“In God We Trust” did not appear on any coin until 1864. It wasn’t used on all coins until Roosevelt’s presidency, it wasn’t mandated by legislation on all coins until 1955, nor made the official motto of the United States until 1956. Likewise, the Pledge of Allegiance wasn’t even written until 1892, and the words “Under God” weren’t added until 1954. So enough of this nonsensical revisionism that the Founding Fathers were all devoted Christians and founded this country as a Christian nation – those who utter such nonsense are bearing false witness. Even were that not the case, the difference between their faith and today’s “American Christian” is this: they were unwilling to cheapen God’s name by printing it on something so base as money or by using it in political slogans & statements.
…I would suggest that such practices as the designation of “In God We Trust” as our national motto, or the references to God contained in the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag can best be understood, in Dean Rostow’s apt phrase, as a form a “ceremonial deism,” protected from Establishment Clause scrutiny chiefly because they have lost through rote repetition any significant religious content.
From Justice Brennan’s dissenting opinion in Lynch v. Donnelly, 465 U.S. 668 (1984)
Rather superb entry, definitely useful stuff. Never ever considered I’d find the facts I need right here. I have been looking everywhere in the internet for some time now and had been starting to get discouraged. Fortunately, I happened across your blog and received precisely what I was searching for.