of diversity, with all its challenges and promise.
One nation. As the Pledge was first written, that was “One nation, indivisible.” Later, during the Cold War, Congress stuck “under God” in the middle, creating a grammatically confusing sentence that makes it unclear whether it is the nation or God that is indivisible. But the pledge was published in 1892, during a swelling of patriotism in the wake of the Civil War. The point was to stress that the United States was one indivisible nation — a point we struggle with today as partisanship divides as surely as slavery did in the first century of our national history. But scratch below the surface today, and the hints are there: we have more in common with our internal enemies than we do divides. The man who published the pledge, Francis Bellamy, was a Baptist minister and a socialist. It seems impossible today, as Christians seem to define themselves more by hating socialists than by loving Christ. But this is our heritage: a land where these ideas that divide us today were once unified. They can be again. We must take up the flag and make it so.
With liberty and justice for all. I have taken these words as my personal signature, but the words belong to all of us. They are the heart of the pledge, the “action items” that close the meeting: it is not enough to stand by the flag; rather, we who stand by this flag pledge ourselves to liberty and justice for all. Not for all the ones who speak our language, or look like us, or go to our church. For all. Not just liberty, but liberty and justice. This pledge, written in 1892, is the first understanding that without justice, there is no freedom. That is one of us is enslaved, oppressed, or downtrodden, all of use suffer.
Allow me, then, to share the pledge as it is in my head whenever I recite those words. I hope you can join me in this pledge. I truly believe this promise is the first step to a better nation and a better world.
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